euro|topics - Nicolas Sarkozy's European plans

Main focus of Tuesday, May 8, 2007

Nicolas Sarkozy's European plans

As soon as he was elected on Sunday, May 6th, the future French president Nicolas Sarkozy committed himself to placing Europe at the top of his list of priorities. The press wonders if France's European policy will change when he comes to power.

Cinco Días - Spain

The Spanish academic Sebastian Royo considers that Nicolas Sarkozy's ideas represent a rupture on both a national and a European level. "He has committed himself to burying the European Constitution that was refused by voters [in 2005] and to negotiating a mini-treaty that would then have to be ratified by the French Parliament. His programme and ideology is coherent with other European leaders in favour of economic liberalism (particularly Angela Merkel, José Manuel Barroso and Tony Blair/Gordon Brown). This will allow him to form a strategic relationship and create an axis of reforms and modernisation within the EU concentrating on getting results rather than on pursuing EU accession. However, his Gaullist defence of French interests, along with his criticism of the European Central Bank and his defence of national champions will lead him into conflict with Brussels and other Member States." (08/05/2007)

Der Standard - Austria

Dominique Moïsi, currently teaching at the College of Europe in Natolin near Warsaw, comments: "The election of Sarkozy is no bad thing for Europe. The problems of the European Union won't be solved merely because France has a new president. But Sarkozy's vision of a simplified constitutional contract to replace the one that the French and Dutch rejected in 2005 is more realistic than Royal's call for a new referendum. A few years ago, Sarkozy hinted at the possibility that a Club of Six should take over leadership of Europe. But Poland has cut itself off from from the circle of politically relevant countries, and the leaders of Italy and Spain made no secret of their support for Royal. In Britain, the ardent Euro-sceptic Gordon Brown is about to replace Tony Blair. So the French-German alliance will once again take the lead, even if only by default." (08/05/2007)

Le Monde - France

"Mr. Sarkozy's talk concerning the European Community along with his talk on outsourcing and against the ECB means that we may rightly fear French isolationism", worries Arnaud Leparmentier, chief editor of the Europe and France section of the daily. "As for the creation of a fortified European stronghold, this is an anachronistic idea in a world where China and India are emerging. ... Europe can move away from a certain internationalist naivety by seeking foremost to defend its legitimate interests. Some paths are worth exploring: the taxation of imports from countries that don't respect Kyoto protocol; the introduction, like in Germany, of a social VAT that imposes a social security contribution on imports; a firmer management of the euro facing the dollar. For this, however, Sarkozy needs to convince his partners that he is not motivated by nationalist interests." (08/05/2007)

The Independent - United Kingdom

Mary Dejevsky considers that Sarkozy will not live up to Westminster's hopes that he "would take a more 'British' view of the EU, as a grouping of states in which national sovereignty nonetheless trumps everything. ... He supports a 'mini' version of the constitutional treaty (about which the British, unlike the Germans, are ambivalent) and he opposes membership for Turkey. In fact, beyond climate change and, probably, defence, it is hard to see how Sarkozy's arrival at the Elysée will make Britain look less like the EU's odd man out. ... Sarkozy stressed that he wanted France to be more open to the world. But he coupled this with a promise of more curbs on immigration and an acceptance that French (and European) workers feared unfair competition. If they had misgivings about the EU, he said, it was because they saw it as a 'Trojan horse' for globalisation. This is not at all how the EU, or globalisation, are regarded by the British Government, which castigates the former for its rigidity and hails the latter as the future." (08/05/2007)

» To the complete press review of Tuesday, May 8, 2007

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