Berlin Declaration (50 Years of the Treaty of Rome)

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The Berlin Zeughaus on the day the Berlin Declaration was signed

The Berlin Declaration is a document formulated by the German EU Council Presidency , which was ceremoniously signed on March 25, 2007 on the occasion of the fiftieth anniversary of the conclusion of the Treaty of Rome at an informal summit of the 27 heads of state and government in the Berlin arsenal . According to the European Council, the legally non-binding declaration of intent should have an orientation effect within the population of the European Union with regard to the values, tasks and structure of the union of states .

content

Installation ideas for Europe in front of the Federal Chancellery on the occasion of the anniversary

The document, which was seen as a symbolic and normative sketch of the future political agenda of the German Council Presidency, initially contains an evaluation of European policy over the past 50 years in four sections.

The first section summarizes the achievements of European integration since the signing of the Treaty of Rome establishing the European Economic Community and the European Atomic Energy Community .

Subsequently, the importance of a European community of values ​​is underlined and thus the need to put the European Union on a constitutional basis until the 2009 European elections . The text speaks of a “common basis” , avoiding the concept of a constitution, the mention of which was viewed critically by France and the Netherlands in particular because of the failed constitutional referendums there.

Fundamental political challenges for the European Union such as environmental and climate protection as well as international terrorism are also named. At the request of Spain , shortly before the signing of the declaration, the fight against illegal immigration was included in the text as a further domestic political goal.

Basic criticism

In the run-up to its publication, the announcement met with criticism from, among others, the opposition groups in the German Bundestag . Several MPs criticized the non-transparent formation of will and decision-making on which the document was based and described the Federal Government's approach as “secret diplomacy”, which would not be conducive to the following, necessarily transparent and citizen-friendly constitutional process.

Pope Benedict XVI expressed his regret at a European bishops' conference about the missing reference to God in the declaration on the grounds that Christianity is an essential element for the formation of a European identity.

Overall, little attention is paid to the Berlin Declaration; it evidently only served a short-term purpose to keep the reform efforts in the European Union open.

The federal European Union of Germany described them as "excellent for illustrating European identity ".

literature

  • Ansbert Baumann: A way out of the constitutional crisis. The Berlin Declaration of March 25, 2007. In: Documents. Journal for the German-French dialogue. Issue 2, 2008, pp. 23-28.

See also

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Basis instead of constitution: "Berlin Declaration" . n-tv.de. March 23, 2007. Retrieved June 3, 2012.
  2. Europa-Union, February 23, 2008: Publish the consolidated version of the EU treaties .