Deepening in Europe
Description of Deepening
The Concise Encyclopedia of the European Union describes deepening in the following terms: [1] Increasing the degree of integration between the EU’s member states. Sometimes contrasted with ‘widening’, or enlarging the number of members, on the theory that the two aims may be incompatible (see more in this European encyclopedia). The basis for this presumption is that new members, especially from Eastern Europe, are unlikely to be able to comply with the acquis communautaire, for example to meet the criteria for adopting the single currency: thus their accession would undermine the integration process and contribute to a ‘two-speed Europe’.
The opposite theory, orthodox in Community circles, is that deepening is a necessary pre-condition of widening. Decision-making in the EU is already cumbersome and would be paralysed with the addition of new member states, each having powers to block legislation or joint action. Hence (so the argument runs) the need to accelerate integration by substantially removing the national right of veto before the new countries are admitted. (See also Variable geometry.)
Resources
Notas y References
- Based on the book “A Concise Encyclopedia of the European Union from Aachen to Zollverein”, by Rodney Leach (Profile Books; London)