So the European 'Constitution' has been knocked back by two of it's founding members, "The French slapped the left cheek of Europe, the Dutch have now slapped the right," plunging Brussels into chaos and the future of Europe into confusion. Those looking to the future and hoping for Europe to be a more 'approachable' super-power holding the US and China in sway may be disappointed at this apparent arrow through the heel of its progress, but I feel inclined to disagree.
It's interesting to note that of the countries who had already ratified the 'constitution' (I keep doing that because it wasn't really a constitution, more of a collection of treaties to be ratified, apparently unreadable) didn't do so through referendums but through parliamentary debates, which brings me to this statement, "The EU has to face the problem of the mismatch between the views of the people and the views of the politicians." Naturally a problem which I think places other than the EU suffer from.
There's a theory that researchers and academics should be forced to teach, with the idea of keeping their feet on the ground, so that they remain connected with not only the practical elements of their field but also with reality. Perhaps the European Parliament should look at something similar, with 25 separate member states, that's a lot of different types of toes to step on.
It's not as depressing as all that, really, I think it's fantastic that the people of France and the Netherlands gave their governments a kick up the behind and said, 'get your feet back on the ground, Europe's important, but you forget that we are Europe,' or something like that. For starters, they could "go back to the drawing board with the aim of producing a much more understandable and accessible text." which would be a good start, and maybe listening to their constituencies would be another.
