<TITLE: Politics Seminar 1
ACADEMIC DOMAIN: social sciences
DISCIPLINE: political science
EVENT TYPE: seminar presentation
FILE ID: USEMP01C
NOTES: continuation of and continued in USEMD01A, seminar also includes presentations USEMP01A-B

RECORDING DURATION: 18 min 26 sec

RECORDING DATE: 27.11.2001

NUMBER OF PARTICIPANTS: 11

NUMBER OF SPEAKERS: 2

S1: NATIVE-SPEAKER STATUS: Finnish; ACADEMIC ROLE: senior staff; GENDER: male; AGE: 51-over

S9: NATIVE-SPEAKER STATUS: Chinese; ACADEMIC ROLE: undergraduate; GENDER: male; AGE: 17-23>


<S9> hello everybody er i will analyse the current EU er enlargement of EU furthermore i will analyse the relationship between EU and russia in the future and as my interest i would like to introduce one imagination among china russia and EU in the future and er in 1995 austria and finland and sweden have become full members of EU so that now there are 15 members in EU and er actually the current current EU is not european union we can say it's western european union and er when we treat the EU organisation like a ship we must acknowledge the relevant responsibilities of each of several er member countries there is the responsibilities of like the hel- helmsmen seamen or the first mate the second mate and so on and now there are three main powers in EU that is UK germany and france , and er germany er there , there was one argument about german europe and european germany on the eve of consolidation of germany and er german europe means er germany will be the leading power of the whole europe and anything were will be decided by germany and er european germany means that germany was er dissolved in in the affairs of EU and and er germany was er will be doing anything in the framework , under the framework of EU and i think european germany this point is more peaceful practical acceptable and understandable and er when we look back to the consolidation of germany we can s- we can understand that germany the whole germany is a kind of threat to the to others in the europe because western germany has the like high technology and er high industrialisation and eastern europe has the cheap labour powers and rich natural resources and i think the the whole GDP amount from (internet) is bigger than some of UK and france together and now now for all the process of integration EU integration i think germany is performing the policy of european germany they er germany wants to be like dissolved inside the europe and france france is the initiative country of paris agreement in 1951 and er and i think the er compromises and conflicts always exist in the development of the EU and er the compromises and the cooperations between UK france and germany was is the main motivator to the EU's development and france france is a france tried tried to avoid a new super power in europe since germany consolidated and er in under the framework of EU er the equality of france is the most important mission of french policy they france wan- wants to er keep in any field france wants to keep er equal to german position , and UK , for UK it's more <SIC> complexed </SIC> situation because er they there on one hand there is a atlantic relation which means UK and america they have a like traditional and special relations with each other and on the other hand UK don't want itself to be er separated from the continent the europe continent and er we can s- see from er from 1950 to 1960 er under the two main engines of france and germany the european union was developing very greatly so UK realised that it should not be separated from the continent therefore UK proposed to join EC two times in august 1961 and may 1967 but its willingness was objected by french president at that time charles de gaulle because de gaulle said UK's having special economic and political relationship with the USA and each stands on a preferable business position to other english economies so we eat really want to buy more expensive french foods instead of new zealand beef ireland potato canadian wheat and australian vegetables so in one word to UK we can say er the UK tries to keep some kind of balance between er USA and and er continent europe so er s- the strong influential UK will be held in respect by USA and the UK which is winning american respect will play more influential role in EU i think it's the most policy to the UK politician and the one er furthermore we should take care of other members' opinion about the EU the first the nordic countries such as denmark sweden and finland they all argue that they should be in the core in the core of powers in the future EU although they are all such smaller countries than france UK and germany they all want to keep their own national culture and stay as independent characteristics and they also think that EU should not demolish all different european national interests and smaller countries should not be treated as some kind of attachment to bigger powers to super powers and er furthermore there is the (point) that developments and cooperations of all european countries in the field of environmental protection human rights democratic issue social employment security stable economic growth social justice and so on and one one more point is the common people of nordic countries mostly worry about the situation that their nordic welfare system would be demolished or shocked by european common social policies , and er then germany germany proposed the federalisation of EU and they er germany wants to er EU to be like federation er to be the similar political system with german system , so er germany anyway is trying to become the most powerful engine and the leader of the EU and france france also proposed a similar er plan like federation of EU but the most important is france wants to be er keeping equal to german position in any field and like er agricultural policies or some er security , or and so on and er france france er think that it should not it should has his own position in EU and french powers should not be weakened , and UK UK just refused to form EU like federation and the UK argues that the EU should be an entity in which each sovereign state makes cooperations with each other and keeps their own independencies and er i think the most essence of this argument is UK don't want to contribute its own sovereignty to the central european union in some field and er it's yeah and the some geographic separation also also made this kind of argument in a common people's mind and er common english people they they thought that they were like britain or english they were not europeans so and italy italy holds some er compromised (draft) which stands between the german (draft) and the french (draft) italy stresses that the EU should be built to be one federation with several national interests which is also called the european national federation and er now i'd like to talk about the enlargement of EU and er the enlargement is the fifth er stage in the EU's history and the the first enlargement happened in 1973 when denmark ireland and UK joined EU and now i i'd like to talk some s- er questions several problems during in the process of enlargement the first one is the enlargement is it to the east east or central europe or to the southern europe , and er when we talk about er enlargement to the central and eastern europe it's this kind of plan is lead by germany because germany has it's er like historic influence or former influence on in central europe and eastern europe so er and also germany has its er biggest export market in c- in er of central and eastern europe so er france feel that it's er france was was er how to say er separated from this kind of plan because of the strategic position and cultural relations so france and italy they proposed the enlargement to the southern europe , and er , so we we can say that enlargement if the enlargement to the central europe or to the southern europe is a kind of balance between france and germany and the second one is cultural and the religious factors as i show here is er i'm not sure you here the <NAME> the the book it said the er catholic area and eastern of the blocks area the line between them is er from the finland the boundary between finland and russia then to er estonia latvia lithuania then across the belarus and then to the west of ukraine then along with the boundary between er romania slovenia and bosnia , so you can see the east side and west side and er i think in the during the enlargement of EU er the cultural relativeness and attractiveness play very important role and the current EU i got some information from the internet they announced that the EU first should absolve the central europe europeanist countries in order to make an essential cultural ligament going through london paris rome munchen warsaw budapest and prague and er in some case the excep- exception of the western christian religion like catholic area not including the orthodox and islamism has become a precondition for accepting new countries into the EU one more point is if we look look at the turkey er turkey proposed to join the EU like in a ten years before 20 years but now now turkey is not still in er accepted by EU i think personally because turkey is a islam country then it has no similar cultures relations with the common european countries and then i'd like the next point is is the enlargement of EU the er how i say the target of the enlargement is to establish the great europe or some western europe because if we talk about the europe it is including russia ukraine </S9>
<S1> five minutes </S1>
<S9> belarus romania and so on so er yeah and next point is the the qualitative social and structural challenge to the current EU and now the nearly over ten countries er proposing to join the EU and the EU's current framework of like a structure or an framework was not suitable for the current situation because the basic structure of the EU was established to fulfil that the bound of those six countries in the late 50s and it's not suitable now so there must be some er reconstruction of the EU's ba- framework and political system , and though if we talk about the russ- the relationship between russia and EU the beautiful the most beautiful picture in the future is the combination of russian military force and european er er western european's economic factors but from from now on i think there are many problems to fulfil this kind of picture , and and i think in the in the future EU er during the process of EU integration the different nations' own interests should not be redundantly emphasised and the common european's interests may replace the nati- national interest and in terms of national interest we may emphasise that the equality of each national interest should be interpreted as the equality of each european citizen's interest which means each nation's individual gets the equal rights to participate the whole europe's construction and social administration and the citizens' interest should be above the nation's interest , and then i will show you the last one as my interest i propose this plan in the 1990 china established one railway we called the new europe asian er bridge is similar with the silk road in ancient times and is from the (xx) the eastern china and across the west of china then across russia and to the EU and this kind of bridge i think it's contributing to the future cooperation among russia china and EU because russia is also in some in some case is also a distant countries or asian countries because its most part is ins- inside asia so , and now i i will give you the the final points and now as the peace and development are the biggest subject in the modern world the european awareness about unification and the situation in the europe will be relatively stable and developed well instead of the threat of warfares and the problems related to russia is anyway unavoidable and necessary to solve so the current EU should face many questions such as how to deal with the relationship with the USA how to involve russia in the whole europe how to solve the problems resulting in the enlargement of the EU and so on , and er we must believe that there will be a perfect end only if EU and russia are al- altruistic and contributing to the mutual economic and political development and the NATO a external factor should not stop the procedure of european integration </S9>
