The EUROPEAN UNION
It is an economic and political union set up in Europe consisting of 28 countries.
The root of the this union is the European Economic Community (EEC) set up on March 25th, 1957 by six member states: Belgium, Germany, France, Italy, Luxembourg and the Netherlands.
The treaty underlaying the EEC is the Treaty on setting up the European Economic Community, which became effective on January 1st, 1958.
In time, the EEC changed over into the European Union, with this move being possible due to the changes ocurred from a simple economic union to an economic and political union with particular implications on the cultural, social, health, education, transport fields.
The EU’s slogan is “Unity in diversity.”
Therefore, such terms as multiculturality and multiculturalism emerged in this union’s policies.
It means an assembly of various cultures, ways of thinking, education levels, of various religions and, most of all, an assembly of different identities, which, by mutual transformation, adaptation and understanding, should only achieve its purpose normally and logically concerning the general consensus, freedom, equity, peace and security of all EU’s citizens, regardless of their race, religion, sex or national identity.
These differences and interferences of various identities should not have but contribute to building a territory whose values should enable the peace, protection and security for all its citizens, that should lead to the European Union’s progress and development at all levels.
Along the way, some European states have been accepted to join the EU and one could notice that some member states found hard to accept, assimilate and integrated the new EU citizens in their lives. Some of these citizens left their countries and headed to other areas where they hoped to find a better living.
Some obtained it.
Some succeeded, others failed.
Some had a civilised behaviour and integrated in the community of that foster country.
Others didn’t. As a matter of fact, their goal was different, they didn’t have an eye to integrate themselves and to contribute to the new country’s evolution.
In time, some people from the media and from the political stage found it appropriate to voice their opinions regarding the quality of the new member states’ citizens and these opinions did nothing but cause a split and confusion within the Union, while creating a categorisation of these people as second or third-rank citizens by allowing this discrimination process.
Thus, an interesting fact was exposed, that in some ways, methods and principles elaborated, implemented and approached by the European leaders are not quite realist and proper to lead to the goal that will guarantee freedom and security for the human being at all levels.
It would be more than necessary that in those moments or at least soon after that, the persons taking care of the union’s fate to notice, to understand and to act accordingly, as the new aspects of the citizens’ free movement inside the European Union have reshaped the Union and, as such, its policies should have also been reshaped in terms of the new events, relations, changes ocurred in the picture of the Community’s new identity and enlarged entity.
Many times, Europe proved not to be ready to manage the circulation of its own citizens within its borders and now it is presumably ready to manage a larger flow of the people coming from Northern Africa, Middle East, Near of Far East and who are pushed towards Europe on grounds of war, poverty, starvation and other reasons and who are forcing and successfully breaking Europe’s gates.
I believe it’s even harder now to obtain this balance, this normality state and complete peace, this feeling that all EU citizens are longing for.
At the same time, one can notice that, more than never, the outcome of the cultural, educational and social policies adopted and implemented righ now at the EU and country level are outdated and maybe sometimes idealist.
The question is how we came to this outcome.
It’s simple: the white collar workers in Brussels and Luxembourg, as well as the white collar workers in every country, did their jobs in a wrong way. They forgot why they were appointed in those positions in the first place. They forgot that the mission of a leader isn’t to take care of his own interests, or of the group or party’s interests. They are named to represent citizens, the people who set great store by a better, safer, more beautiful and prosperous life on Europe’s territory and not elsewhere.
Maybe the reader might wonder why I approached the topic of Europe and the EU so much, while the title is referring to Constantinople, the capital of the Byzantine Empire, of the Easter Roman Empire and of the Roman Empire at some point.
Many personalities have studied the Byzantium historically.
Depending on the age, be it the Renaissance or the Enlightenment, the Byzantine world was depicted in many ways and from a lot of angles, in a pleasant or less pleasant manner.
I would like to close the article by recalling one of Montesquieu’s quotation, where he reminded us of the Byzantine Empire under the rule of the last Paleologi family when it was threatened by the Turks, as « a small river running into the sea. »
I hope Europe won’t end up as a small river running into the sea.