Copenhagen criteria
From Open Encyclopedia
The Copenhagen criteria are the rules that define whether a nation is eligible to join the European Union. The criteria require that a state have the institutions to preserve democratic governance and human rights, a functioning market economy, and that the state accept the obligations and intent of the EU. These membership criteria were laid down at the June 1993 European Council in Copenhagen, Denmark, from which they take their name.
Excerpt from the Copenhagen Presidency conclusions:
- "Membership requires that the candidate country has achieved stability of institutions guaranteeing democracy, the rule of law, human rights and respect for and, protection of minorities, the existence of a functioning market economy as well as the capacity to cope with competitive pressure and market forces within the Union. Membership presupposes the candidate's ability to take on the obligations of membership including adherence to the aims of political, economic and monetary union."
Most of these elements have been clarified over the last decade by legislation of the European Council, the European Commission and the European Parliament, as well as by the jurisprudence of the European Court of Justice and the European Court of Human Rights. However, there are sometimes slightly conflicting interpretations in current member states — some examples of this are given below.
During the negotiations with each candidate country, progress towards meeting the Copenhagen criteria is regularly monitored. On the basis of this, decisions are made as to whether and when a particular country should join, or what actions need to be taken before joining is possible.
The European Union Membership criteria are defined by the three documents:
- The 1992 Treaty of Maastricht (Article 49) — geographical criteria and general policy criteria
- The declaration of the June 1993 European Council in Copenhagen, i.e. Copenhagen criteria — describing the general policy in more details
- Framework for negotiations with a particular candidate state
- specific and detailed conditions
- statement stressing that the new member can not take its place in the Union until it is considered that the EU itself has enough "absorption capacity" for this to happen.
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Geographic criteria
Neither the EU nor the candidate countries have the power to change geographical reality, so compliance with the first set of conditions, the geographical ones, is usually determined much earlier in the enlargement process - at the beginning, when adopting the first opinion of the application of a particular country. Later negotiations do not then need to address this issue.
The 1992 Treaty of Maastricht (Article 49) stated that any European country that respects the principles of the EU may apply to join. No mention is made of enlarging the EU to include non-European countries, but precedents of turning down Morocco's application and speaking about Israel's closest integration as being "just short of full membership" suggest that for non-European states it is not possible to attain EU membership. However, various definitions of Europe exist so whether a country is "European" is "subject to political assessment"[1] by the Commission and more importantly - the Council. The internal reasons for classification are thought to be similar (but not identical) to those of the Council of Europe. There has been some debate about this in the case of Cyprus - the island is geographicaly Asian; but extensive historical, cultural, and political ties to other European countries lead most to consider it as a European country.
There has been some controversy about whether Turkey is a European country, on the basis that only 3% of its territory lies in Europe. The real question, however, was whether a country with more than 90% Muslim population can follow European (i.e. Christian) ways. In the end, those considerations were overwhelmed by Turkey's strategic importance and the EU formally started accession negotiations with Ankara in 2005.
Although "non-European" states are not considered eligible to be members, they may have some degree of loose integration with the EU, set out by international agreements. Current frameworks within which such agreements can be developed are the Barcelona process and the European Neighbourhood Policy. Image:Europe political map.png
Political criteria
Democracy
Functional democratic governance requires that all citizens of the country should be able to participate, on an equal basis, in the political decision making at every single governing level, from local municipalities up to the highest, national, level. This also requires free elections with a secret ballot, the right to establish political parties without any hindrance from the state; fair and equal access to a free press; free trade union organisations; executive powers restricted by laws and allowing free access to judges independent of the executive.
Rule of Law
The rule of law implies that government authority may only be exercised in accordance with written laws, which were adopted through an established procedure. The principle is intended to be a safeguard against arbitrary rulings in individual cases.
In order to satisfy this set of requirements, several of the Central European states that recently joined the EU had to drastically improve their judicial procedures, make them more transparent, introduce accessible procedures for appeal and take measures against certain Communist party nominees in judicial ranks.
Human Rights
Human rights are those rights which every person holds because of his quality as a human being; human rights are "inalienable" and belonging to all humans. If a right is inalienable, that means it cannot be bestowed, granted, limited, bartered away, or sold away (e.g., one cannot sell oneself into slavery). These include the right to life, the right to be prosecuted only according to the laws that are in existence at the time of the offence, the right to be free from slavery, and the right to be free from torture.
The United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights is considered the most authoritative formulation of human rights, and is more stringent than the very similar European Convention on Human Rights. The requirement to fall in line with this formulation forced several nations that recently joined the EU to implement major improvements in their legislation, public services and judiciary. Many of the changes involved the treatment of ethnic and religious minorities, or removal of disparities of treatment between different political factions.
Respect for and protection of minorities
Members of such national minorities should be able to maintain their distinctive culture and practices, including their language (as far as not contrary to the human rights of other people, nor to democratic procedures and rule of law), without suffering any discrimination (see also the 'Convention for the Protection of National Minorities', COE, 1995).
The convention from the Council of Europe on this issue was a major breakthrough in this field. However the area was so sensitive that the convention did not yet include a clear definition of such minorities. As a result, many of the signatory states added official clarifications to their signature on which minorities in their country were involved. Some examples follow. Declarations made with respect to treaty No. 157. Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities include:
- in Denmark: the 'German minority in South Jutland';
- in Germany: 'Danes of German citizenship and the members of the Sorbian (Lusatia Sorbs) people with German citizenship....the ethnic groups traditionally resident in Germany, the Frisians of German citizenship and the Sinti and Roma of German citizenship';
- in Slovenia: 'Italian and Hungarian National Minorities'.
Many other signatories simply stated that they do not have any national minorities as so defined.
A consensus was reached (among other legal experts, the so-called groups of Venice) that this convention refers to any ethnic, linguistic or religious people that defines itself as a distinctive group, that forms the historic population or a significant historic and current minority in a well-defined area, and that maintains stable and friendly relations with the state in which it lives. Some experts and countries wanted to go further. Nevertheless, recent minorities, such as immigrant populations, have nowhere been listed by signatory countries as minorities concerned by this convention.
Economic criteria
The economic criteria, broadly speaking, require that candidate countries have a functioning market economy and that their companies have the capability to cope with competitive pressure and market forces within the Union. This is a requirement.
Legislative alignment
Finally, and technically outside the Copenhagen criteria, comes the further requirement that all prospective members must enact legislation in order to bring their laws into line with the body of European law built up over the history of the Union, known as the acquis communautaire. In preparing for each admission, the acquis is divided into separate chapters, each dealing with different policy areas. For the process of the fifth enlargement that will conclude with the admission of Bulgaria and Romania (expected in 2007) there were 31 chapters. For the talks with Croatia and Turkey the acquis has been split further into 35 chapters.
Absorption capacity of the EU
The EU leaders declare at multiple occasions that for a new member state to join the Union there are two general requirements: the state to comply with EU rules and the EU to have enough "absorption capacity" to welcome the new member.
External link
de:Kopenhagener Kriterien nl:Criteria van Kopenhagen pl:Kryteria kopenhaskie
