The EU as a whole is confronted with the consequences of its ageing population and demographic decline in the long term, while individual member states are confronted with the consequences of the most severe financial and economic crisis in 80 years, as well as with increasing competition, notably from the US. The huge debt levels of member states (88 % of the European GDP in 2010, and exceeding 100% within 10 years), must also not be forgotten, nor the reactions they generate – a lack of trust from investors and lenders. The impact of demographic change is especially notable in the fields of health services and pensions, and also raises the question of our attitude towards immigration.
For Alternative Libérale, solutions must be sought for new approaches in the fields of health care, insurance and pension scheme systems as well as for a liberating approach to work through the adoption of a renewed model of education and in the definition of targeted and accepted immigration.
Alternative Libérale’s approach for this new governance
Analysing the present situation leads us back to the liberal origins of the EU, created thanks to the pragmatic approach of Jean Monnet and his three famous counterparts, who wished to bring stability, peace and prosperity to the European continent.
But in a dramatic drift, member states have all more or less adopted collectivist doctrines and for 60 years have undertaken a race for all-out intervention bringing the result we now witness. In doing so, fearless of accumulating budgetary deficits, they placed themselves under the control of creditors; the measures of last resort that have needed to be taken with regard to Greece, leading to ‘a rescue by the cavalry’, characteristic of bad managers.
Public opinion starts to question this kind of governance. One must go beyond the recognition of the detrimental effects of these over-developed states, and come back to the sources of the conception of liberalism.
It is obvious that the advent of a governance based on the principles mentioned above calls into question the suitability of the present and ill-adapted institutions to address the coming and present challenges. This is why Alternative Libérale recommends the adoption of a new European Constitution establishing that:
- Europe must be the warrant of individual freedoms. It must define what a central or local power cannot take away from its citizens and go back to the spirit of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights;
- It must limit the powers of the state and local government and preserve the sovereignty of the individual confronted by all forms of coercion;
- Europe must be able to call to order nations that place citizens under financial trusteeship: and to put a ceiling on the total compulsory direct and indirect taxes that can be legitimately imposed on an individual.
This definition of the role of Europe can only be formalised by way of a Constitution initiated by the people of Europe, it must be simple, clear and concise, and start by: “We, people of Europe, meeting in a Constituent Assembly … “