Network vs Block

8/13/2019 Network vs Block

1/5

Network vs Block

Block

Strength in numbersUnited voice resonates more

Standardised social, economic and military ethics. Prevents country vs country direct disputesOverarching authority on disputes, EU courts

etc.

Network

Sanctity of Individual identity and sovereignty

Soviet bloc a failure, so would a Capitolist block be any different?

Personal actions can be taken without being constrained by consent of overarching power

A bloc would impact international relations with non-bloc countries, such as the US

Facts

European court of Auditors refuse to approve EU budget

120 billion euros just vanished

Britains contribution 12 billion Enough to scrap:

o Inheritance tax

o Stamp Duty

o Capital gains tax

Join or Not?

Join:

European nations need strong united voice to compete with other powers

Banks only in London due to EU membership

Freedom of trade and movement at a greater extent

Not

Individual responsibility and allegiances

Independent currency allows independent economic controls

Who rules? One country will always have more power than the rest?


2/5

Core findings:

o Brits call for a major revision of the UKs relationship with Europe

o Eurozone and Britain heading in two starkly different directions - majority of people in

France, Germany and Italy want more integrationand even in some cases a fully

federalised United States of Europeo The dynamics of German public opinion threaten a break-up of the Eurozone, with

significant opposition to a greater crisis-fighting role for Germany and the ECB

Brits call for a major revision of the UKs relationship with Europeo 60% of Brits want a national referendum to decide on Britains relationship with the EU (versus

19% who dont)

o 60% want a looser relationship with the EU or to leave altogether, and to opt out of EU-wide

policies enforced from Brussels (versus 27% who want continued full membership or closer

union)

o Only 14% want more integration with Europe and a further 13% want to keep things as they are

with Britain as a full EU member

A majority of Brits want national control of almost all policy-areas including crime and justice (85%), laws on trade

unions/strikes (80%), immigration (79%), agriculture (74%), financial regulation (68%), rights for workers (66%)

and trade links with other countries (60%).

Findings show that Deputy PM Nick Clegg is out of step with a significant majority of his own party:

o Half of Lib Dem voters want a looser relationship with the EU or outright withdrawal.

o National versus European control shares similar support, for most major policy areas, among Lib

Dem voters including immigration (70% of Lib Dems), trade links with other countries (51% of Lib

Dems), rights for workers, (50% of Lib Dems), crime and justice (81% of Lib Dems), agriculture

(77% of Lib Dems) and laws on trade unions and strikes (74% of Lib Dems).

Labour and Lib Dem voters unite on attitudes to regulation and economic recovery:

o Majorities of both Labour (57%) and Lib Dem (66%) voters support an EU-wide tax on profits

made by banks, compared with only 39% of Conservatives who support it.

o UK voters in general show less support for an EU-wide tax on financial trading, but the public is

still divided on this issue between a plurality of Labour (35%) and Lib Dem (39%) voters who

support it, versus a plurality of Conservatives (41%) who oppose it

Changes to the Eurozone

Britain and the big Eurozone economies are moving in two starkly different directions. While Brits want less

integration, a significant number of people in France, Germany and Italy want more integration and even a fully

federalised United States of Europe:

o Europeans call for a US-style democratically elected EU President (61% of Italians support

versus 15% who oppose/ 41% of Germans support versus 28% who oppose/ 46% of French

support versus 23% who oppose).


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o and a single EU military that decides when European nations go to war (55% of Italians

support versus 18% who oppose/ 41% of Germans support versus 28% who oppose/ 43% of

French support versus 30% who oppose).

o 63% of Italians, nearly 40% of French and over 1/3 of Germans support turning the EU into a

fully integrated United States of Europe.

o Majorities of French, Germans and Italians want continued full EU membership or more

Integration. (47% of French/ 62% of Germans/ 61% of Italians).

The dynamics of German public opinion could lead to a break-up of the Eurozone, with significant opposition to a

greater crisis-fighting role for Germany and the ECB:

o 51% of Germans say the main priority for the economy should be to curb inflation with less

government spending.

o Only 17% of Germans support the idea of Eurobonds, compared with 53% of Italians and 1/3 of

French.

o More than half of Germans think its wrong to spend taxpayers money to try and save theEurozone.

o Where 65% of Italians and 60% of French support lower interest rates for the EU as a whole,

only 40% of Germans support.

o Where 63% of Italians and 51% of French support making it easier for EU countries to borrow

from the ECB, only 30% of Germans support.

Britains relations with the EU

Dr Joel Faulkner Rogers, Director of YouGov-Cambridge says, Public opinion in the UK calls for a major revision

of Britains relationship with the EU, with significant majorities who want a looser relationship with the EU, where

almost all areas of policy are controlled by London, not Brussels.

These attitudes span the political divide, and challenge the current narrative advanced by the Liberal Democrat

side of the coalition government, seeking to maintain current levels of integration with the EU or to expand them.

European trends for integration

Dr Joel Faulkner Rogers, Director of YouGov-Cambridge says, In other words, a majority of voters in the

Eurozones big 3 want more integration and even some elements of a fully federalised United States of Europe.

They also support Brussels having control of key-policy areas, and many of these voters see central EU

government as the best framework for crisis-management and responding to continent-wide problems.

However, it should be noted that the desire for more integration and federal union in the Eurozone has its limits.

No European country has a majority of people who are willing to cede national control in three key areas of power

and statecraft, namely: national budgets, crime & justice, and the basic means of national production, in

agriculture and industry.

German public opinion


4/5

Dr Joel Faulkner Rogers, Director of YouGov-Cambridge says, German public opinion presents a major obstacle

to alternative paths for weaker Eurozone countries between default and exit from the Eurozone or heavy austerity

and likely continued stagnation inside it. A shift towards greater ECB activism would evidently require leadership

from Germany as Europes largest economy and its most powerful creditor.

As it currently stands, German opinion looks unlikely ever to support the expansion of backstop and bail-out roles

for the European taxpayer, or the likely higher doses of European inflation that would come from policies

designed to relieve the adjustment-pressure on peripheral debtors l ike Greece, such as greater monetary easing,

allowing the ECB to become European lender-of-last-resort, a Euro-depreciation to support current-account

deficits, the collectivisation of European debt or fiscal redistribution to weaker regions.

In other words, a majority of Germans say to Greece and other peripheral debtors: exit the Eurozone or enter a

generation of heavy austerity.

UK Germany France Italy

Relat ionship with the EU? % % % %

SURVEY COUNTRY staying as a full EU member and

working for a more integrated Europe than now

14 40 31 44

SURVEY COUNTRY staying as a full EU member but using

the power of veto to block any moves towards a more

integrated Europe than

13 22 16 17

TOTAL SAME OR MORE INTEGRATION 27 62 47 61

SURVEY COUNTRY having a looser arrangement with the

EU, based on maintaining trade and cooperation on some

common policies, but opting out of EU-wide policies

enforced by a European government in Brussels

40 16 22 26


5/5

SURVEY COUNTRY withdrawing from the EU altogether 20 8 13 8

TOTAL LOOSER RELA TIONSHIP 60 24 35 34

Dont know 11 9 13 3

Documents

Network vs Block