Nouvelle Europe dossier - Europe et régionalisme

MARS, 2018

VOL. 5

Nouvelle Europe dossier

Europe et régionalisme

THIS ISSUE INCLUDES:

Introduction par Pauline Maufrais

The three-seas-initiative.

European regionalism of supranational nature

by Francis Masson

A new Korean village next to Moscow

by Svetlana Kim

La régionalisation balte et la transition européenne par Pauline Maufrais

The Catholic origins of the EU’s principle of subsidiarity

by Andreas Pacher

The Regional Operational Centre: a transnational entity at the service of the security of supply

by Guillaume Gonzalez

South Tyrol: a model for autonomous regions?

by Balázs Gyimesi

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Nouvelle Europe is a think tank based in France, with members all around the world.

Nouvelle Europe focuses on comparative research and publishing on modern tendencies in the EU and its neighbourhood, as well as conducting forums and simulation seminars in close partnership with institutions such as the European Commission, aimed at education and networking.

Contacts: Balรกzs Gyimesi, President - balazs.gyimesi@nouvelle-europe.eu Inga Chelyadina, Treasurer - inga.chelyadina@nouvelle-europe.eu Andreas Pacher, Editor-in-Chief - andreas.pacher@nouvelle-europe.eu Philippe Perchoc, Founder - philippe.perchoc@nouvelle-europe.eu The present dossier was organised by Pauline Maufrais.

Cover: Francisco Iturrino, Manolas, 1908-1909

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Sommaire

Introduction Europe et régionalisme par Pauline Maufrais ...................................................................................................... 5 The three-seas-initiative. European regionalism of supranational nature

by Francis Masson. ......................................................................................................... 9 A new Korean village next to Moscow

by Svetlana Kim. ........................................................................................................... 19 La régionalisation balte et la transition européenne par Pauline Maufrais .................................................................................................... 23 The Catholic origins of the EU’s principle of subsidiarity

by Andreas Pacher ........................................................................................................ 31 The Regional Operational Centre: a transnational entity at the service of the security of supply

by Guillaume Gonzalez ................................................................................................. 35 South Tyrol: a model for autonomous regions?

by Balázs Gyimesi ......................................................................................................... 39 Bibliographie................................................................................................................. 43

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Introduction Régionalisme

« Tendance d’un écrivain à décrire dans une œuvre littéraire les mœurs, paysages, particularités d’une région déterminée. » Dans l’histoire de l’art, le régionalisme correspond à un mouvement artistique de l’entre-deux-guerres aux Etats-Unis. Des artistes à l’instar de Thomas Cole, Grand Wood souhaitent peindre la réalité, les campagnes américaines du Sud, les oubliés et les méconnus. Ils figurent une réalité rurale face à une urbanisation croissante, la lenteur en opposition à la mouvance.

Pourtant, ce courant n’a pas atteint le continent européen. La représentation du régionalisme en peinture serait davantage l’illustration de territoires ayant une singularité culturelle. Par exemple, Francisco Iturrino est un peintre né à Bilbao, ville de la communauté basque du nord de l’Espagne. Proche du fauvisme espagnol, son œuvre Manolas conforte, dès le premier regard, la représentation de l’imaginaire populaire sur la culture basque. Les touches de couleurs, les vêtements drapés, la coiffure et la proximité des femmes basques espagnoles sont une ode au nord de l’Espagne.

« Tendance à conserver ou à cultiver les traits originaux d’une région, d’une province. » « Doctrine socio-politique apparue au XIXe siècle posant pour principe l’existence au sein de l’Etat de communautés culturelles, sociologiques, économiques correspondant aux régions et réclamant la reconnaissance politique de cette réalité. » Le régionalisme basque, catalan, corse, breton, écossais parcourt les actualités.

Ces régions prônent leur singularité culturelle, linguistique, historique qui les distinguent de l’Etat dont elles sont membres. Si les discours régionalistes n’ont que peu de résonnances en Bretagne, les récents évènements en Catalogne en 2017 et la percée régionaliste corse indique la sensibilité de ce sujet. Pour les régionalistes actifs, l’état peut être considéré comme un organe oppresseur par sa volonté d’uniformiser le territoire. Il applique des politiques ne prenant pas en compte les spécificités locales.

Ces discours vont au-delà d’une simple opposition au centralisme et à la décentralisation à partir du moment où les groupes régionalistes veulent tout simplement quitter l’Etat et devenir indépendants. Le discours des régionalistes affirme un « eux » contre un « nous ». Par ailleurs, les écossais et les Catalans passent par des référendums. L’aspect juridique et politique détermine plus généralement le régionalisme contemporain, dépourvu d’affrontements armés ?

Le régionalisme est prégnant en Europe centrale et orientale, dû aux multiples fluctuations de frontières au XIXe et XXe siècle. Actuellement, certaines régions de l’Italie parlent allemand, des régions ukrainiennes, estoniennes parlent russe, et la Catalogne en Espagne se distingue par sa non-utilisation de l’espagnol. Cela conduit à des revendications particulières vis-à-vis du pouvoir central et à un questionnement autour même de la question du nationalisme et de la nation. La nation est-elle une 5

construction entre de multiples identités souhaitant participer à un projet commun, comme la définition française portée par Ernest Renan ? Ou faut-il prendre une vision allemande portée par Herder, c’est-à-dire une nation construite sur une uniformisation de sa population par rapport aux populations d’origines ? L’utilisation d’une ou de l’autre définition du nationalisme conduit à une attitude différente vis-à-vis des revendications régionalistes et minoritaires.

Le régionalisme reste une construction sociale et politique. Alors que certaines populations sont ancrées sur un territoire et promeuvent un régionalisme, d’autres sont éparpillées mais ont tout de même une histoire, une langue et une culture commune à l’image des Koryo-saram en ex-Union soviétique. La restauration d’un régionalisme passe-t-il alors nécessairement par un ancrage territorial ?

« Collaboration internationale existant entre des Etats qui forment des organisations, accords et traités en fonction de leurs intérêts communs. » Le régionalisme entre un territoire et le gouvernement central n’est toutefois pas le seul exemple de régionalisme. La richesse de ce terme s’applique à de multiples cas.

Pendant les années 1980 une vision du monde portée sur la mondialisation s’est développée sous l’égide des Etats-Unis, grands vainqueurs de la guerre froide en 1991 avec la chute de l’Union soviétique. Les institutions internationales, dont l’ONU ou le FMI, furent les promotrices de politiques mondiales visant à protéger les acquis démocratiques tout en ayant une économie globale et libérale. Dans le même temps, des groupements régionaux d’Etats permettaient une application de ces politiques, et à ces mêmes d’Etats d’avoir plus de poids. L’ASEAN, le MERCOSUR, l’UE étaient des acteurs majeurs des politiques et regroupaient des identités multiples au sein d’une même institution. Au niveau économique, un rapprochement entre les Etats frontaliers, des unions ou allègements des taxes douanières permettaient d’accroître les échanges commerciaux et de bénéficier d’économies d’échelles.

Au niveau politique, les unions intégrées dont l’exemple le plus poussé est l’Union européenne ont encouragé des Etats à aligner leur politique dans une perspective de prospérité. Le supranational européen s’est instauré au niveau législatif et économique. Cela conduit actuellement à une défiance de plusieurs Etats européens et à une montée de partis politiques appelant à une renationalisation et à un retour au souverainisme politique et économique. Le régionalisme politique européen permet à des projets de grande ampleur de se créer à l’instar d’une action conjointe dans la protection de l’environnement et la lutte contre la pollution, de projets maritimes communs, ou dans le développement énergétique.

L’Union européenne promeut l’Europe des régions, notamment depuis le Traité de Maastricht en 1992. Les spécificités territoriales doivent conduire à une application différenciée de la politique européenne selon les besoins. Les fonds européens mettent en avant les valeurs et les projets régionaux. L’institutionnalisation du Comité des régions en 1992 permet aux régions de faire remonter des revendications particulières.

Elle réutilise des notions catholiques.

De nouveaux régionalismes se créent dans le même temps au sein même de cette union régionalisée qu’est l’Union européenne. Le groupe de Višegrad composé de la 6

Hongrie, la République Tchèque, la Slovaquie et la Pologne s’unit afin de peser dans les débats européens et de faire valoir leurs propres intérêts, notamment dans la crise migratoire européenne. En effet, ils ne souhaitent pas participer à la politique de quotas d’accueil des demandeurs d’asile. Un rapprochement entre Etats s’observe aussi dans la région Balte afin de lier des pays plus petits afin de peser face à la France et à l’Allemagne dans les décisions.

La notion « régionalisme » a ainsi plusieurs définitions et applications au niveau européen. Ce nouveau dossier de Nouvelle Europe permet d’en avoir un aperçu qui, loin d’être exhaustif, appelle à de nouvelles réflexions sur ce sujet.

Premièrement, Francis Masson relate le projet « Three-seas initiative » en Europe. Le régionalisme n’est pas uniquement une lutte pour l’indépendance mais également une union entre plusieurs Etats pour porter des projets et des valeurs communes.

Svetlana Kim illustre les liens entre communauté et ancrage territorial concernant les Koryo-saram en Russie. Une régionalisation passe-t-elle nécessairement par l’apanage d’un territoire ?

Pauline Maufrais étudie le régionalisme dans les Etats Baltes depuis la chute de l’Union soviétique en 1991. Le régionalisme entre plusieurs Etats permet de peser davantage au sein des institutions internationales.

Andreas Patcher analyse les liens entre le principe européen de “subsidiarité” permettant un développement et une application de l’action politique par l’entité la plus compétente, et l’église catholique. Si ce principe trouve son origine dans la religion catholique, son application diffère au sein de l’UE. Guillaume Gonzalez reprend un projet proposé par la Commission européenne sur le développement de « Centres opérationnels régionaux » pour sécuriser l’approvisionnement en électricité au niveau européen et une régionalisation de ce domaine. Toutefois, un débat émerge sur ce sujet qui reste une prérogative nationale.

Balazs Gyimesi retrace l’histoire de la région du Tyrol du Sud actuellement en Italie. Cette région où la population parle majoritairement allemand montre les conséquences des fluctuations des frontières en Europe. L’auteur s’interroge sur les conséquences d’une autonomisation de cette région.

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Summary Regionalism presents different definitions depending on the countries and cultures. It can be a construction of a reality, old or new and, most of all, local or international. Simply, it is a local identity in a territory. It involves a particular culture or language in a region (Britany, Corsica) where people promote it and also defend it.

Besides, it can represent an alliance between countries to develop a different politic or economy framework, such as the Visegrad group in Europe (Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary) or the European projects concerning electricity security.

Promoting by the European Union, regionalism is also a mean for local communities to defend themselves against the central government.

This dossier tries to analyse various visions of regionalism in our societies and continent.

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The three-seas-initiative. European regionalism of supranational nature.

FRANCIS MASSON Regionalism is not always the desire for greater independence. At the supranational level inside the European Union, it is about finding partners that share common interests or face similar challenges. While a multispeed European is now finally in the pipe, some regional groups of interest have become topics for heated discussions.

Since their arrival to power in October 2015, Polish leading politicians have been tirelessly trying to build close collaborations with their neighbours. By doing so, they want to counterbalance the “old Europe’s” influence in Brussels (loosely speaking, “old Europe” refers to the pre-2004 EU-members minus Great Britain). Since 2015, the “Three Seas Initiative” has been a topic for discussion and has gained an international visibility with Donald Trump’ visit in Warsaw in July 2017.

Comments on this project of regional cooperation are often misleading because the Three Seas Initiative is usually described in the light of what is perceived as its ideological roots: Intermarium, a project of regional integration of Central Eastern Europe dating from the interwar period. I was myself misled in my article from last August for Nouvelle Europe (in French). The confusion with the Intermarium project has many reasons, but can be understood from the perspective of an external observer as the results of the multi-layered Polish foreign policy since 2015 (a search for various alliances at regional, European and international levels). Let us first clarify what we are talking about before trying to understand the stakes underlying this project.

Three Seas Initiative: a limited framework for regional cooperation?

Shortly speaking, the Three Seas Initiative is a project of regional cooperation between twelve countries located between the Baltic, Adriatic and Black seas (see the picture below by the Polish Institute of International Affairs). The cooperation is not unconditional and all-encompassing. On the contrary, it is focussed on economic matters, notably on energy, transportation and digital communication. It was officially launched by the 2016 Declaration of Dubrovnik (Croatia).

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Back then, the Croatian president Kolinda Grabar Kitarovic assured that the cooperation “would benefit not only these twelve EU country members but the whole European Union”. The whole region, which suffers from structural weakness in terms of economic development, will need 50 billion Euros of investment to develop in the coming year. The declaration of 2016 is a political framework based on which concrete projects will be designed to help Central and Eastern European countries catch up on their European partners. Still, the cooperation is informal, based only on a “declaration” which means that it is not legally binding for the signatory parties.

The Three Seas Initiative is not Intermarium, don’t get confused!

The term Intermarium refers to a geopolitical concept developed by interwar polish leader Józef Piłsudski. After the division of the Russian empire in the wake of the First World War (1919), Poland, Ukraine, Lithuania and Belarus were newly formed independent nation-based states. Piłsudski believed that an alliance of those four states in a federative body would safeguard their respective sovereignties. The concept was extended to Hungary, Italy, Yugoslavia and Romania in the later 1930’s by the Polish minister for foreign affairs Józef Beck. For both Piłsudski and Beck, the federal entity would be located at the core of the 16th- and 17th-century Europe political entity of Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and would be marked by a Polish leadership.

The scope of the Intermarium varied depending on the time and place of its formulation, sometimes stretching from the Scandinavian countries up to the Balkans.

The concept survived in the Polish and Central Eastern European political thinking during the communist time thanks to elites in exile. At the same time, the keyword Intermarium remained censored in Central and Eastern Europe during the post-war era. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the concept did not rise up because the geopolitical offer toward which the region strived was the EU and NATO integration.

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Intermarium

today:

a

rather

pessimist

view

of

European

integration?

Still, since the new millennium and the turnaround of Russian foreign policy toward the EU, the Intermarium concept regained visibility in the Polish foreign policy narrative and was clearly promoted by Lech Kaczynski, Poland’s President from 20052010. This was visible in its attempt to diversify energy suppliers as part of his energy security strategy that aimed at cooperating with Azeri producers and later with Kazakh energy elites. After the former President’s death in the Smolensk plane crash, Intermarium faded away from Polish presidential foreign policy. Since then, Intermarium was more a slogan for right-wing politicians, presented as a better alternative than European integration to contain the “Russian threat”.

But in November 2015, the Polish President Andrzej Duda (member of the PiS party ruled by Jarosław Kaczynski) referred indirectly to it during a visit in Bucharest. He expressed his will to pursue the plan drafted by President Kaczynski. He wants to expand NATO bases in Central and Eastern Europe and hoped to see the countries of this region speak with one voice. Krzysztof Szczerski, chief of Cabinet of the Polish president and advisor for international affairs, also put the two concepts in direct connection on his book The European Utopia published last year. Nowadays, as explained by Ostap Kushnir, the term Intermanirum is loosely used in the public debate to describe “any interstate formation which has a hypothetic chance to emerge in the space between Baltic and black see”. This is one of the reasons for the “geopolitical confusion” between Trimanirum and Intermarium.

Other reasons come from the fact that existing cooperation in the regions echoes parts of the Intermarium project of Piłsudski. A Lithuanian–Polish–Ukrainian Brigade was created for peacekeeping in 2009 by a trilateral agreement and eventually formed in 2014 (it has not yet been deployed). Para-militarists groups in Ukraine and in Poland seem to consider the creation of this brigade as the premise of the realisation of the historical project of Intermarium as a replacement of a failed European Union unable to prevent the downfall of a European continent assaulted by Russia and “Islamizing” forces. For those groups: “The future of European nations lies in Intermarium as a geopolitical alternative!”

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Snapshoot of a video circulating on the Ukrainian YouTube praising the completion of the Intermarium project. A promotor of the project in Poland in the online-portal http://jagiellonia.org Moreover, a forum of former presidents of Poland, Ukraine, Moldova and the Baltic States, held in Kaunas (Lithuanian) on March 9-10 2017, revealed the common mistrust regarding NATO in the light of the common security interest of Eastern European State. Vytautas Landsbergis, first leader of independent Lithuania said that “The revanchism of the old Russian empire is insurmountable�, while former Polish President Lech Walesa spoke of the need for the integration of Intermarium countries.

To sum up, Intermarium is an historical project of regional integration, while the Three Seas Initiative is a project of regional cooperation. The geopolitical confusion between Trimarium and Intermarium lies in the fact that the same question is raised by both projects: Is Poland looking to become the leader of the region and where lie its own national interests in this proposal? Or as many commentaries already put it, is the Three Seas Initiative part of an Intermarium that does not yet say its name?

Three Seas Initiative: a Polish geopolitical move recalling the interwar claims to lead Central and Eastern Europe?

According to official documents, the Three Seas Initiative aims at increasing Central European cooperation in the fields of energy security, infrastructural development, communication and transportation. The regions and the whole continent need more North-South connection to achieve the completion of the internal market that had been so far connecting the continent along an East-West axe.

However, the Polish conciliating narrative on the project, having in background opened anti-German and anti-EU rhetoric, failed to convince Czech and Slovak policymakers. The tone of Polish national politics explains why international commentators accuse the Three Seas Initiative to be a step toward more Central Eastern European leadership claims.

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The Warsaw summit of July 2017 was the second meeting comprising the Heads of States of the Three Seas Initiative. It was highly mediatized because it took place in the background of the visit of the Donald Trump in Poland. The president of the USA was invited to join the leaders, which has been perceived by many western commentators as an expression of privileged relation between Warsaw and Washington. All this had in background the Brexit-negotiations and the revival of the Franco-German tandem planning further steps of European integration.

Many speculations have been formulated on the Polish intensions behind this framework for regional cooperation. The lack of consistency of observers has played a role in the conceptual chaos we mentioned above. However, the cooperation must also be assessed in the light of its concrete implementation. Is the Three Seas Initiative delivering anything concrete?

The meaning of the Three Seas Initiative for the region: possibilities and limits Online, it is easier to find editorialist papers arguing on the revival of the historical Polish Intermarium geopolitical agenda. It is more difficult, however, to identify the deliverables of the initiative. However, one must acknowledge that the cooperation is still young and that it takes time to deliver, even more so when the main purpose of a project is to trigger the development of common infrastructures. Indeed, infrastructures (in communication, transport or energy) are so called “capital intensive” goods. It requires a long decision-making process and implementation periods before a road, a bridge, or a high-voltage line or a pipeline is build. Don’t expect them to bloom within couples of years. What can Three Seas Initiative means for its members, and what difficulties it will surely encounter?

The Foundation Institute for Eastern Studies, known for organizing the yearly Economic Forum in Krynica, organized a round of conferences in 2017 entitled "Adriatic – Baltic – Black Sea. Visions of Cooperation”. In Tallin, Robert Filipczak, Polish Ambassador to Estonia, said the Trimarium is meant to “boost the economy and support the EU”. Przemysław Żurawski Vel Grajewski, the then Adviser to the Polish Minister of Foreign Affairs, added that the main aim is to build some tangible infrastructures. For example, Estonians political interests lie in digitisation and cyber security, but at the same time, they are working very hard now on connecting the Baltic states to the rest of Europe, notably to move the energy security of three states away from Russia and towards the EU. When it comes to security, official assure that the cooperation in the framework of this initiative is solely about energy security and digital security, not about military security.

So what is delivered? One key word comes out of the talks between experts and stake-holders: Via Carpathia. The Latin expression refers to a flagship infrastructure project intended to link the Central and Eastern European countries on the North South axes. Via Carpathia is meant to become a transnational highway linking Klaipėda in Lithuania with Thessaloniki in Greece (see map below). The project is in the pipes since the 2006 Declaration of Łańcuc. Since then, the project is still in a conceptual phase, while the number of participating states has steadily increased.

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Trimarium is hence logically the ideal framework to welcome its realization that is planned until 2050.

Source: Polish Ministry of Infrastructure and Construction

Interconnection is a real need for the region. This has been one structural weakness of the regions that has been addressed for years by the European regional funds (see for examples the EU Strategy for the Baltic Sea Region and the EU Strategy for the Danube Region). However, the use made of these funds failed to deliver the expected outcomes. Structural weaknesses are very visible in the energy security of the region. Almost all participating countries are heavily dependent on Russian natural gas and oil. Still, solidarity of supply between the countries is not possible because their national networks are not interconnected. Therefore, the most important challenge of the Three Sea Initiative should be to create a regional energy network allowing to diversity energy suppliers to the region (following the logic of the synchronisation of the three Baltic States' electricity grid with the continental European network).

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Learning

from

previous

failed

schemes

of

intra-European

cooperation There have been many regional groups, oriented around more or less narrow interests within the EU and with a more or less integrated structure of cooperation, an old example being the Benelux, originally an economic union in the post-war time.

Other keywords in the regions are the groupings of GUAM (Georgia, Ukraine, Azerbaijan, Moldova), the BSEC (Organisation of Black Sea Economic Cooperation) and the Visegrad Group.

The Visegrad group (V4) gathered since 1991 four Central Eastern European countries: Poland, Czechia, Slovakia and Hungary. They chose to cooperate around their EU and NATO integration projects as well as their shared development challenges in transforming their post-communist economies. It is notable that the V4 delivered in the culture and youth exchanges, notably via co-funded projects. However, it failed to integrate the economies of the four countries to make them less unilaterally interdependent form the Germany market. Moreover, no political unity exists among the countries in Brussels. The V4 countries align unregularly and incompletely on each single dossier. For example, none of the country supported Poland in voting out Donald Tusk as president of the European Council in March 2017. Not even Viktor Orbán, in opposition to what he had announced.

The Weimar Triangle (France, Germany, and Poland) is also often tagged as a failed cooperation scheme. It managed to deliver its first objectives: facilitate GermanPolish reconciliation and the integration of Poland in the transatlantic structures. But since 2004, it failed masterfully to be a new motor for the deepening of EU integration or even to be a platform for the three countries to consult each other’s in a constructive way to facilitated negotiations in the European Council. This trilateral cooperation framework is so loose that it has proven unable to survive the burst of national politics of its members. In light with the mitigated results of the Visegrad group and the Weimar Triangle, what hopes do we have for the Trimarium, an opened cooperation framework between twelve countries that shall not compete with the EU’s doing?

The failure of previous intra-European cooperation frameworks to deliver long term results stems, in my view, from the lack of concretely defined quantifiable deliverables.

Without undermining the actors’ contributions to the long term understanding of their respective societies, cooperation such as the Weimar Triangle and the Visegrad groups are nowadays tagged as inefficient because the expectations linked to those regional groups were disproportionate to the tools they were provided with. At least, the Three Seas Initiative is clearly defined as a tool to foster the Nord-South interconnection of Central Eastern Europe. It has a sectorial limitation. To be efficient, it requires tangible tools such as a budget and dedicated manpower within ministries to ensure a coordination of the cooperation. We shall see what the next meeting of Trimarium in Romania will deliver. Eventually, the effort Polish leaders will invest in making this initiative work on the long term will tell us more about the geopolitical rational behind it.

This leads us to the following consideration: Even at a supranational level, are those regional cooperation schemes not also the expression of a fight for more independence 15

from a centralized authority? In the answer to this question lies the red line between complementarity and competition with Brussels. Increased independence does not erase the interdependence of living on a shared territory. Hence, intra-European cooperation mechanisms need to be complementary to the Union (in complete line with the logic of subsidiarity) in order to be meaningful at all. To be viable, initiatives such as the Three Seas Initiative should represent a complementary intermediate level between Brussels and the national level.

References Primary sources:  Joint statement on the three seas initiative, Dubrovnik, 25 August 2016 http://predsjednica.hr/files/The%20Joint%20Statement%20on%20The%20T hree%20Seas%20Initiative%281%29.pdf  “Intermarum z perspektywy ukraińskiej (WIDEO)”, Jagiellonia.org, 9 September 2016 http://jagiellonia.org/intermarum-z-perspektywy-ukrainskiej/  “Deutschlandfunk: Intermarium zamiast Unii Europejskiej?”, Jagiellonia.org, 17 October 2016 http://jagiellonia.org/deutschlandfunk-trojmorze-zamiast-unii-europejskiej/  Sejm Information System, Highway from Rzeszów to Budapest - Via Carpathia under construction, 26 june 2017  Ruslan Szoszyn, “Kaunas talks on the Intermarium alliance”, Rzeczpospolita 20.03.2017 https://poland.pl/politics/foreign-affairs/kaunas-talksintermarium-alliance/ Secondary:  Ksenia Szelachowska, “The revival of Intermarium – Poland can talk the talk but can it walk the walk?” Stratfor, 14 January 2016. https://worldview.stratfor.com/article/revival-intermarium-poland-can-talktalk-can-it-walk-walk In July 2017, the Lazarski University in Warsaw hosted an international academic conference entitled “The Intermarium in the 21st Century: Visions, Architectures, Feasibilities”. The findings of this conference (published by New Eastern Europe) helped us to understand the confusion between the Three Seas Initiative and Intermarium. 

Intermarium in the 21st century, New Eastern Europe, 5 July 2017 http://neweasterneurope.eu/2017/07/05/intermarium-in-the-21st-century/ See articles from:  Daria Nałęcz Intermarium vs the Three Seas Initiative  Ostap Kushnir, Why great national ideas end up on the backstage of regional politics  Dariusz Góra-Szopiński, Trimarium is not Intermarium  Jonathan Hibberd, Warsaw debates Intermarium  Jan Menzer, Intermarium – A view from Germany 16



Michał Kuź, Sovietisation and post-Soviet development in the Intermarium

Sur notre site :  Francis Masson, “Macron, Merkel, Szydło (et Trump) : aperçu de la géographie mouvante des alliances européennes”, Nouvelle Europe [en ligne], 9 August 2017.  Francis Masson, “Le Triangle de Weimar (1/2), un réflexe politique qui n'a rien d'anodin”, Nouvelle Europe [en ligne], 11 April 2016  Francis Masson, “Le Triangle de Weimar (2/2) : le versant sociétal des relations franco-germano-polonaises”, Nouvelle Europe [en ligne], 1 May 2016  Marine Michault, “Le groupe de Visegrad a-t-il encore une utilité?”, Nouvelle Europe [en ligne], Jeudi 9 novembre 2006  Marine Michault, “L'or noir en mer Noire : un nouveau Grand Jeu ?”, Nouvelle Europe [en ligne], Dimanche 4 mai 2008.

Pictures credits :

Three Seas Summit, Warsaw, Poland (Poland’s President Office, Public domain)

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Szczerski: Trilateral project - developmental, attractive, positive, gospodarkamorska, 04/07/2017 http://www.gospodarkamorska.pl/Stocznie,Offshore/szczerski:-projekt-trojmorza--rozwojowy-atrakcyjny-pozytywny.html

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A new Korean village next to Moscow SVETLANA KIM

Post-Soviet Koreans – a Russianized ethnic minority also called Koryosaram – are building an ethnically exclusive village close to Moscow.

Just 30 minutes from Moscow a little village is being built where the kinsmen of a rather obscure ethnic minority are about to settle by their own free will – the ‘Koryosaram’ or ‘(Post-)Soviet Koreans’. The construction of their own, ethnically exclusive might be magnanimously welcomed as a triumphant proof of feasibility, but the village can also be seen as a symbol of their people’s tragedy – continuous rootlessness, perpetual nostalgia, abiding quest of an unknown homeland.

In the summer of 2014, most of the (soon-to-be) settlers co-organized and participated in a group tour which led them from Vladivostok through various Koryosaram-related memorial places (including Moscow, Tashkent, Bishkek and Almaty) to Pyongyang and Seoul. During the trip they were hosted by various local and highranking politicians such as North Korean mayors and the Prime Minister of South Korea, Hwang Kyo-ahn. One of the participants was the North Korean ambassador to Russia, and the trip enjoyed generous support by Russian ministries. This was at the time when the Russian government had already been conspicuously forging a “Putin’s Pivot” to East Asia, and just a few months after the trip (in March 2015) North Korea and Russia announced a “year of friendship” between the two countries.

This may sound very high-carat and promising, but a certain uneasiness lingers around. Not following any political cause, some participants of the trip which coorganized the group tour and now build the Korean village near Moscow seem to be in a disoriented search for a new homeland. They may forge ever-closer ties with the two 19

Koreas, but the 500.000 Koryo-sarams (who today mostly live in the urban centers of Russia, Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan) will not be able to un-develop the Russian customs they acquired over generations since the 1860s. Moreover, their knowledge of Korean language is mainly made up of household-related terms. At the same time, they do not feel completely Russian, which is now illustrated by their endeavour to build a seemingly self-isolating village in ethnic exclusivity.

Uprooting and Centralasiation The participants of the 2014 trip claim to be the first tourist group to have crossed the border from North Korea to South Korea. This is symbolic, for they are neither North Koreans nor South Koreans – they are simply Koryo-sarams, descendants of 19th- and 20th-century Korean settlers in the Russian Far East. In 1863, the first thirteen Korean families furtively crossed the Tumen River into Russia. Other Korean families joined to flee hunger or for political reasons, especially after Japan annexed Korea in 1910. They were quickly Russianized and welcomed by the Russian government for they were able to cultivate rice and other products in cold areas which were hitherto seen as non-arable. But in the aftermath of the Japanese puppet state Manchukuo’s creation in 1932 the Koreans caught Stalin’s attention. He knew that minorities were receptive for subversion, especially in areas bordering turbulent conflict zones. The political situation was tense – the persecution of Trotskyism slopped over to the Far East, in 1935 little skirmishes between Russian and Japanese troops were noted in the banks of the Eastern rivers Amur and Ussuri, the Spanish Civil War in 1936 gave some leeway to Germany’s and Japan’s Anti-Comintern Pact, and a moment later Japanese aggression incited the Second Japanese-Chinese War. It was during this politically complex atmosphere that the Russian newspaper “Pravda” in April 1937 first reported that Koryo-sarams were used as collaborators of the Japanese secret service, while at the same time vast areas of Central Asia were still recognized to be waiting for productive usage. So, in August 1937, Molotov and Stalin signed a secret ordinance to simply have the 180.000 Koryo-saram relocated to Central Asia (mainly to Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan) within a few months – the first forced mass deportation under Stalin.

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Perpetual search for identity This violent uprooting of an already deracinated people proofed to be utterly traumatic, even though the Koryo-saram soon recovered, cultivated the land, integrated into the domestic societies and experienced social advancements. The main motifs of their literature narrate migration-related topics in a grateful manner, thanking Kazakhs, Uzbeks and other peoples for their welcoming attitude in difficult times. The Korean-Kazakh writer Lavrentij Son, for example – by the way, note the typical name of a Koryo-saram bearing a Russian prename and the characteristically monosyllabic surname, the sole syllable left over from the fragmentary remnants of a Korean identity, as the poet Stanislav Li gloomily said – the writer Lavrentij Son remembers the solitude of his childhood, lonely and left behind on a daily basis from his impoverished parents who were forced to work hard in their new Central Asian lands. First- and second-generation children from deported Koryo-saram often report their aloneness. This orphaned emotion is emblematic for their seclusion from their people’s history, and led to a perpetual search for identity. Most Koryo-saram writers, always alien to the land where they were born, refrained from naming a certain geographical territory as their home. Whereas Vladimir Kim confessed to be completely rootless, Vladimir Li regarded his own memory as his native land, Mikhail Pak abstractly detected happiness as his homeland, and Anatoly Kim spiritually found his essential home in the act of writing.

Own home in the outland Now participants of the trip try to make the previously unimaginable possible: a new, geographically definable home for the Koryo-saram. While Volga Germans reemigrate to Germany, Russian Jews to Israel and post-Soviet Greeks to Greece, the Koryo-saram build their own village – situated in Russia. Russian is their first language, in the post-Soviet countries they were born and raised, and everywhere they are considered to be reputable, successful fellows. The building of their own village is therefore unexpected, somehow baffling and a peculiar sign of their craving for what they have never really experienced, their “own home in the outland”, as Anatoly Kim and Vladimir Kim said: “They say, being born and brought up in a foreign country cannot create any nostalgia – how can one yearn for the unknown? But in each of us, there is an ineradicable craving to know where we come from and what it is, the land of the ancestors, and who they are, the brothers in blood – are they still there? How could we satisfy our eternal desire to understand ourselves without this knowledge?” (Gone Away)

References Adamson, F. B., & Demetriou, M. (2007). Remapping the Boundaries of State and National Identity: Incorporating Diasporas into IR Theorizing. European Journal of International Relations, 13(4), 489-526.

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Fumagalli, M. (2016). Growing inter-Asian connections: Links, rivalries, and challenges in South Korean–Central Asian relations. Journal of Eurasian Studies, 7(1), 39-48.

Khan, V., Yong, S. (2013). Koreycy Tsentral’noj Azii: proshloe i nastoyashchee.

Moskva: MBA. Khrapov, A. (2011). Rol’ koreycev Yuga Rossii v kul’turnych svyazyach Rossii I Respubliki Koreya s 1990-2010gg. Retrieved May 31, 2016, from http://world.lib.ru/h/hrapow_a_o/kulturniesvyazi.shtml Kho, S. (1987). Koreans in Soviet Central Asia. Studia Orientalia, 61, 262.

Kilduff, M., & Corley, K. G. (1999). The diaspora effect: The influence of exiles on their cultures of origin. ManAgement, 2(1), 1, 1-12.

Kim A. (2002). Moyo proshloe. M: Tsentrpoligraf. Retrieved May 31, 2016, from http://koryosaram.ru/kim-anatolij-moyo-proshloe/ Kim, V. (1997). Ushedshie vdal’. Sankt-Peterburg. Retrieved May 31, 2016, from http://koryohttp://koryo-saram.ru/vladimir-kim-yong-thek-ushedshievdal/saram.ru/vladimir-kim-yong-thek-ushedshie-vdal/ Ko, J. (2009). President Lee’s Visit to Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan and Future Tasks.

Retrieved May 31, 2016, from http://www.koreafocus.or.kr/design2/essays/view.asp?volume_id=86&content_id= 102596&category=G Miyamoto S. (2009). South Korea’s Energy Diplomacy Towards Central Asia, SAIS U.S.-Korea Yearbook 2009. Washington: John Hopkins University, 45-56.

Saveliev, I. (2010). Mobility decision-making and new diasporic spaces: Conceptualizing Korean diasporas in the post-soviet space. Pacific Affairs, 83(3), 481504.

Sheffer, G. (2003). Diaspora politics: At home abroad. Cambridge University Press.

Vorontsov, A. (2012). Rol' rossiyskikh koreytsev v protsesse sblizheniya Severa i Yuga Korei. http://koryosaram.blogspot.co.at/2012/03/blog-post_06.html Wada, H. (1987). Koreans in the Soviet Far East 1917-1937. In Suh, D. (Ed.) Koreans in the Soviet Union. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Yoong, S. (2014). President Appreciates Ethnic Korean Artwork. Retrieved May 31, 2016, from http://www.korea.net/NewsFocus/Culture/view?articleId=120082

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La régionalisation balte et la transition européenne PAULINE MAUFRAIS

Tallinn, Wikimedia commons.

Lors de leur transition politique dans les années 1990, les trois pays baltes souhaitent adhérer aux institutions occidentales et s’éloigner de l’ancien grand frère russe. Pour cela, ils développent plusieurs stratégies afin de se revendiquer comme une région européenne et occidentale. Toutefois, leurs disparités demeurent tout comme les influences russes et scandinaves sur leur territoire. L’étude de ce cas pratique indique l’intérêt des anciens états soviétiques à se revendiquer comme européens et ainsi, à refuser de se penser comme un espace des confins. Le régionalisme balte existe-t-il ? Est-ce une construction extérieure pour définir ces Etats ? Ou un moyen des baltes pour se scinder de la Russie et affirmer leur spécificité territoriale ?

Une transition régionale et européenne La notion de transition démocratique apparaît dans l'historiographie mondiale à partir des années 1970. Issue de recherches pluridisciplinaires en politologie, en histoire et en sociologie, elle représente un intervalle politique entre deux régimes. Elle est utilisée afin d'expliquer les changements de régimes qui s'opèrent dans le monde au XXème siècle autour de trois phases majeures : 1918, 1945 et 1989. Cette notion est régulièrement employée afin d'analyser le passage d'un régime autoritaire, en l'occurrence communiste, à un régime démocratique, libéral et capitaliste. La notion est sujette aux critiques dans l'historiographie. Elle symboliserait le passage d'un régime autoritaire à un régime démocratique et représenterait ainsi une évolution politique. En effet, elle serait le produit d'une forme de pensée occidentale, qui tendrait à inscrire la démocratie comme le régime politique auquel toutes les sociétés devraient aspirer. La démocratie, nouveau modèle érigé, symboliserait l'alternative principale d'un changement politique. Toute transition se dirigerait vers une occidentalisation, une libéralisation, une mondialisation et une européanisation de la société. Elle dispose d'une définition globale, bien que son universalité soit réfutée par les auteurs.

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Les particularités et les singularités locales de la transition démocratique dans les différents pays d'Europe orientale sont sous-estimées. De surcroît, l'application de ce terme n'est pas unanimement partagée. Certains auteurs préfèrent employer le mot de transformation politique à l'instar du sociologue tchèque Jan Sládek. Selon lui, la transition implique le passage d'un régime autoritaire, communiste, à un nouveau régime antagoniste, en cela qu'il serait libéral, démocratique et capitaliste.

Lorsque les pays Baltes intègrent l’OTAN et l’UE au printemps 2004, cela fait suite à une politique proactive de transition politique et économique menée depuis 1991 pour se rapprocher de l’Occident. Les trois Etats partagent des caractéristiques géographiques similaires. En effet, ils sont peu peuplés et sont relativement petits avec un relief faible en comparaison des pays avoisinants (Russie, Biélorussie et Pologne.)

L’Estonie, la Lettonie et la Lituanie se trouvent au centre de plusieurs aires géoculturelles à l’instar des aires russes, allemandes et scandinaves. En outre, ils ont une maitrise de la mer Baltique qui leur apporte une ouverture économique et politique.

Ces différents aspects confèrent aux Baltes des contraintes géostratégiques importantes. Ils se situent au centre des affrontements entre la puissance ex-soviétique russe et l’Occident représentée par l’OTAN et dans une moindre mesure la Communauté européenne. La situation géostratégique des Baltes est influencée par la Russie. L’expansionnisme russe sur la Baltique et dans la région est constant depuis le XVIIe siècle. La maitrise de la Baltique donnait un accès direct à la Russie à la mer du Nord, et ainsi à cette zone commerciale. Par conséquent, cette politique russe a induit un contrôle également des pays Baltes, et ils ont été transformés en zone tampon entre le monde russophone et l’Occident. Au temps de l’Union soviétique, l’opposition entre les deux blocs américains et russes a inscrit les pays baltes dans cette position de « pays tampons » : ils se sont révélés essentiels à sa sécurité et furent qualifiés de « cordon sanitaire » par le pouvoir soviétique face à l’Occident. Ainsi, l’adhésion des Baltes aux institutions et aux structures occidentales a nécessairement conduit la Russie à repenser totalement son organisation géopolitique. En effet, pour la première fois de son histoire, elle devient voisine d’états appartenant à l’OTAN et elle ne disposerait plus de zone tampon entre elle et l’Occident. En outre, la Russie fut privée d’un accès manifeste à la mer Baltique dont elle disposait via les ports baltes de Tallinn, Riga et Klaipéda.

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Si les Baltes sont perçus comme un tout, ils continuent d’affirmer leurs singularités historiques et linguistiques. Le concept « balte » apparaît comme étant une construction extérieure. En effet, l’Estonie revendique un lien avec l’Europe du nord et la Finlande au niveau historique et linguistique ; la Lituanie s’inscrit dans la Mittel Europa et ses relations avec la Pologne, la religion catholique et son histoire médiévale (Duché de Lituanie) la conduisent à se différencier. La Lettonie devient finalement le seul des trois pays jouant sur l’identité balte, n’ayant pas d’alliés bien définis comme la Pologne ou la Finlande.

La prégnance du passé balte dans les relations étrangères Pour assurer leur souveraineté et reconstruire un état national indépendant, les Baltes s’appuient sur leur première expérience démocratique entre 1919 et 1939. Les trois Etats ont eu leur première indépendance politique, cette dernière étant considérée comme étant un âge d’or où ils avaient tenté de se soustraire des oppositions géostratégiques régionaux. En outre, cette indépendance leur donne une légitimité pour adhérer aux valeurs occidentales : ils affirment dès lors que l’occupation soviétique ne fut qu’une parenthèse. Ils s’inscrivent pleinement dans un destin européen.

La communauté balte connait un tournant dans les années 1980. Les trois Etats souhaitent se différencier mais ils affirment des affinités afin de peser davantage sur la table des négociations. A la fin des années 1980, de premières évolutions apparaissent : les Baltes affirment leur solidarité et dénoncent le pacte germano-soviétique de 1939, les crimes staliniens et demandent l’indépendance. Pour cela, ils s’appuient sur plusieurs acteurs comme la diaspora balte établie aux Etats Unis ou dans les pays scandinaves, très active lors de la Conférence sur la Sécurité et la Coopération en Europe en 1975. Ils affirment leur identité, notamment linguistique, et, profitant de la chute du mur de Berlin en Allemagne et de la révolution de Velours en République tchèque en 1989, les premières lois de nationalisation économique sont votées. Par ailleurs, cette même année la voie balte allant de Vilnius à Tallin (560km) via Riga regroupe 1,5 à 2 millions de personnes faisant une chaîne humaine pour demander leur indépendance. Ainsi, en 1990, les trois Etats votent leur souveraineté face à Moscou, et deviennent indépendants en 1991.

Dans un premier temps, l’intégration des Baltes dans l’OTAN conduit la Russie à repenser sa géostratégie régionale mais également la place de son enclave Kaliningrad. Cette région russe située entre la Pologne et les pays baltes abrite depuis 1991 une partie des anciens soldats russes mobilisés en Estonie, en Lettonie ou en Lituanie. Ce déplacement de soldats a détérioré les relations russo-baltes. Kaliningrad devient désormais une zone où vivent une majorité de militaires, et où les civils russes doivent disposer de visas pour aller en Russie en traversant la Lettonie. Le coût élevé des visas lettons contribue à une marginalisation des Russes dans la région selon Moscou. Kaliningrad représente une zone tactique d’ouverture à la Baltique et elle est le symbole d’une russification de la région depuis 1945.

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La géographie balte a une influence majeure sur leur conscience identitaire. La stratégie balte oscille entre une animosité envers la Russie et une volonté d’intégrer les institutions occidentales. L’élargissement de l’OTAN crée des tensions dans les années 1990. En effet, les pays européens seraient dès lors scindés en deux groupes : les atlantistes et les non-atlantistes. De son côté, la Russie s’inquiète d’avoir des pays atlantistes à ses frontières. Les diplomates russes se demandent si l’ancien conflit de la guerre froide ne va pas se mouvoir et opposer désormais la Communauté des Etats indépendants (CEI) instituée en 1991 et l’OTAN. En outre, la Russie craint la fin de son « cordon sanitaire » face à l’Occident. Le pays étant désormais vaincu, un sentiment d’isolement face à l’Europe s’installe. Moscou développe dès lors une doctrine de l’étranger proche. Ces pays, à l’instar de la Lettonie, l’Estonie ou la Lituanie, l’Ukraine et de la Biélorussie, avec lesquels la Russie considère avoir des relations historiques, politiques, économiques et culturelles proches, ne peuvent être considérés par cette dernière comme de véritables étrangers. Pour les Baltes, cette doctrine laisse entendre qu’ils ne disposent pas d’une souveraineté temporaire. De surcroît, les manœuvres militaires russes aux frontières baltes et les conflits autour de la démilitarisation russe de la région ne font qu’accroître les dissensions.

La place de la Communauté européenne est perçue différemment par la Russie et par les Baltes. Pour Moscou, la future UE est une union politico-économique intégrée n’ayant pas d’aspect militaire. Ainsi, l’adhésion des Baltes serait mieux acceptée.

Toutefois, les pays baltes voient la solution de l’UE comme secondaire ; la diplomatie extérieure balte se concentre sur une adhésion à l’OTAN et ne souhaite pas être abandonnée des Américains. Le mécanisme de défense européen étant peu développé, ils n’auraient pas de force dissuasive à opposer à la Russie. Face à ce dilemme, une dissension apparaît entre les Baltes : la Lituanie propose d’adhérer seule à l’OTAN tandis que l’Estonie et la Lettonie pourraient intégrer l’UE. Cet aspect développé pour la première fois dans l’ouvrage indique une volonté des pays baltes de se différencier afin de mener une politique étrangère efficace.

En outre, plusieurs alliances s’offrent aux Baltes dans les années 1990 comme l’alliance baltico-nordique. Cette alliance inscrit les Baltes dans une stratégie septentrionale soutenue entre autres par la Finlande ou la Norvège, qui souhaitent une alliance locale et ne pas impliquer davantage les Américains, contrairement à la Suède et au Danemark qui sont favorables à l’intégration des Baltes dans l’OTAN et à une présence américaine plus soutenue dans la région. Les Etats baltes décident d’accroître leur coopération avec les pays scandinaves au sein d’un Partenariat euro-atlantique et un Partenariat de la Paix en 1998. Enfin, le Conseil des Etats de la mer Baltique (19891992) regroupant les Etats ayant un accès à la mer Baltique fut un autre exemple d’organisation régionale permettant une intégration économique et politique pour les Baltes.

La régionalisation des Baltes semble être naturelle en 1991. En effet, d’un point de vue extérieur, les Etats sont similaires pour leurs alliés occidentaux. Toutefois, il convient de s’interroger sur une régionalisation à plus large échelle. En effet, les pays Baltes n’ont pas les mêmes intérêts. L’Estonie se place comme un Etat scandinave septentrional. De ce fait, elle pourrait s’intégrer avec les autres Etats de la Baltique. A l’inverse, la Lituanie possède de nombreux liens avec la Pologne et la Biélorussie. La notion des « Baltes » amène par conséquent à être déconstruite afin de comprendre leur réalité historique, linguistique et culturelle d’avant le XXe siècle. L’expression balte date du traité de 1934 entre les trois états amenant à une Entente baltique. Les 26

Baltes deviennent une identité propre, se distinguant dès lors des Slaves et des Scandinaves. Ils sont associés par les acteurs étrangers et disposent d’une représentation d’un ensemble régional homogène, malgré leurs différences nombreuses. Toutefois, afin de peser dans les négociations et de porter leur voix en Europe, les Baltes s’associent et s’accordent participant à leur propre régionalisme.

Les Baltes opposent la Russie et l’Occident. Ils construisent et diffusent une image de la Russie afin de mieux s’y opposer. Ils promeuvent une identité occidentale afin que leur adhésion à l’OTAN et à l’UE soit d’autant plus acceptée et naturelle. Il y a une réelle cristallisation autour des questions identitaires dans la société balte. Pour cela, l’histoire soviétique est mise en parallèle avec l’occupation nazie. Les Baltes demandent à la Russie des dédommagements et se placent comme des Etats démocratiques face à une Russie non-démocratique. En outre, ils mettent un avant un nationalisme parfois xénophobe, en commémorant notamment des combattants nationaux qui ont combattu l’armée Rouge au côté de la Waffen SS. Enfin, l’annexion russe jamais reconnue par la Russie est un point central dans les tensions opposant ces trois pays et Moscou. En retour, la Russie s’oppose au traitement fait aux minorités russophones, principalement en Estonie et en Lettonie, et ne reconnait pas l’annexion russe. Deux interprétations manichéennes de l’histoire s’opposent. Les Baltes s’inscrivent aussi dans les thèses d’Huntington du choc des civilisations, où la civilisation russe est perçue comme barbare comparée à la civilisation occidentale dont ils souhaitent faire partie. Si la menace militaire russe est certes atténuée en 1991, les Baltes mettent en avant une menace politique, économique et industrielle plus insidieuse. En intégrant l’OTAN, les Baltes opèrent un retour à l’Europe et défendent des valeurs démocratiques qui sont dans les règles de l’OTAN. Les Baltes font davantage confiance à l’OTAN qu’à l’Europe de l’Ouest, étant toujours soumis au syndrome de Munich.

Tout d’abord, des politiques sont entreprises concernant les minorités russophones. Les pays Baltes ont connu plusieurs vagues migratoires de russophones.

Au 19e siècle, des élites russes sont venues s’installer dans les pays baltes, principalement pour coloniser de nouvelles terres agricoles et elles se sont intégrées.

Une seconde vague migratoire s’installe après 1945 où des Russes nommés « allogènes » sont venus vivre à la frontière entre l’Estonie, la Lettonie et la Russie. La Lituanie fut moins touchée par ces politiques de migrations de populations soviétiques.

Ces russophones sont perçus comme des envahisseurs et sont assimilés aux Russes. En 1991, les russophones constituaient un tiers de la population estonienne et presque la moitié de la population lettone. Par conséquent, Baltes souhaitent que ces allogènes se réinstallent en Russie, alors que cette dernière ne leur offre pas la nationalité. Dans le même temps, des lois sur la langue retirent au russe le statut de langue officielle face à l’estonien et au letton. Ces populations immigrées russophones se doivent d’avoir la nationalité estonienne ou lettone, au risque d’être apatrides, mais ces lois conçues au début des années 1990 rendent l’accès à la citoyenneté estonienne et lettone complexe.

Les russophones deviennent désormais des citoyens de seconde zone ayant une faible représentation démocratique. La Russie s’empare de cette question pour montrer les dérives nationalistes baltes.

Quelles identités chez les Baltes ?

Au-delà des tensions avec la Russie, les Baltes entreprennent un reformatage de leurs sociétés à l’occidentale, selon les critères de Copenhague. Ces critères sont à 27

respecter pour intégrer la Communauté européenne. Ils obligent les futurs Etats membres à avoir des institutions politico-juridiques démocratiques, une économie de marché et la capacité à mettre en œuvre les acquis communautaires au niveau national.

Ils veulent rétablir leur héritage constitutionnel de l’entre-deux guerres. Le nationalisme et la réconciliation nationale sont au cœur de la politique menée par la Lituanie, la Lettonie et l’Estonie. L’Estonie et la Lettonie mettent en place un régime constitutionnel, et la Lituanie a un régime constitutionnel présidentiel. Une période de lustration s’instaure afin d’éloigner les personnalités dirigeantes compromises pendant l’ère socialiste. Le multipartisme se redéveloppe, les élites jeunes, et formées souvent en Occident, sont portées au pouvoir.

Enfin, les Baltes revendiquent leur aspect septentrional au détriment de leur rattachement à l’Europe de l’Est russophone. En effet, des liens prégnants existent entre les Baltes et leurs alliés nordiques c’est-à-dire la Norvège, la Suède, la Finlande et le Danemark. Ils se concrétisent au sein d’un Conseil d’Etat de la mer Baltique créé en 1992. En effet, il s’agit principalement de mettre en place une politique baltique unifiée, et ces Etats font dès lors office de relais dans la politique et les intérêts baltes.

La recherche sur la politique étrangère balte insiste sur leur européanisme politique et identitaire face à la civilisation russe, dans une perspective de choc civilisationnel développée par Samuel Huntington. Les Baltes font preuve d’une transition dans les années 1990 complète et conforme aux critères occidentaux de mise en place d’institutions juridico-politiques démocratiques.

Le repli nationaliste des Baltes à partir de 1991 s’accompagne de la construction d’une identité linguistique autour de la mémoire et de l’histoire balte. Ce nouveau paradigme a lieu dans de nombreux Etats de l’ex-URSS à l’instar de l’Ukraine qui souhaitent affirmer leur différence par rapport à l’Union soviétique. Le rôle des historiens dans la construction du récit national et du pouvoir politique dans la patrimonialisation est prégnant. Il y a une articulation entre le territoire et la mémoire dans les pays baltes, autour des statues soviétiques et des régions frontalières. Les Baltes veulent affirmer leur empreinte nationale tout en rejoignant le camp euroatlantiste. Ils rejettent les héritages patrimoniaux et historiques soviétiques et cela contribue à accroître les tensions avec la Russie. A Riga, un musée de l’occupation de la Lettonie a vu le jour retraçant l’histoire de 1940 à 1991. Ainsi le socialisme soviétique et le nazisme sont mis sur le même pied d’égalité pour avoir réprimé les populations lettones. A Vilnius, un musée du génocide a été construit. La représentation du passé dispose d’une importance fondamentale pour comprendre la volonté des Baltes de rejoindre les institutions européennes. Leur première indépendance avortée et le nonrespect de leur neutralité ont conduit à avoir une transition politique tranchée en 1991 à destination de l’Ouest. Ils se distinguent des ex-républiques socialistes Asie centrale en ce point.

Enfin, la problématique des minorités russes peut être analysée dans une volonté balte de construire son identité souveraine. Les Baltes ont connu une politique de russification de leur population pendant l’époque soviétique. En 1991, les Russes et russophones représentent la première minorité en Estonie et en Lettonie. Dans le même temps, une crise démographique s’installe et les pouvoirs politiques souhaitent modifier le partage ethnique de leurs populations. Tandis que les Estoniens représentaient 60% de la population en 1989, ils sont 80% dans les années 2010. Par ailleurs, si les Russes représentaient un tiers de la population lettone en 1989, ils sont 28

environ 25% aujourd’hui. Cela peut s’expliquer par la difficulté d’accès à la citoyenneté des populations russophones qui ont pour nombre d’entre elles émigré en Russie, en Europe occidentale ou aux Etats-Unis. La construction des nations politiques baltes fut en 1991 influencée par leur première période d’indépendance. La Lettonie a par exemple considéré que la période soviétique sur son territoire était une occupation et une parenthèse. Ainsi, les personnes, notamment les allogènes russes, arrivées sur son territoire pendant cette période ne pouvait être considérées comme lettones.

L’économie et la géostratégie dans le régionalisme balte Les Baltes ont élargi leur concept de sécurité en incluant les menaces économiques, terroristes et environnementales. En effet ces derniers ont une économie attractive dans certains domaines. L’Estonie est engagée dans des recherches sur la cyber-sécurité dès les années 2000 et se situe à la pointe dans ce domaine. Par ailleurs, la Lituanie a développé la sécurité énergétique. Ils entrent alors dans des logiques de spécialisation et de valorisation de projets sécuritaires comme dans la cyber-sécurité.

Ainsi, depuis 2012 Tallinn accueille l’agence de gestion du système Schengen – SIS. Ils s’investissent dans le développement et certains projets européens. Dans le même temps ils bénéficient d’aides européennes pour développer les infrastructures de transport comme la via baltica ou la rail baltica.

La façade maritime balte est essentielle pour l’URSS et les ports se développent.

Suite à l’indépendance, la Russie construit de nouveaux ports. Néanmoins, le commerce russe, biélorusse et ukrainien continue à transiter par les ports baltes. Une politique émerge visant à faire de ces ports des points de départ économique pour toute la CEI. Les autorités portuaires présentes à Riga ou à Tallinn ont des relations économiques importantes avec l’arrière-pays. Le port de Riga joue un rôle majeur pour la CEI et notamment pour le Kazakhstan. Des trains relient le Kazakhstan et Riga et il est fréquent que des délégations de classe portuaire baltes se rendent en Asie centrale pour renforcer les liens. Il en va de même avec la Russie où le port de Riga est un point de débouché pour l’exportation du charbon sibérien. Ainsi, suite aux relations conflictuelles entre les Baltes et les Russes, les autorités russes ont en effet développé leurs bases autour de Saint Pétersbourg avec Primosk. Mais un trafic important passe par les pays baltes.

Ces éléments soulignent le fait que les stratégies politiques et les actions d’entreprises de transport diffèrent. Les entreprises russes investissent sur le port de Riga, cela ne correspond pas aux discours critiques des autorités russes vis-à-vis de la Lettonie, ou de décideurs lettons par rapport à la Russie. Il existe un décalage important entre le discours politique et les pratiques des acteurs économiques. Les autorités portuaires veulent faire des Baltes une interface et une façade portuaire importante pour le monde post-soviétique. Des projets sont menées pour développer les infrastructures dans les pays baltes notamment au niveau des transports. Le projet de la via baltica a pour objectif de créer des autoroutes et des voies ferrées pour relier les pays baltes entre eux. Par conséquent, si l’Ouest de l’Europe constitue un marché attrayant et rejoint la volonté politique balte d’un virage à l’Ouest, l’Est reste une opportunité de marché manifeste.

Les Baltes ont repensé leur économie afin de devenir un pôle géostratégique régional. Dans un premier temps, les ports de Tallinn, Riga et Klaipéda furent 29

développés afin d’être intégrés au commerce maritime de la Baltique. Le commerce dans la Baltique atteint 8% du commerce maritime mondial. Grâce à leurs liaisons avec l’Allemagne du Nord, les pays Baltes se placent en interface entre l’hinterland russe, centrasiatique et l’Europe. Dans le même temps, ils s’appuient sur les nouvelles technologies. Les capitales de Tallinn et Riga insistent sur leur capacité à attirer des start-up et des fintech européennes.

References CHILLAUD, Matthieu. “Les Pays baltes en quête de sécurité.” Inst. de Stratégie Comparée, 2009.

GIBLIN, Béatrice. “L'est de l'Union européenne.” Hérodote, 2008, no 1, p. 3-8.

PERCHOC, Philippe, et al. « Les États baltes, entre défense territoriale et élargissement des concepts de sécurité. » Revue d’études comparatives Est-Ouest, 2013, vol. 44, no 03, p. 61-88.

RICHARD, Yann « Pays Baltes – Russie. L’impossible coopération transfrontalière? », L’Espace Politique [En ligne], 14 | 2011-2, mis en ligne le 11 juillet 2011.

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The Catholic origins of the EU’s principle of subsidiarity ANDREAS PACHER

Photo: Pope Pius XI. conceptualized subsidiarity in his encyclical Quadragesimo Anno (1931).

The EU’s principle of subsidiarity is rooted in Catholic social thought. It offers guidance on how to allocate powers among a plurality of communities. While the Catholic understanding centers around individual dignity and the vocation of each human collective to offer itself as a gift to social life, the EU’s approach resembles federalist visions based on instrumental-rational calculations of efficiency.

Political concepts as a ‘secularized theology’ International politics is filled with concepts nourished by Christian foundations.

‘Sovereignty’, for instance, denotes a secularised monotheism focusing on a single ruler (Kantorowicz 1957); ‘balance of power’ parallels a harmonious order of things designed

by God’s will (Agamben 2011); the term ‘national interest’ is directly borrowed from St. Augustine’s animus dominandi or ‘lust for power’ (Guilhot 2010, 246); diplomacy’s inherent thrust to maintain relations between estranged entities despite the acceptance to live under conditions of separateness is evocative of Apostle Paul’s ambassadorial sending (Constantinou 2006); and the very concept of ‘human rights’ has an intellectual genealogy which can be traced back via scholastic scholasticism to biblical teachings. Sovereignty, balance of power, national interest, diplomacy, human rights – these are just a few examples of the ‘secularised theological concepts’ that lurk around in international relations (Schmitt 1985, 36).

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Within the EU, there is one principle which is obligatorily addressed in each legislative initiative by the European Commission, and which has repeatedly caused political and judicial fights ever since it became first enshrined in the Maastricht Treaty 1992 – the principle of subsidiarity. The term was drawn from Catholic social teaching, which conceptualized subsidiarity in the 19th and 20th century when the Church struggled against Liberalism and Totalitarianism – the one seeking to marginalize the state on the basis of a relentless individualism, the other seeking to expand its outreach by negating the dignity of non-state actors (extra rempublicam nulla sallus).

Subsidiarity in Catholic Social Thought In short, subsidiarity is a guidance for determining proper allocation of authority among various communities in a society. Within a multitude of organized human gatherings – from sport clubs to NGOs, from hospitals to religions, from state agencies to diasporic associations – which collective should ‘rule’ in a given domain or area?

The Second Vatican Council’s Lumen Gentium recalls that according to the Gospel, ‘ruling’ and ‘serving’ are inherently the same: Servire regnare est. Musing about Adam and Eve, John Paul II. found that the two ‘served’ each other by gifting themselves to one another. People are not simply bearers of power, but also poised to act in self-giving. This is evocative of the term munus: Deriving from an Etruscan rite of bloodstained sacrifice on ancestral graves, munus came to mean a gift of service, and later entered the word ‘com-munity’ which denotes the sharing of gifts. In his encyclicals, Pius XI. stated that all com-munities (families, corporations, governments, international organizations etc.) have iura and officia and munera, i.e. rights to vindicate, power to wield, and gifts to give. As each collective possesses its proper munus, the latter’s plurality prompts the question of when the state (as simply yet another, but more powerful, institution) may claim to fulfil another community’s tasks.

This is what the concept of subsidiarity seeks to answer (Hittinger 2002).

During the political mood of creeping totalitarianism, Pope Pius XI. conceptualized subsidiarity similar to what we usually associate with human rights. At least in so-called Western countries, we take for granted that fundamental rights protect individual dignity. In applying this latter notion, Pius XI. argued that each social institution possesses its own dignity as well – its proper function, its social munus, which derives from the laity’s vocation to ‘rule’ (i.e., to ‘serve’ the common good). When exercised wisely and in liberty, the plurality of munera creates an aggregated common good. Parallel to the biblical metaphor of the Church as a body consisting of various limbs, society itself is a body which only functions when each collective can perform its proper end. Only if one of the body parts fails “to perform its essential functions to a degree which has significant public consequences” (Chaplin 1997, 122), only then may another suitable institution (e.g. the state) offer its aid, or ‘subsidy’ (subsidium), to exercise the task.

As Jonathan Chaplin, a specialist of Christian political thought, writes, “Humans are social creatures unable to realize their ends in isolation from others; they need the subsidium, the help, of others in order to be human. The human community itself thus performs a ‘subsidiary function’ in relation to persons; ‘all social activity is of its nature subsidiary’, as Pius XII puts it” (Chaplin 1997, 118).

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The EU’s understanding of subsidiarity Subsidiarity in the EU hardly mirrors this Catholic approach. At the European level, most of the debates occurring under the label of subsidiarity simply use it synonymously with federalism or decentralisation. Read Article 5(3) TEU (Treaty on European Union, better known as a part of the Lisbon Treaty): “Under the principle of subsidiarity, in areas which do not fall within its exclusive competence, the Union shall act only if and insofar as the objectives of the proposed action cannot be sufficiently achieved by the Member States, either at central level or at regional and local level, but can rather, by reason of the scale or effects of the proposed action, be better achieved at Union level.”

The Treaty’s wording already indicates rightly that the EU’s subsidiarity arose out of the Member States’ fear of centralization (cf. Føllesdal 1998). In the 1980s, the European Parliament, Britain and Germany (whose Länder sought to maintain their constitutionally allocated national competences) apprehended European federalism which had already grown to be far-ranging due to the European Court of Justice’s (ECJ’s) integrationist activism. In a number of ground-breaking judgements, the ECJ established the doctrines of direct effect of EU law in national settings (the famous case Van Gend en Loos from 1963), and the principle of the EU law’s primacy over national laws (the case Costa vs. ENEL from 1964), thus contributing to deepened supranational dynamics perceived to erode the Member States’ claim to sovereignty.

The principle of subsidiarity was devised as a counter-balance to creeping EU competences, stipulating that powers allocated to the EU should generally rest with lower-level political units (i.e. with Member States) unless the tasks’ efficiency would be indubitably enhanced when undertaken by the higher authority (i.e. the EU) (de Búrca 2000). The burden of argument naturally lies with the European Commission.

As a consequence, the EU’s principle of subsidiarity contains a clear devolutionary bias, an inherent thrust towards decentralization. It is a political instrument contrived by Member States (and sub-state entities) against the EU to drain the latter of its authority (Golemboski 2015).

Divergences between Catholic and EU approaches How does the EU’s understanding diverge from its Catholic origins? First, the EU’s approach implies a vertical hierarchy of social bodies rather than a horizontal equality as in the Church’s encyclicals. In this perspective, the right to rule is purely instrumental of rational, state-sanctioned calculations of efficiency.

Secondly, the EU approach recognizes as sub-units potentially endowed with authority only political-territorial bodies (i.e. sovereign governments). The scope of authorities who regulate social life under the principle of subsidiarity is thus limited to the EU and the Member States. By contrast, in Catholic thought, any human institution – starting with the individual and the family – can be considered under the label of subsidiarity.

The most prominent explanation for EU integration is the so-called “neofunctionalism”. Neofunctionalists premise that individuals generally channel

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loyalty towards their nation, but with increasing allocation of powers to a supranational body, people will gradually aggregate their loyalty towards the supranational institution. This mode of thought assumes a zero-sum game: Loyalty is either here or there. But if one is to take the fundamental Catholic question tackled by subsidiarity seriously – i.e. the relationship between the individual and the community – then one will find that there are multiple loyalties to various social institutions which are equally worthy (and none of them simply instrumental to rational choice and efficiency). There is no space for a politicized desire to attain aggregations of loyalty anymore, but rather a differentiated assessment about which of the many institutions in society is best suited to exercise its proper munus in a given domain. Subsidiarity advocates a sensitivity to the laity’s vocation to rule according to the munera allocated by divine providence: “Just as it is gravely wrong to take from individuals what they can accomplish by their own initiative and industry and give it to the community, so also it is an injustice and at the same time a grave evil and disturbance of right order to assign to a greater and higher association what lesser and subordinate organizations can do” (Chaplin 1997, 118), as Chaplin writes before departing from the hierarchical terminology of ‘greater/higher’ and ‘subordinate/lesser’ in favour of a semantics implying a horizontal-equal understanding of communities.

In essence, the Catholic principle of subsidiarity seeks to maintain the proper dignity of each human collective so that it can offer the gift it is best able to bestow on society. It prescribes that none of the divinely appropriated munera get lost; “that when subsidium be given either by the parts to the whole or the whole to the parts, the plurality of functions or munera should not be destroyed or absorbed” (Hittinger 2002, 394).

References Agamben, G. 2011. The Kingdom and the Glory: For a Theological Genealogy of Economy and Government. Stanford University Press.

Búrca, G. de. 2000. “Reappraising Subsidiarity’s Significance after Amsterdam.” 7/99.

Harvard Jean Monnet Working Paper. Cambridge.

Chaplin, J. 1997. “Subsidiarity: The Concept and the Connections.” Ethical Perspectives 4 (2): 117–30.

Constantinou, C. M. 2006. “On Homo-Diplomacy.” Space and Culture 9 (4): 351–64.

Føllesdal, A. 1998. “Survey Article: Subsidiarity.” Journal of Political Philosophy 6 (2): 190–218.

Golemboski, D. 2015. “Federalism and the Catholic Principle of Subsidiarity.” Publius 45 (4): 526–51.

Guilhot, N. 2010. “When Political Theology Became International Relations.”

Constellations 17 (2).

Hittinger, R. 2002. “Social Pluralism and Subsidiarity in Catholic Social Doctrine.”

Annales Theologici 16 (2002): 385–408.

Kantorowicz, E. H. 1957. The King’s Two Bodies. A Study in Medieval Political Theology. Princeton University Press.

Schmitt, C. 1985. Political Theology. MIT Press.

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The Regional Operational Centre: a transnational entity at the service of the security of supply GUILLAUME GONZALEZ

In its legislative proposal to review the organisation of the EU power market, the European Commission proposes the emergence of transnational entities, the Regional Operational Centres, to enable transnational decision-making for the security of electricity power supply.

This decision is controversial as ensuring a secure system operation is currently a national prerogative.

Towards a new form of regionalism?

Regionalism is often flagged as a critical vehicle for European integration, as both political approaches conflict with the nation-state paradigm. In the early 1990s, Liesbet Hooghe and Gary Marks developed the concept of multi-level governance, a new political science theory based on the structure that emerged with the implementation of the Maastricht treaty in 1992. If this theory explains how “the supranational, national, regional and local governments are enmeshed in territorially overarching policy networks� (Marks, 1993), the creation of a new transnational layer

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between Member States and the European Union was not foreseen. Yet, the Clean Energy Package released by the European Commission in November 2016 and currently at its last stage of negotiation (Trilogue or plenary vote) in the European institutions introduced a new structure, the Regional Operational Centers (ROC), covering several Member States and which are to take binding decisions to ensure the security of electricity supply. This transnational entity would gather the Transport System Operators (TSOs) of each Member State which are national stakeholders in charge of maintaining the real-time balance between power demand and power supply.

The resulting ROCs would then ensure supranational monitoring, conduct regional studies, advice and compel TSOs to coordinate national actions – thus strengthening the security of supply.

A proposal based on existing structures created at the initiative of TSOs The precedent for this proposal is CORESO, an entity created at the initiative of several TSOs following the 2006 European blackout that left 15 million people without power for several hours due to a lack of coordination between TSOs in the Central Western Europe area. This outage, triggered by a routine disconnection as a German TSO allowed a boat to pass beneath overhead cables without notifying its neighbours, proved how valuable further coordination could be in an increasingly integrated European power market. This entity, covering the United Kingdom, Northern Ireland, France, Spain, Portugal, Italy, Spain, Belgium and parts of Germany, computes national grid assessments and proposes improvements based on a supranational approach in different time frames (2 days ahead, day ahead, intraday). This model spurred several initiatives across Europe which are now called Regional Security Coordinators (RSCs). As the number of services provided by CORESO kept increasing to make the most out of national markets interdependency, the European Commission decided to take over this success story and to oblige all European TSOs to gather to form Regional Operational Centers, a rebranded RSC with more competencies.

ROCs: regional scope and competencies Article 32 of the Commission’s proposal for the Regulation on the Internal Market for Electricity provides that all EU TSOs shall establish Regional Operational Centers at the latest twelve months after the entry into force of the Regulation. The text also stipulates that the geographical scope of these ROCs should be determined by the European Network of Transmission System Operators for Electricity (ENTSO-E) under the supervision of the Agency for the Cooperation of Energy Regulators (ACER) and considering the existing regional security coordinators such as CORESO. In addition to security of power supply reinforcement, the European Commission outlines that an enhanced cooperation could improve the profitability of cross border interconnectors only exploited at 25% of their maximum capacity partly due to lack of coordination. Among the 17 competencies allocated to the ROCs, the European Commission proposes to introduce compulsory regional calculations and analysis to further improve cross-border knowledge of TSOs, thus leading to better decision making. However, the European Commission shifts from CORESO’s model envisioned as an advisory body, as the Regulation states that ROCs will be entitled to take biding decisions over national TSOs, notably when sizing the regional capacity needed as well as cross border capacity involved in the national capacity mechanisms. Although the rationale behind these provisions is that national power markets are ever more 36

intertwined, they also contribute to promoting a new form of transnational regionalism and consequently set forth a new stage of European integration.

An extensively discussed proposal These provisions, which structurally affect decision-making, have been extensively debated in the Council of the EU and in the European Parliament, where the initial proposal has been significantly amended, as well as by actors from the private sector. Most stakeholders do acknowledge that effective coordination is needed to successfully achieve the Internal Energy Market while raising the share of intermittent renewable sources of energy in the European energy mix. The European association of TSOs (ENTSO-E) however stresses that Member States remain politically responsible for the security of supply, and that a splitting of decision-making powers would therefore lead to political and legal gaps. The European Parliament report was written by K. Karins (a Latvian MEP from the European People’s Party), leading to a vote in the Parliament’s ITRE Committee on February 21 st 2018, which renamed the Regional Operational Centres to Regional Cooperation Centres in order to underline that TSOs will remain the key stakeholders for secure system operation.

In contrast with this rebranding, the ITRE Committee voted to reinforce the independence of this new entity without hampering its capability to take binding decisions: “the regional coordination centres shall act independently from individual national interests and from the interests of transmission system operators”. If voted as such during the April plenary, the European Parliament will stand in favour of the emergence of a partially-independent regional entity with strong competencies to ensure the security of power supply over the continent. On the other hand, the Council of the European Union amended the text so as to reduce the ability of this entity to take binding decisions and to postpone to 2025 the deadline for the implementation of these provisions. In contrast with the ITRE report, Member States advocate to keep the TSOs at the heart of the decision-making structure, starting with the geographical scope as the Council proposes to let TSOs submit the initial proposal on the region covered by the coordination centres.

In fine, if the interinstitutional negotiations will be critical to determine the governance approach of these cooperation centres, they should nevertheless endorse the emergence of mandatory regional entities with binding competences over national stakeholders. These new transnational stakeholders will need to prove their relevance by striking a delicate balance between macro analyses at the regional level while taking into consideration issues that might emerge at a local stage through the TSO’s operational expertise. All in all, this development breaks a new ground in the integration of the EU power market and lays the first milestone towards the development of an EU principle of solidarity for power supply.

References European Commission, Press release: Clean Energy for all Europeans – unlocking Europe’s growth potential (link) European Commission, Proposal for a revised electricity regulation

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European Parliament, Report for a regulation on the internal market for electricity (recast) - link ENTSO-E, Clean energy Package: ENTSO’s position on the ROC proposals - link Council of the European Union, General Orientation on the regulation on the internal market for electricity (recast) Hooghe Liesbet, and Gary Marks. Multi-level governance and European integration.

Rowman & Littlefield, 2001.

Gary Marks, Structural Policy and Multilevel Governance in the EC. In A. Cafruny, & G. Rosenthal (Eds.)

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South Tyrol: a model for autonomous regions?

BALÁZS GYIMESI

The traditionally German-speaking Alpine region of Südtirol (South Tyrol) became a part of Italy after the First World War – today, South Tyrol is an exemplary autonomous region where the rights of German-speakers are widely protected. How did South Tyrol become the autonomous region it is today? In order to explain, we need to understand the region’s history and Austria’s role as the “protector” of the German-speakers of South Tyrol.

South Tyrol is situated in an idyllic region of the eastern Alps, with summits such as the Ortler (Ortles in Italian) raging over valleys and cities such as Meran (Merano in Italian) or Bozen (Bolzano in Italian), which Wolfgang von Goethe described as a “herrliche Gegend” (beautiful region) in his travel diary in 1786. 1 Goethe was crossing Tyrol to get to Italy – at the time of his journey, the whole of Tyrol was under Habsburg rule, and it remained, with temporary changes in its political structure, a part of the Habsburg Empire until the end of the First World War. The Paris Peace Conference of 1919 separated South Tyrol from the rest of Tyrol, and attached the region, with 89% of its population being German-speaking at the time2, 1

Goethe, J. W. (1786), Italienische Reise, Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag, München ASTAT, Autonome Provinz Bozen/Südtirol/Landesinstitut für Statistik Provincia Autonoma di Bolzano/Alto Adige/Istituto provinciale di statistica (2011), Statistisches Jahrbuch für 2

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to Italy. Although German speakers constitute until today the majority (64%) in the modern province of South Tyrol, they are a minority in Italy. How can the rights, culture and language of the German-speaking population of the region be protected in this situation?

The solution in South Tyrol was the creation of an autonomous region, the Provincia Autonoma di Bolzano – Alto Adige/Autonome Provinz Bozen – Südtirol, with the adoption of the “New Statute of Autonomy” in 1972. What exactly is an autonomous region and how did South Tyrol become one?

Autonomous regions and national minorities For regions where a group that is distinctly different from the state’s majority constitutes the majority, creating an autonomous region can be beneficial on many levels. Autonomy can provide “for the possibility to share legislative and executive powers between the central states and national minorities safeguarding both aims: the preservation of the integrity of a state and its sovereign territory and self-government for the minority group in its specific region.”3 However, the possibility of the creation of autonomous regions within a state depends on the given state’s constitution and legal framework, therefore a comparison between countries is a difficult task.

Furthermore, there is “no internationally agreed definition as to which groups constitute minorities”4 according to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights. Nevertheless, there are numerous examples of autonomous regions in Europe, such as the Åland Islands in Finland, the Faeroe Islands in Denmark, and the Basque country in Spain, which are all organized differently, depending on their legal status and the country’s constitutional framework.

Südtirol/ Annuario statistico della Provincia di Bolzano, http://astat.provinz.bz.it/downloads/jb_2011.pdf 3 Benedikter, T. (2006), Territorial Autonomy as a Means of Minority Protection and Conflict Solution in the European Experience—An Overview and Schematic Comparison, Bolzano/Bozen: Society for Threatened People, http://www.gfbv.it/3dossier/eumin/autonomy.html 4 The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (2018), Minorities under international law, http://www.ohchr.org/EN/Issues/Minorities/Pages/internationallaw.aspx 40

South Tyrol: the first statute of autonomy

Language groups of Südtirol/Alto Adige, in % 100.0% 90.0% 80.0% 70.0% 60.0% 50.0% 40.0% 30.0% 20.0% 10.0% 0.0% 1890

1900 1910 Italian speakers

1921 1961 1971 1981 1991 German speakers Ladin speakers

2001

Source: ASTAT

The creation of the South Tyrol autonomous region was the result of a long process, which, despite some violent moments, was largely characterised by peaceful negotiations. In the interwar period, Mussolini’s fascists initiated a “March on Bozen/Bolzano” against the German-speakers in 1922, and the regime initiated an aggressive policy of Italianization of South Tyrol, trying to erase the German-speakers’ demographic and cultural importance in the region.5 The end of the Second World War brought a change with the creation of the first autonomous region in northeastern Italy, the Trentino-Alto-Adige. However, this autonomous region did not only comprise the mainly German-speaking South Tyrol, but attached the traditionally Italian-speaking region of Trentino (Welschtirol in German) to it, thereby shifting the majority to the Italian-speakers.6 This situation was not satisfactory from the point of view of the mainly German-speaking South Tiroleans, who demanded a new arrangement for their region.

Austria’s role: internationalisation of the South Tyrol issue The negotiations to create a new statute were significantly shaped by Austria.

The country saw itself as the protector of the German-speakers of South Tyrol, and it advanced the cause of autonomy by internationalising the issue. Bruno Kresiky, Austria’s Minister of Foreign Affairs between 1959-66, brought the issue of South Tyrol to the attention of the United Nation’s General Assembly in 1960, where he proposed a resolution7 to call on Italy and Austria to resolve the question together. In the same period, terrorist attacks were perpetrated in South Tyrol by groups such as the 5

Köfler, W. (n.a.), Zeittafel zur Geschichte Tirols, Tiroler Landesarchiv https://www.tirol.gv.at/fileadmin/themen/kunst-kultur/landesarchiv/downloads/zeittafel.PDF 6 Scantamburlo, L. B. (2007), « Le cas du Haut-Adige ou Tyrol du Sud » , Les Cahiers du MIMMOC, http://journals.openedition.org/mimmoc/232 7 United Nations General Assembly (1960), 909th plenary meeting, http://digitallibrary.un.org/record/743020/files/A_PV.909-EN.pdf?version=1 41

Befreiungsausschuss Südtirol (South Tyrolean Liberation Committee), which caused the death of 21 people and wounded 57 between 1950-808. However, these attacks did not lead to a permanent breakdown of the negotiations between Italy and Austria.

The new, second statute of autonomy of South Tyrol was achieved through peaceful, diplomatic negotiations in 1972, defining the institutional framework of today’s Provincia Autonoma di Bolzano – Alto Adige/Autonome Provinz Bozen – Südtirol. This new statute covers the territory of South Tyrol/Alto-Adige and introduced two new elements compared to the old statute: the obligaroty bilingualism of the region’s public administration and a linguistically proportional system in the region’s economy. 9 Furthermore, this new statute was the first to take the region’s Ladin-speaking community into account,a Rhaeto-Romance language spoken in the provinces of South Tyrol, Trentino and Belluno.

Conclusion The case of South Tyrol demonstrates that creating an autonomous region that effectively protects the rights of national minorities is possible, without threatening the territorial integrity of the country. However, the importance of the South Tyrolean issue’s internationalisation by Austria, and the country’s role as the protector of German-speakers in South Tyrol played a crucial role in the creation of a second, more efficient statute of autonomy. As mentioned above, the possibility of creating autonomous regions depends on the constitutional orders of countries, therefore it is difficult to compare the situations of minorities in different countries. Nevertheless, South Tyrol is a remarkable example of minority protection in Europe.

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Scantamburlo, L. B. (2007), « Le cas du Haut-Adige ou Tyrol du Sud » , Les Cahiers du MIMMOC, http://journals.openedition.org/mimmoc/232 9 Idem.

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Bibliographie

References Anastassia Obydenkova, “Comparative regionalism: Eurasian cooperation and European integration. The case for neofunctionalism?”, Journal of Eurasian Studies, 2010.

Anssi Paasi, “Regions are social constructs, but who or what “construct” them? Agency in question Introduction” in Environment and Planning A, October 2010.

Anssi Paasi, “Boundaries as Social Processes: Territoriality in the World of Flows”, in Geopolitics, June 1998.

Romain Pasquier, « La fin de « l’Europe des régions »? », Politique européenne, 2015/4 (N° 50), p. 150-159. DOI : 10.3917/poeu.050.0150. URL : https://www.cairn.info/revue-politique-europeenne-2015-4-page-150.htm Podcast radio: https://www.franceculture.fr/emissions/lesprit-public/le-regionalisme-en-europeet-la-reforme-territoriale-en-france-la-situation

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