The Czech presidency of the European Union has had its fair share of mishaps, culminating in the fall of the government in late March. Nevertheless meetings have continued to be chaired, agendas set, and Europe’s administrative machinery has run on. The embarrassment has been a Czech concern rather than a serious problem for the wider EU.
But the important thing about the Czech EU presidency is that it is happening at all. This is the first time a former Soviet Block country is presiding over the EU.
Only twenty years ago, in early 1989, Václav Havel was in prison, and communism firmly entrenched. Anyone tempted to regard the events of November 1989 as inevitable should reflect on what happened in Tiananmen Square that June. Nothing was inevitable about the fall of communism in Central Europe.
Neither was a smooth transition to democracy inevitable. Numerous countries have seen some regression to authoritarianism. Until recently Poland was led by the Kaczynski twins, and Slovakia experienced several years under the authoritarian Mečiar, before he was voted out in 1998. Not to mention countries such as Belarus, which have slipped back into outright dictatorship.
Indeed what is remarkable about the transition in Central & Eastern Europe is its peacefulness, given the youth of democratic institutions and the national and ethnic tensions festering in the region. What happened in the former Yugoslavia might well have been replicated to a greater or lesser degree in other places. We must acknowledge the influence of the EU in encouraging democracy and human rights. The incentive of membership, and the process of integration into European institutions, provided tremendous momentum towards changes that might otherwise have faced insurmountable obstacles. In discussions about the EU’s role in today’s world we sometimes overlook its massive part in democratizing half the continent. European ‘soft power’ has proved to be the most successful democratizing force in history.
This is something that Labour should stress in our campaigning on Europe – we should be proud of our contribution. Since 1997, Britain under Labour has been a strong supporter of EU enlargement and the full integration of the former communist states into a free Europe.
It seems that the closer to EU borders one gets, the easier the transition has been, and the Czechs are a case in point. Despite the now very visible provincialism of the political class the country has witnessed the least regression to authoritarianism in the former Soviet block. That is not to deny the serious difficulties that persist: corruption is still rife and unresolved issues endure in the country’s relations with its minorities. The point is not that there are no problems, but that things have turned out so well despite enormous problems.
And economic success has been startling. A visitor to Prague in the early 1990s might hardly recognize the city now. In the years before the current crisis the country experienced GDP growth around twice the EU average. The crisis has hit this export-centred economy, but this should not detract from the achievements of the years since 1989.
This success can partly be traced to a long-standing democratic tradition. After all, this is the country that Karl Popper once called ‘probably one of the best and most democratic states that ever existed.’ Czechoslovak women got equal voting rights 10 years before British women.
In some areas the Czechs still lead Europe – with the lowest level of relative poverty in the EU and one of the lowest rates of infant mortality in the world. With this kind of social cohesion there is perhaps something this small country can offer us in terms of vision and inspiration. Seven decades have now passed since Chamberlain spoke of ‘a faraway country’. In the midst of our ongoing debate on spreading democracy, we could do well to pay more attention to a quiet success story, in a country that is, after all, not so far away.