Regional waves at Club Med

On Sunday in Paris, French President Nicolas Sarkozy will unveil the jewel in the crown of France's EU Presidency, and one of the key inventions of his foreign policy -- the 'Mediterranean Union'. His brainchild reveals a good deal about the power structure and ambitions of the new EU.

The Union for the Mediterranean is now a project management organisation, open to all EU countries, with a rotating two-headed presidency drawn from one EU and one North African state. The structure waters down both the Mediterranean focus of the organisation (Finland could now take the chair, for instance) and France's early leadership. EU officials will run the organisation, and no new money is available.

The group's original soubriquet has been lost to mealy-mouthed bureaucracy. The initiative has been solemnly renamed the 'Barcelona Process: Union for the Mediterranean', after the current lacklustre mechanism for interaction between EU countries and the rest of the Mediterranean. Member states had been concerned that they were creating and bankrolling a parallel institution with some of the same competencies as the EU, but only comprising a handful of its members. The language of the organisation's planners -- who compared their efforts to the architects of the new Europe in the 1950 -- did not assuage those fears.

The whole affair reveals the balance of power in Brussels: the Germans appear to have blocked French hopes of intellectual leadership. Sarkozy has again backed down from his initial rhetorical flourishes in the face of fierce resistance from German Chancellor Angela Merkel. The annual Franco-German summit on the eve of the 'Club Med' launch will attempt to restore some bilateral warmth.   

Likely attendees

Despite the setbacks, Sarkozy has fought to make the guest list match the invitations he sent -- hoping to relaunch an ambitious EU presidency already poleaxed by a defeat for the Lisbon treaty on EU reform, and shore up his weak domestic standing:

• Sarkozy still had to cajole Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika on the fringes of the G8 summit, in spite of Prime Minister Francois Fillon's recent visit to Algeria.
• Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan required reassurance that the Mediterranean Union was not a poor substitute for Turkey's potential EU membership (which it probably was under the original proposal -- Sarkozy is deeply sceptical about Ankara's membership ambitions).
• Now it seems only Libya will definitely not attend, angered by Israel's presence at the launch. Tripoli also protests that the group would dilute the African Union and Arab League.

Even if the leaders attend, it is unlikely that relations will be very cordial. Many feel Sarkozy showed his true colours when Paris presented its first major initiative, the 'European Immigration Pact'. Middle Eastern leaders join the group concerned by the 'creeping normalisation' of relations with Israel. In recognition of the meeting's limitations, discussions in the first three-hour meeting are limited to fangless issues such as solar power and shipping lanes. 

Increasing regionalisation?

Even with the limitation of its powers, the Mediterranean organisation reveals a trend towards the regionalisation of EU foreign policy. For example, an 'Eastern partnership' has also been proposed around the Baltic. As stronger states become the policy sheriffs of their bailiwicks, such partnerships will weaken Brussels' clout just as it makes preparations to develop a fully-fledged foreign service. Club Med may just be the first of many, much to the European Commission’s dismay.