Alvaro Vargas Llosa: We the European People
... The European Union finds itself re-enacting, more than two centuries later, the polemic between the Federalists who wanted a Constitution for the United States and the Anti-Federalists who opposed what they considered the emergence of a political leviathan. There are, of course, many differences--which is why it is unclear that Europeans will ever be able to reach the kind of compromise that the Americans arrived at.
The ideological opposition to federalism was more clear-cut in 18th-century America than in 21st-century Europe--where political integration is not even called federalism. Although some Anti-Federalist groups were more concerned about losing support from their state governments once a federal entity emerged than about limiting government, on the whole the movement was consistently mindful of individual rights and fearful of bureaucracy. The Anti-Federalists lost, but they forced the Federalists to include a Bill of Rights that severely curtailed the ability of the federal government to intrude. Eventually, part of the Anti-Federalist cause evolved into the Democratic Party of Thomas Jefferson, perpetuating the pressure on the federal government to respect the boundaries (not always successfully or consistently).
The waters are much more muddied in Europe because the European Anti-Federalists, known as"Euroskeptics," range from protectionists and globalphobics to free-traders and libertarians, and the Federalists, known as"Europhiles," have been able to co-opt their adversaries once they gained power and became part of the club (with a few exceptions such as Czech President Vaclav Klaus, who holds a ceremonial post). Italy's Forza Italia, a center-right party that tended to voice concerns about European bureaucracy, is now an ally of Brussels. France's Nicolas Sarkozy, the conservative president who once promised reforms, is no less of a Europhile than Spain's socialist prime minister, Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero: Sarkozy left his mark on the Lisbon Treaty by downgrading the aspects that safeguard free trade because he believes in protecting"national champions." The fact that Europe's mainstream parties on the right and the left--with the exception of Britain's opposition Conservatives--are all Europhiles means that there is no democratic mechanism for bridging the divide between the people and the Brussels bureaucracy.
In the rivalry between American Federalists and Anti-Federalists, ideas were more important than interests, whereas in the antagonism between Euroskeptics and Europhiles, interests prevail over ideas. This means that every referendum that Brussels loses is followed by new forms of centralization that disregard the citizens' concerns over the explosion of European bureaucracy. One cannot see a meaningful Bill of Rights emerging in that context.