Contents | Key Points | Foreword | Preface | One | Two | Three | Four | Five | Appendixes: 1 2 3 | Notes | Author

The Quest for Democratic Security The Role of the Council of Europe and U.S. Foreign Policy

European Democratic Security and United States Foreign Policy

Ever since the end of World War II, the United States has supported European unity. Recent confirmations of this policy were President Clinton’s State of the Union Address on February 3, 1997, and Secretary of State Madeleine Albright’s commencement address at Harvard University on July 5, 1997. Needless to say, this does not mean that Europe and the United States do not have diverging interests in certain areas, which may also produce political frictions from time to time.

U.S. Support for European Unity and Stability
After 1989, the United States became the leading international power, which implies the assumption of more responsibilities in world affairs—even more so, as the Europeans are often divided on international issues and thus unable to act in unison. The United States was led to intervene in two world wars and subsequently took the initiative for creating NATO to avert a third. After World War II, the United States undertook a momentous effort to shore up its own long-term security by facilitating economic recovery in war-torn Europe. The Marshall Plan, which celebrated its fiftieth anniversary in 1997, was unprecedented in history as an act of enlightened generosity.⁸⁷

     The United States encouraged the creation of the Organization for European Economic Cooperation (OEEC), later transformed into the OECD with American participation. The United States followed with interest the creation of the Council of Europe. In 1950, twelve U.S. senators and congressmen participated in a major European–American debate in Strasbourg at the invitation of the council’s Parliamentary Assembly, then chaired by Paul-Henri Spaak (who later became NATO secretary general). Last but not least, the United States gave the creation of the European Communities, now the EU, its strong moral support.

     Today U.S. foreign policy toward Europe is pursued through three types of relationships: bilateral relations with European states, multilateral diplomacy and cooperation in international organizations of which the United States is a member, and relations with European organizations.

     Bilateral relations with individual nations will remain indispensable as long as Europeans, despite progress toward European unity, are incapable of speaking with one voice on certain policy issues that concern both Europe and the United States. Recent crises, such as the standoff between Iraq and the UN Special Commission over the weapons-inspection regime, revealed once again different political approaches between the United States and member states of the EU or the Council of Europe. As Henry Kissinger is said to have remarked once, “We would like to speak with Europe, but we don’t know whom to call.” We must also be aware that the geographical extension of European institutions to the East may temporarily reduce, rather than promote, political harmony inside these institutions.

     While the United States is directly engaged in multilateral diplomatic relations with Europeans in OECD, NATO, and OSCE, it is also dealing with them in two specifically European international institutions of which it is not a member: the geographically wider Council of Europe and the more close-knit EU. In this regard, the EU is not only a negotiating partner on economic and trade issues but also, increasingly, a political interlocutor. However, the Council of Europe draws its moral force from standing up throughout its history for the principles of true democracy. It shares with the United States a community of values and, as a school of democracy, offers a yet insufficiently exploited potential for cooperation toward the common goal of democratic security. “The New Transatlantic Agenda,” adopted at the December 1995 U.S.–EU Summit in Madrid, refers to a “new European security architecture in which the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, the European Union, the Western European Union, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe and the Council of Europe have complementary and mutually reinforcing roles to play” (emphasis added).

     International organizations become mutually reinforcing if they recognize each other’s contribution to a common purpose; avoid “empire-building” competition (which does not mean there is no room for healthy competition); coordinate their activities (which means more particularly, in the context of this study, the manifold initiatives to spread and consolidate democracy); and make it clear that they are not working against each other, but toward a common goal.

A New Relationship between the Council of Europe and NATO
Not long ago, relations between the Council of Europe and NATO were practically nonexistent, in large part because of the council’s statute and the presence of neutral states in its membership. Concerning the latter, informed public opinion in most of the neutral European states has evolved considerably in recent years. The day may not be far off when all or most of them would be ready for NATO membership.⁸⁸

     According to Article 1(d) of the statute, defense issues are excluded from the council’s mandate, but the practical significance of this provision has receded over the years. Today it is understood that “the political aspects of defense” can be discussed in the council, with neutral states present. It should also be remembered that an organic link has always existed between the council’s Parliamentary Assembly and the Assembly of the Western European Union (or WEU, sometimes called the “European pillar of NATO”) because for Council of Europe states the parliamentary delegations in both assemblies are identical.

     The common political purpose of NATO and the Council of Europe came into the public eye for the first time on January 30, 1997, when NATO secretary general Javier Solana addressed the council’s Parliamentary Assembly.⁸⁹ Reiterating the tenets of democratic peace theory, Solana asserted that stability and security are built on the foundations of pluralist democracy, human rights, and the rule of law, leading him to pay tribute to the work accomplished by the Council of Europe within the “architecture of European security”:

If there is today general agreement on the fundamental importance of security ensured through the respect of democracy, it is because the Council of Europe, for so long, has entertained the vision of a Europe united around common democratic values. . . . The Council of Europe has played a leading role in spreading democratic values and practices to Central and Eastern Europe since the political watershed of 1989. It has given a powerful incentive to the process of democratization and reform among Central and Eastern European countries.

In this sense, Solana concluded that NATO and the council had a “joint agenda,” namely, developing a “common security culture” across Europe. Cooperation between the two organizations, he argued, could enhance these goals, specifically with regard to engaging Russia in a closer relationship with European institutions.

     The U.S. position essentially broadens such an agenda. In the State Department’s February 24, 1997 report to Congress on NATO enlargement, the final chapter addresses the “impact of NATO enlargement on other institutions and treaties.” It confirms the philosophy underlying the 1995 U.S.–EU declaration: “No single European or Euro-Atlantic institution provides all the requirements for maintaining transatlantic security. Each makes a unique contribution: NATO, the European Union, the Partnership for Peace, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, the Western European Union, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development in Europe, and the Council of Europe all play important roles.”⁹⁰

     The integration of Russia into NATO is not a practical proposition at the moment, and there may be good arguments for not envisaging it even in the longer run.⁹¹ At the same time, it has often been emphasized that no new lines of demarcation should be established in Europe: “An area of shared and collective security . . . must embrace the whole of Europe. The exclusion of any country would undermine the very foundations of the new order, as it would produce a real risk of new antagonisms leading in the long term to a return to defensive security based on military dissuasion.”⁹²

     Russia is a member of both the OSCE and the Council of Europe, and there is hope that its still fragile and incomplete democracy will consolidate itself. The May 1997 Founding Act on Mutual Relations between Russia and NATO is another important step in this direction. Let us now turn to the respective roles of the Council of Europe and OSCE.

The Council of Europe and OSCE: Partners for Democratic Security
OSCE now stretches from North America across Europe and into Asia; therefore, it is not, despite its name, what one would call a specifically European organization. Since the 1975 Helsinki Accords, the reference has been to security and cooperation in Europe. The participation of the United States was legitimate—and desired by the Europeans—as a counterweight to the Soviet Union. When the Soviet empire imploded, the United States was the strongest supporter of extending CSCE/OSCE membership to all former Soviet satellites and republics, including those in the Caucasus and Central Asia. The United States is now firmly committed to OSCE’s role in supporting democratic transitions.

     When discussing the role of the Council of Europe in the democratic transition of Central and Eastern Europe, American foreign policy experts sometimes express the view that the council’s work, valuable as it may be, is not indispensable to U.S. policy. This view holds instead that the U.S. government promotes democratic institutions, the rule of law, and the protection of human rights through OSCE, in which the United States, as a member, plays an important part. However, as we have seen, the 1995 New Transatlantic Agenda and the 1997 State Department report on NATO enlargement support a different interpretation. These documents see European and transatlantic security as a cooperative concern, where different organizations make their contribution in accordance with their specific mandates, expertise, and possibilities.

     The architecture of international cooperation is not the result of a rational blueprint. Certainly, one could imagine more efficient structures entailing less duplication of efforts and wasted energy. However, governments must work with what exists. To quote from the “Lisbon Declaration on a Common and a Comprehensive Security Model for Europe for the Twenty-First Century,” adopted by OSCE heads of state and government in December 1996, “European security requires the widest cooperation and coordination among participating States and European and transatlantic organizations.” This is yet another confirmation of the concept of complementary and mutually reinforcing roles. The links between European and transatlantic organizations should become ever closer as they all extend their incremental grasp of membership to Central and Eastern Europe.

     The complementarity between OSCE and the Council of Europe arose implicitly from the Helsinki negotiations, beginning in 1973 and ending with the Helsinki Final Act of August 1, 1975. Both East and West joined the Helsinki process out of a mutual concern for military security. In addition, the Soviet Union sought international recognition of the borders resulting from World War II.⁹³ For its part, the West wanted all the participating states to guarantee human rights and fundamental freedoms. This was formally conceded by the Soviet-bloc countries, but long remained a concession on paper only. Moreover, the Helsinki Final Act is not a legally binding instrument—it is a political declaration, signed by heads of state and government. Nonetheless, the West’s strategy proved to be farsighted: The ideological seed of Helsinki spread across the continent. Together with the economic contradictions of communism, this strategy was largely responsible for the collapse of the Soviet empire and totalitarian rule on the Eurasian continent.

     Over the years, good cooperative relations have been established between the Council of Europe and OSCE, notably through the latter’s Office of Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) in Warsaw. This cooperation includes, for example, the preparation and execution of election monitoring and cooperation in crisis situations in Bosnia and Herzegovina and, more recently, in Albania.⁹⁴ In the framework of its activities on the rule of law—one of ODIHR’s major concerns—the office is preparing a manual for Russian judges, which devotes a large section to Council of Europe texts, including the ECHR and other relevant conventions, recommendations, and resolutions.⁹⁵ In the spirit of the mutual reinforcement concept, all governments concerned should encourage such cooperation and coordination.

     The political obligations entered into by OSCE’s participating states and the follow-up procedure foreseen by OSCE documents usefully complement the normative action and support the objectives of the Council of Europe.⁹⁶ In such a way, political commitments are transformed into legal obligations. One of the best examples is the 1990 Copenhagen Document of OSCE (then still CSCE), which details with remarkable precision the concept of the rule of law and the rights of national minorities. The rule of law is enshrined in general in the Council of Europe Statute and in the ECHR. The latter is less detailed than the Copenhagen Document, but the relevant provisions have been elaborated further in the jurisprudence of the commission and the court, the control mechanisms established under the ECHR. The action of OSCE makes it possible to propagate democratic values beyond the frontiers of the Council of Europe, extending the school of democracy to the former Soviet Union’s Central Asian and Caucasian republics.

     The definition of minority rights in the Copenhagen Document was largely taken over by the Council of Europe’s Parliamentary Assembly when it proposed an additional protocol to the ECHR. The objective was to combine the precision of OSCE’s formulations with the legally binding character of an international treaty through an additional protocol to the ECHR and its control mechanisms. This ambitious project has been shelved provisionally due to resistance by some Council of Europe member states, but it has not been abandoned by the assembly. For the time being, the rights defined in the OSCE Copenhagen Document and the Parliamentary Assembly’s draft protocol have been included in the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities, although drafted in more flexible terms that offer states many loopholes. Nonetheless, this is the first comprehensive, legally binding multilateral treaty on minority rights, which an American scholar calls “a fascinating example of the manner in which regional and international institutions interact and complement each other.”⁹⁷

     Close cooperation in the form of a regular exchange of information and, in certain cases, joint action characterize the relationship between the Council of Europe and the OSCE’s High Commissioner on National Minorities, whose task is one of early warning on minority problems that might develop into a threat to peace. ⁹⁸ The treatment of minorities under Estonia’s and Latvia’s citizenship laws is a good example of such institutional collaboration. High Commissioner Max van der Stoel knows both organizations well: He has had personal experience with the Council of Europe, having been a prominent member of the Parliamentary Assembly and, as Dutch foreign minister, a member of the council’s Committee of Ministers.

The Council’s Partnership and Cooperation with the European Union
Among the European organizations whose membership is limited to geographically European states, the EU now plays the preeminent role. The EU has become the United States’ most important economic partner, and when European political cohesion increases, relations between the U.S. and the EU gain in political importance. It is also undeniable that an economic power like the EU normally carries more weight in international politics than an essentially “moral” force like the Council of Europe.⁹⁹

     The EU’s engagement with Central and Eastern Europe stems primarily from economics. After all, at some stage in the next millennium, all or most Central and Eastern European countries may be members of, or have concluded association agreements with, the EU. Currently, the EU is not in a position to accept the Newly Independent States, with their struggling economies and still underdeveloped free markets. At the EU’s June 1997 Maastricht Summit, it was understood that a further enlargement of the EU would probably not take place before the middle of the next decade.¹⁰⁰

     The Council of Europe, the first and geographically widest specifically European organization, has been relatively neglected in U.S. political thinking in recent years, both within the executive branch and on Capitol Hill. Technical cooperation has been practiced for years through the participation of U.S. observers in Council of Europe expert committees. The United States acceded to a few “open” (that is, open to nonmember states) Council of Europe conventions, although much of its interest has focused on the human rights aspects of the council’s work.¹⁰¹

     Through increased diplomatic contacts and visits to Strasbourg, the United States signaled renewed interest in the Council of Europe’s political role after 1989 as the organization opened up to Central and Eastern Europe. Soon after the council’s Committee of Ministers created an observer status within the organization, the United States applied accordingly.¹⁰² The letter of application, signed by Assistant Secretary of State Richard Holbrooke, mentioned U.S. interest in cooperating with the Council of Europe to promote democratization in Central and Eastern Europe. While this was almost unanimously welcomed in the Council of Europe, the representative of one member state in the Committee of Ministers objected, stating that the Council of Europe was and should remain an exclusively European organization and not be open to extra-European influences.¹⁰³ This position was not founded on the wording of Committee of Ministers Resolution (93) 26: “Any State willing to accept the principles of democracy, the rule of law and the enjoyment by all persons within its jurisdiction of human rights and fundamental freedoms, and wishing to co-operate with the Council of Europe may be granted by the Committee of Ministers, after consulting the Parliamentary Assembly, observer status with the Organization.”

     In the end, observer status was granted after the Parliamentary Assembly came out very strongly in favor of it.¹⁰⁴ Indeed, an overwhelming majority of member states attached importance to seeing the link with the United States established before Russia entered the Council of Europe. Without publicly revealing their apprehension, many were concerned that Russia’s “weighted” membership would create a political imbalance in the council. Apart from its size and its status as a nuclear power, Russia’s population of more than 160 million is twice that of reunified Germany and almost three times that of the other “big” states: France, Italy, and the United Kingdom. In addition, many delegations feared that Russia would continue in its Soviet tradition and practice power politics inside the council, contrary to the organization’s tradition of strictly observing the principle of “one state, one vote” (except in the Parliamentary Assembly, where population figures roughly determine the size of delegations).¹⁰⁵

     Formally, the U.S. ambassador to France is the U.S. observer with the Council of Europe. In practice, the State Department charged the U.S. consul general in Strasbourg with follow ing the council’s activities. Observer status automatically gives the right to participate in all expert committees and, upon invitation by the respective host country, in conferences of specialized ministers. Under Resolution (93)26, observer status does not give the right to be represented on the Committee of Ministers or the Parliamentary Assembly unless a specific decision is taken to this effect by either body. However, there is no doubt that a request by Congress for permanent observer status in the assembly (under its rules of procedure) would be favorably received. Since 1995, the consul general participates in the confidential discussions of the Committee of Ministers rapporteur groups. Normally, the consul concentrates on work that is specifically of interest to the United States. The U.S. representative can also be present during the committee’s dialogues with ministers from Central and Eastern Europe. As an observer, the U.S. representative cannot vote, but may sit at the same table with the representatives of member states and can express the American point of view in the meeting, as well as in personal contacts with diplomatic colleagues. Observers do not participate in plenary meetings of the committee, but normally the latter ratify decisions prepared in the rapporteur groups.

     The “cohabitation” of the U.S. representative with the Russian Federation representative in Council of Europe meetings has not been a problem. Generally speaking, Russian representatives in both the Committee of Ministers and the Parliamentary Assembly have adapted remarkably well to the organization’s “rules of the game.” Members of the Russian parliamentary delegation have acted responsibly, except for occasional outbursts from politicians like Vladimir Zhirinovsky. The same holds true for initial pressures by the Russian authorities to disregard the council’s staff recruitment procedures to place candidates of their choice in various council positions, or President Yeltsin’s alleged instruction to the Russian parliamentary delegation to block any initiative running counter to Russia’s interests.

     With one exception (the creation of a School of Magistrates, a joint venture of the Council of Europe, the United States, and the European Commission), U.S. observer status has not yet led to concrete cooperation or to joint projects such as those undertaken by the Council of Europe and the EU. Such cooperation and better coordination would, however, be desirable in the interest of overall efficiency. It would also make the new democracies understand that there is no fundamental contradiction between U.S. and European democracy.¹⁰⁶

Contents | Key Points | Foreword | Preface | One | Two | Three | Four | Five | Appendixes: 1 2 3 | Notes | Author

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