The European Union is planning to make e-commerce platforms such as Temu, Shein and Amazon Marketplace liable for dangerous or illegal products sold online, the Financial Times reported on Saturday.Customs reforms would oblige online platforms to provide data before goods arrive in the EU, allowing offici
EU is like the dad the rest of the world wish we had. 😂
Depends on an issue. You mostly hear about the good stuff, not the bad / idiotic part.
Of course, but it’s like 90% good vs 90% bad. 😂
As a Canadian I wish we could be part of EU instead of being stuck with loud, polluting, selfish, violent neighbors.
I wonder if Canada could realistically join?
I don’t think so, but I wouldn’t be surprised if, as the old world order continues to change into… this, that we will see an expansion/rework/new layer on top of the current association agreements. Something more like associate member states.
My guess is that it will take a form where associate states will have no explicit political power (no elected politicians, and not likely any appointed political positions either), but will have greater access to less direct influence, that could potentially-eventually even include formal rights of hearing with the Commission, a right to speak in Parliament, and/or guarantees of consultation on certain matters.
I think this could become a more standardised system than the current association agreements. In many ways it would be like having different membership tracks, with different benefits and requirements. I expect that realist school foreign policy is going to overwhelmingly dominate global foreign affairs, with the idealist school being relegated to mainly having influence in regional foreign affairs. As such, I think standards on political and human rights that these associate members will have to live up to are going to be an order og magnitude less strict than what is required of full members. There will probably be other requirements that will be more important, such as certain foreign policy commitments.
As for level of integration, I would imagine that such an associate member would be able to become fully integrated in many areas, but on an opt-in basis, possibly with almost standardised package deals, where certain benefits and obligations (both legal and economic) are bestowed together. Things like Schengen membership, or access to some of the large redistribute programs (agricultural subsidies come to mind) will remain very exclusive, and membership in these will continue to be largely political, rather than something that can be accessible to any associate member that fulfills certain objective criteria.
Do I have any special insights that make me able to predict the future? No. No one can predict the future. But I think these are some pretty solid guesses.
There’s been talks on Turkey joining, which is mostly outside of Europe, but it’s not even close. With Canada it doesn’t make much sense, it’ll always be closer to US. Maybe something resembling NATO or UN could be introduced, uniting all the still sane countries, but that would be short lived given how hard it is even for UN and NATO to function in the current political climate and rising alt right movements all around Europe - I don’t think any country or organization is truly safe from those.
The point of eu is less about geographical location, and more about increasing cooperation and trade. It’s evolved to more than that, but Canada joining is no different than any island nation already in the eu. Ireland, Cyprus, malta are all seperate from continental Europe. Canada trades heavily with the USA, but that relationship is not currently positive. The USA would have less ability to force conditions on Canada if they were part of the eu. Instead of being the smaller trading partner beholden to America, the become part of an equally larger bloc. No tariffs would be possible without tariffs on all. And likewise, reciprocal tariffs would be imposed by all states. Trump in his first term tried to negotiate terms with Germany. He couldn’t grasp the collective nature of the eu when Merkel deflected him on multiple times.
I think there is likely less upside on trading for Canada, than, say, Iceland or turkey, but there is still benefit, as a smaller country beside a larger one, that’s their biggest trading partner. Those benefits are minimal for Iceland, but moderate for turkey. For each country it’s a different list of pros and cons.