Inside the Brussels Beltway

Last Friday, January the 11th, was a whirlwind day. I departed from my home base of Maastricht, the Netherlands on the 7:07 AM international train for the one-and-a-half-hour trip direct to Brussels to meet Geert Laporte, who heads up Institutional Relations for the European Centre for Development Policy Management, (ECDPM), my new client. ECDPM is an organization that for the past 20 years has served as a fiercely independent, ‘honest broker’ in creating a level playing field between the European Union and its southern neighbors from Africa, the Caribbean, and the Pacific to optimize and operationalize development policy that has a big impact for both sides.

Geert collected me across from Gare Midi, (Central Station), shown above with an EU building in the background, at the posh Le Meridien Hotel. From there we trekked across Parc de Bruxxelles, past the Belgian Royal Palace on one side and the Belgian State Capitol (Parliament) or Palais de la Nation, shown here, on the other, ultimately arriving at the headquarters of the newly established “Permanent Residence” for Slovenia, the country that is the first of the new entrants of the recently expanded European Union of 27 Member States, and the first former communist nation, to hold the EU’s six-month rotating presidency. As of 2007, three countries share the EU presidency over an 18-month, each taking its six months at the helm. (This works like some non-profit boards where the current president is aided by the immediate past president and the vice president.)

The Slovenian Ministry of Foreign Affairs commissioned ECDPM to undertake a study on children affected by armed conflict, an issue that falls under the priorities agreed to by the current EU presidential troika of Germany, Portugal and Slovenia under a programme called ‘Strengthening the European Union’s Role as a Global Partner for Development’. ECDPM presented the study entitled “Enhancing the EU Response to Children Affected by Armed Conflict”, as one of the kick off events of Slovenia’s new presidency. It was my opportunity to view ECDPM work first-hand. These are members from the panel discussion following the presentation.

The majority of members of audience, who were from international organizations and government agencies such as: the International Rescue Committee, Instituto Portugués de Apoio ao Desenvolvimento, and the European Commission’s Directorate of Development, responded favorably to the report while asking for more concrete recommendations in the future. Women impacted by armed conflict will be the next topic to be covered in this series that overlaps many issues faced by the developing nations.

From this gathering on such a sobering topic I was whisked to a more festive reception for the first official representative of the EU to the African Union (AU), Belgian Koen Vervaeke, who will be based in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. While Vervaeke is being called a full ‘ambassador,’ representing the EU Council and Commission, this formal title falls under a diplomatic corps that will only come into effect next January once the infamous EU Constitution, (once voted down by France and the Netherlands and now safely termed a “constitutional treaty ”) is ratified by all EU member states. Therefore, Mr Vervaeke, 47, who had been the director of the ‘Task Force Africa’ at the EU office for foreign affairs led by Javier Solana, is essentially a regional foreign minister with a mandate to talk on behalf of the entire EU.

Both events underline the intricacy of Brussels’s beltway politics, with their multilevel, multi-actor makeup. I continue to follow with interest this evolving experiment in democracy called the European Union, and to marvel and respect its machinations based upon extreme cooperative principles. I’m finding that US-, or even UK-style politics, seem too unilateral to be successful in today's global meshworks. While observing the layers of policy making here is akin to watching paint dry, this style of compromise and consensus is practiced as a high art, and along with the multiple language skills of its participants seems the way of the future. Having a seat at this feast speaks volumes to the fact that we unilingual, unilateral Americans seem ill-equipped indeed for truly global leadership.