New prospects for cooperation

In Toulon in 2007, a French Mediterranean Union project was launched within the framework of the Barcelona Process. Fully aware of the limits of that process, the Mediterranean Union outlined four main objectives: to control and manage migration; protect the environment; promote joint development so as to close the gap between the two shores of the Mediterranean; and fight corruption, organized crime, and terrorism (Henry 2008, 38). Politically, however, the Mediterranean Union was primarily aimed at mending the fraught relationship that had evolved between France and the Arab world over the course of their postcolonial interactions, particularly when it came to Algeria, and to correct the perception that French foreign policy was tilted in Israel’s favour and geared towards the Atlantic (Mohsen-Finan 2009,98).

Over time, the French project went through several revisions. Thus, in a speech delivered on 23 October 2007 in Tangiers, French president Nicolas Sarkozy emphatically stated that “the future of Europe [...] lies in the south,” and that only by going back to its Mediterranean roots can the European project “recover the sense it should never have lost, which is that of a civilizing project.”^[1] At the same time, he introduced a new vision that saw a common horizon for both Europe and Africa: “Eurafrica” he called it—le pivot de I’Eurafrique (Sarkozy 2007)—and it would favour an opening to the East.

Furthermore, and this was certainly the most innovative aspect of the French policy proposal, Sarkozy (2007) underscored the essence that is common to Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, locating this kernel in a culture of love, peace, and fraternity.^[2] And, finally, anticipating the resistance the French initiative might have faced from other EU countries, Sarkozy took care to point out that “this Mediterranean Union project will not be a French project: it will be a project for us all, developed by us all.”

Yet, despite this broad, inclusive appeal, the French project did meet with resistance, especially from Spain and Germany. This led to a new, jointly developed project being put together, which happened in Hannover in March 2008, when the proposal was submitted to the European Council (Mohsen-Finan 2009, 99).

This document, which allowed 27 EU Member States and the European Commission to join the project, proposed the creation of a Union for the Mediterranean (UfM), conceived according to the German Chancellor as “an EU project with the South Mediterranean Countries.” It therefore consisted of extending the Barcelona Process by lending it new impulse. (Ibid.)

And “instead of defining general spheres of cooperation,” it would allocate aid to support the development of the southern Mediterranean countries by way of “concrete projects” (ibid., scare quotes in the original) to fight pollution, build new roadways, and create a Mediterranean energy market, among other initiatives.

But development aid cannot be reduced to financial aid: for even more important to its outcome is the form of government under which it is implemented. And with that recognition we are brought back to the basic problems of development policy, which need to be probed more deeply before we can hope to level off the asymmetry between North and South and close the development gap separating the two shores of the Mediterranean. Our investigation, in other words, will try to show that economic development hinges on the ability to push the Arab regimes’ forms of government towards democracy. To this end, however, we will first have to understand the challenges faced in bringing about this transformation.

• [1] Translated from the French original: “Car l’avenir de l’Europe, je n’hésite pas à le dire, il est au Sud. En tournant le dos à la Méditerranée, l’Europe se couperait non seulement de ses sources intellectuelles, morales, spirituelles, mais également de son futur. Car c’est en Méditerranée que l’Europe gagnera sa prospérité, sa sécurité, qu’elle retrouvera l’élan que ses pères fondateurs lui avaient donné. / C’est à travers la Méditerranée que l’Europe pourra de nouveau faire entendre son message à tous les hommes. C’est par la Méditerranée, dans la prise de conscience de ce qu’elle lui doit, que l’Europe retrouvera son identité, que son projet retrouvera le sens qu’il n’aurait jamais dû perdre, qui est celui d’un projet de civilisation” (Sarkozy 2007). 2 The European Union project of 2008 was meant to work in parallel with the 1995 EuroMediterranean Partnership (EUROMED), or Barcelona Process. So conceived, it sought to revive a multilateral partnership encompassing forty-three countries in Europe and the Mediterranean basin: the EU’s twenty-seven member states and sixteen Mediterranean partner countries from North Africa, the Middle East, and the Balkans (Kneissel 2011,6). “During his electoral campaign, Nicholas Sarkozy said that the Mediterranean Union would be modelled on the European Union with a shared judicial area and common institutions. Furthermore, he saw Turkish membership of the Mediterranean Union as an alternative to membership of the European Union. The first secretary-general of that very Union, Ahmed Masadeh, quit his post on January 26, 2011, stating that ‘the general conditions against which he accepted to assume the job have changed’” (ibid., quoting from Jordan Times Editor 2011).
• [2] In making the point that these three monotheistic religions share a common core in the message of love, Sarkozy quoted Antigone: “I was made for fellowship in love, not fellowship in hate” (Sophocles 1906, 17 [line 523]). The French original: “C’est un effort pour que chacun cesse de transmettre la haine pour transmettre l’amour, cet amour qui est déjà dans le cri d’Antigone, il y a 2500 ans: ‘Je suis née pour partager l’amour, non pour partager la haine.’ Cet amour qui est l’essence du judaïsme, cet amour qui est l’essence du christianisme, cet amour qui est l’essence de l’islam et que les fanatiques n’ont eu de cesse de vouloir étouffer, cet amour qui est dans notre culture, qui est dans notre pensée, qui est dans notre religion, dans notre art, dans notre poésie mais qui n’est pas assez dans les cœurs parce que ce sont des cœurs blessés que les cœurs des peuples de la Méditerranée, des cœurs déchirés par d’horribles souffrances et le souvenir d’atroces douleurs” (Sarkozy 2007). 2 The French original: “Ce projet de l’Union de la Méditerranée ne sera pas le projet de la France. Ce sera le projet de tous. Elaboré par tous” (Sarkozy 2007).