Abstract

NEW POWER FOR 'OLD EUROPE'

The article focuses on the European Union (EU) as a balancing power against the United States. In the capital of the EU, an unprecedented challenge to longstanding practices of American industry is unfolding. It is signaling its determination to unhinge U.S. industry from what remains of regulations limiting the poisons in our water, our bodies and our air. The EU has been steadily transforming itself from a facilitator of trade to a sophisticated geopolitical power. Over the past decade, EU member states have ceded governing and enforcement authority to Brussels in areas ranging from environmental regulation to food safety, accounting standards, telecommunications policy and oversight of corporate mergers. As a result, U.S. companies that do business in Europe--which remains America's largest export market--are quickly learning that "old Europe" is now wielding new world power. Just this year, U.S. manufacturers of such goods as chemicals, cars and cosmetics have been confronted with E.U. regulations that force a choice: Either conform to the EU's standards of pre-emptive screening for toxicity or risk sacrificing the European market.