Victor,
This
you are here entering a very interesting problem seen from my
point.
Switzerland is not a EU member country, but I feel that is not the same
as the Swiss are not "members of the modern World". Switzerland has been famous
as an independent meeting point between countries in war between each
other. How many meetings have not been in Geneve, Zurich and Bern where peace
discussions have been settled. I presume that Swiss officials have been
very much involved in these talks in order to achieve all those goals. That
a country wants to maintain their independence does not mean that they are
isolationistic.
Neither Norway (or Liechtenstein and Iceland) is a EU member.
But Norway is anyway probably the country which has implemented and followed up
most EU regulations. The reason is maybe, as far as I have understood, that in
Norway "a law is a law" and must be followed every inch. In many EU countries
people and officials have a more relaxed understanding about especially the EU
regulations. In Norway e.g. one will hardly find any cow barn without three
entrances (one for the farmer, one for the cows and one for visitors). The
reason for Norway to act like this is mainly EU demands in order
to aviod problems with export to the EU countries.
Norwegians do not want EU membership because this would probably lead to
lower living standards and to give up a lot of achievments on medical and
social fields. Even if Europe is small there are a lot of differencies from
south to north and west to east. One example is that skin creams made for
Central European market does not fit for most light skin Norwegians. Anyway the
EU regulations says how the instructions should be written and where it should
be sold. Norwegians are blindly following up and thousands are getting skin
damages.
My
personal opintion is that the EU will need to change after some time.
Europe is consisting from a too big mixture of nations with different
understanding on things. To create a custom union is one thing, but to create
one country as some has in mind I do not think will last long if it comes into
being. EU came into being because the borders became too high, migration inside
Europe increased and everybody wished less bureaucracy. But as bigger a
body is becoming, more papers are required.
Jan
Can our
European members fill me in on the status of
Switzerland? With so many
countries clammoring to join
the EU, many that may not even been European
(Cyprus,
depending on who you talk to) an obviously European
country
seems to be isolating itself. I know the Swiss
are very independently
minded, but i mean come on!
Isn't it time to join the modern world? What do
you
think?