{"id":847250,"date":"2026-03-24T14:25:15","date_gmt":"2026-03-24T14:25:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/847250\/"},"modified":"2026-03-24T14:25:15","modified_gmt":"2026-03-24T14:25:15","slug":"europe-of-nations-not-a-european-empire-part-ii","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/847250\/","title":{"rendered":"Europe of Nations, Not a European Empire \u2014 Part II"},"content":{"rendered":"

In the first part<\/a> of this series, I argued that Europe is no longer debating its future\u2014it is fighting over it. The choice is clear: a Europe of sovereign nations or a centralized political project run from Brussels. This is not a theory. It is already reshaping how power is exercised.<\/p>\n

What is called \u2018competence creep\u2019 is not technical drift\u2014it is a systematic transfer of power. Step by step, competences are expanded without Treaty change, hollowing out the very legal framework that created the Union. If powers can be redefined without consent, sovereignty becomes fiction. Integration without sovereignty is not cooperation\u2014it is merely empire-building.<\/p>\n

This is why the Hungarian government launched a systematic review of EU competences last autumn. The goal is simple: expose where coordination has turned into control\u2014in economic policy, energy, migration, rule of law, and even in areas that define national identity, such as education, culture, and family policy.<\/p>\n

Economic Governance: From Cooperation to Financial Leverage<\/strong><\/p>\n

Economic governance has already crossed that line. What began as coordination under the European Semester has become financial pressure. EU funds are now tied to politically defined reforms, turning recommendations into de facto obligations. <\/p>\n

For instance, these recommendations are tied to access to EU funds through the Recovery and Resilience Facility (RRF). When payment of EU funds depends on implementing specific reforms (so-called \u2018milestones\u2019), coordination becomes a sanction-like pressure in practice. This is no longer cooperation\u2014it is conditionality by design.<\/p>\n

Energy Policy: Shared Competence under Pressure<\/strong><\/p>\n

Energy policy, which is a shared competence, has been openly weaponized. At the same time, the Treaties clearly guarantee that Member States retain the right to determine their own energy mix. <\/p>\n

Nonetheless, crisis instruments\u2014such as Article 122 TFEU\u2014are used to push political objectives, bypass unanimity, and override national choices. The RePowerEU regulation is a textbook case: sanctions policy disguised as internal market law to force Member States into unwanted energy decisions. Hungary has challenged this overreach before the Court of Justice of the EU and has proposed its annulment.<\/p>\n

Migration: From Crisis Response to Permanent Framework<\/strong><\/p>\n

Migration policy shows the same pattern. Temporary crisis measures have been turned into a permanent system. Under the new Pact, \u2018solidarity\u2019 means quotas or payments\u2014compulsion either way. Member States are no longer free to decide whom they admit. <\/p>\n

Meanwhile, judicial pressure has escalated to unprecedented levels: Hungary is facing a \u20ac1 million per day penalty for defining its borders. This is not a legal debate\u2014it is coercion.<\/p>\n

\n

\u2018Member States are no longer free to decide whom they admit\u2019<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Rule of Law: From Value to Conditionality<\/strong><\/p>\n

The rule of law has become the EU\u2019s most powerful political weapon. Under the banner of protecting values, Brussels has constructed a political mechanism that exerts pressure on governments it disagrees with\u2014often applying double standards and stretching legal bases beyond recognition. <\/p>\n

Instruments without a Treaty basis are normalized (Rule of Law Dialogue, Annual Rule of Law Report\u2014with recommendations), while existing ones are repurposed for political pressure (conditionality regulation, Article 7 TEU procedure). Cutting Hungarian universities off from Erasmus and Horizon programmes shows how far this logic has gone: the rule of law has become a tool of political coercion, openly used to influence national politics.<\/p>\n

Education, Culture, and Family Policy: The Foundations of Sovereignty<\/strong><\/p>\n

Even education, culture and family policy\u2014core elements of national identity\u2014are no longer untouched. Soft law, court rulings, and funding conditions are used to shape domestic choices. These are not technical policy areas\u2014they define identity, culture, and the future of nations. <\/p>\n

Expanding EU influence here is not coordination; it is an attempt to reshape societies from the outside.<\/p>\n

Respecting the Treaties<\/strong><\/p>\n

The pattern is clear: cooperation is systematically turned into leverage.<\/p>\n

Restoring sovereignty does not mean rejecting Europe\u2014it means restoring the Treaties and respecting Member States. The real threat to the Union is not the Europe of Nations, but a system that expands its powers without democratic consent. A Europe that ignores its own rules cannot expect its citizens to trust it.<\/p>\n

Related articles:<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In the first part of this series, I argued that Europe is no longer debating its future\u2014it is…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":847251,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5174],"tags":[242057,53444,5211,35,5428,2000,126898,43264,299,5187,241775,6657,228371,41279,7338,31619],"class_list":["post-847250","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-eu","tag-brussels-agenda","tag-coercion","tag-economic-policy","tag-energy","tag-energy-policy","tag-eu","tag-eu-funds","tag-eu-member-states","tag-europe","tag-european","tag-hungarian-government","tag-migration","tag-national-identity","tag-repowereu","tag-rule-of-law","tag-sovereignty"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/847250","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=847250"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/847250\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/847251"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=847250"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=847250"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=847250"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}