Euro meditarranean partnership Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words

Euro meditarranean partnership - Essay Example Most of the finance and economy of this area is being used on the defense and war with next-door countries and cultures. It had been a sad state of affair for a long time, dominating the world affairs, and still with no proper solution on hand. This does not mean that West did not spoil the situation. It did, and did so, many times, for its own benefit at times, and because of faulty judgments at other times. The Partnership began with the Barcelona declaration in 1995, and the financial commitment backing it was unprecedented. It began with the best of intentions though the new countries suspected all the intentions throughout. Its impact on economic, cultural, social and political scene that was prevalent during its initiation was apparent immediately and the interdependence of the countries involved has grown over the years immensely. It has its own long term and short-term goals. Short-term goals are: Th 1. Documenting the process of social engineering of the Mediterranean region. 2. Interpreting the interactions launched by Barcelona Declaration and assessing both the opportunities and constraints facing the regional community-building process. 3. Offering policy prescriptions for regional stability. Long-term goal is the 'institutionalization of a long-standing seminar. (Based on http://ies.berkeley.edu/research/projects/stability.html The Northern member-States of the European Union today are effective partners of the partnership though they had numerous reservations in the beginning, including the declaration of the EU that it would remain 'essentially a northern-central European entity' and here the Mediterranean states are definitely a minority, making the North, till now the major player, though the whole North cannot be regarded as one entity. France, for some time, thought that EU was shifting eastwards!!+ "It is important at the outset to acknowledge that it is not easy to discuss the northern European states en bloc. They have differing levels of interest, and different interests, in the Mediterranean and by no means always do they agree on what should be done there. France, which in the present context must be considered both northern and southern European, has had the most extensive involvement in the area in recent history, but British involvement has been substantial, too," http://www.cidob.org/castellano/publicaciones/Afers/37gillespie.cfm EMP has many lofty goals and intentions, some of which are already being processed. One of the main intentions to reduce tensions between Islam and West, in a meaningful way, erasing all the misunderstandings, and there are many of them, and trying to structure a regional identity and culture 'transcending national identities and cultures'. This is a difficult, far reaching task that has to be consciously constructed. EMP feels that regional integration is absolutely necessary keeping in mind the explosive political, cultural and