Hungarian American Coalition News, 2004 (13. évfolyam, 1-3. szám)
2004 / 2. szám
If Schuman's ideas and the principles giving rise to the modern European nations are still valid, then nobody can question the historical, cultural, linguistic coherence of the nation. Questioning this coherence would overturn the very foundation of the identity of the European nations. National identity is not threatened by the post-national development of states, which only demonstrates that the state is not the property of the ethnic group but of the citizenry, and if the citizenry is multi-cultural, than the state has equal responsibilities toward every ethnic or cultural group. This is where the problem of the Carpathian Basin arises. The cross-border reunification of the Hungarian nation is about the reintegration of the parts of the nation that are uniform in their thousand-year old language, culture and history, and this uniformity certainly extends beyond the post-1920 borders. Reunification can occur by creating structures that reach across borders and by recognizing autonomy as a right of these parts of the nation. Earlier, European integration meant international cooperation in economic, financial and border issues. Since Maastricht and Schengen, this cooperation has gained more definite dimensions in fiscal policy, legal and legislative affairs and security policy. The Treaty of Nice concluded in 2000, beyond the compromises concerning the enlargement of the Union, represented a moral enrichment along Schuman's principles: this was the first time that the protection of minorities and disadvantaged social groups entered the inventory of Union principles. Solutions for national problems within the enlarged framework of the Union do not have to fit into the norms of the past half-century of integration. We have to start with the foundations. If closer cooperation among West European nations was caused by their rude awakening following World War II, why shouldn’t the present-day enlargement occasion a similar awakening - one which envisions new cooperation among the nations of the Carpathian Basin? If Churchill and Schuman - a Briton and a Frenchman - were able to formulate ideas that diverged from the political and military positions of their ancestors, why couldn't something similar occur in the Carpathian Basin within a European Union based on Schuman's principles? 6 - Hungarian American Coalition - June 2004 The largest Hungarian communities beyond the borders of Hungary (around 1990)
