THE FACT THAT A PARALLEL CAN BE DRAWN BETWEEN THE PROCESS of European integration and an emerging sovereignty illustrates the political nature of European integration. No matter what definitions of sovereignty are used – and we will come back to that – it is clear that the European Community has one fundamental characteristic: it is a framework within which an attempt is being made to translate into action, through an institutional process, a complex of economic, social, and human aspirations. If politics consist in making possible what is desirable, then the Community does indeed deal with politics. What is important is the degree of originality and autonomy in the community, rather than references to such notions as ‘subject to international law’ or ‘political recognition’. Much has been written on the concept of sovereignty and on various aspects of its changing nature.

IF POLITICAL AND ECONOMIC ORGANIZATION BEYOND THE NATION-state is to prevail in the future, as it well might, what is to be the nature of relations between and among supranational units or regional blocs? Will such relations buttress or endanger world peace? To such broad questions there are no answers. But to a derivative set of more specific questions, which probe the same kinds of concerns, we can attempt answers. We can ask, and hope to discover, for example, how newly integrated units behave in their external relations, and we can also ask why they behave as they do. From this we can postulate a world of super-units successively entering the international system, and then perhaps say something about the impacts that such entrances are likely to make. While an exercise of this nature could be carried out simply for the sake of expanding theoretical knowledge, it could also be put to very practical and immediate use in lending perspective on the external relations of the European Communities and the impacts of the EEC on world affairs. This last, and most practical concern, is the object of this paper.

LET US ASK FIRST OF ALL A SIMPLE QUESTION – ‘WHY DOES ANYBODY want integration?’ There are usually two reasons. The first is: in order not to be killed by somebody with whom we fail to integrate. This argument for integration has been stressed by popular writers, such as Emery Reeves and others. It is a variation of the old German proverb which goes, loosely translated, ‘If thou wilt not my brother be, I'll smash thy skull most certainly.’ This notion that groups that do not integrate must destroy each other is a widespread but false belief. Luckily it is not true. The Scandinavians did not form any United States of the North, and yet they have not killed each other for a long time even though their ancestors were formidable warriors.