Does the EU have teeth?

The US constitution provides a federal guarantee to the states of a republican form of government.

The idea is that the general government could enforce that requirement, and that idea was involved during and after the Civil War to justify Union actions against the states of the Confederacy.

The EU provides an analogous guarantee to its member states, but the measures available to fulfill that guarantee are rather less potent. Or drastic.

Hungary’s far-right government vilifies Finland over rule of law inquiry.

Finland has pledged to pursue a hearing into alleged breaches of the rule of law by Hungary’s far-right government after a campaign of vilification led by the prime minister, Viktor Orbán.

Orbán and his spokesman, Zoltán Kovács, have launched a series of attacks in recent weeks ranging from criticism of the level of domestic violence in Finland to the purchase of strategically important Finnish islands by Russian oligarchs.

As the member state holding the EU’s rolling presidency until the new year, the Finnish government is responsible for chairing meetings of the member states and pushing forward the bloc’s agenda.

The European parliament took the unprecedented step last September of asking member states to determine whether Hungary had breached the bloc’s founding values in its overhaul of the country’s judiciary and alleged failure to respect freedom of expression, religion and equal treatment under the law.

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When its government assumed the presidency on 1 July it said it would respect the parliament’s vote in favour of pursuing the so-called article 7 process, under which Hungary could theoretically face the “nuclear” sanction of having its voting rights in EU institutions suspended.

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A spokesman for the Finnish government said the latest developments would not prevent it from “taking forward the ongoing procedures concerning the rule of law as appropriate”.

The spokesman said: “The article 7 procedure has been triggered, in the case of Hungary, by the European parliament. The treaty indicates that the next step will be a hearing in the council of the country concerned.

“The Finnish presidency believes Hungary has the right to be heard and that it is also in its best interest.”

The spokesman said the parliament had voted “nearly a year ago, so we think it is high time to move to the hearings. For some time already, a large number of member states have been demanding that hearings should begin.

“The article 7 procedure should not be seen as a process directed against a particular member state. The rule of law is part of our shared value basis and something that unites us all. We believe we must cherish it. The Finnish presidency intends to promote rule of law issues through a positive and constructive approach.”

Fabian Zuleeg, from the European Policy Centre, a Brussels thinktank said the stakes for Orbán over the rule of law would be greater if France successfully argued that EU funding should be linked to respect for the bloc’s treaties.

“A greater focus on rule of law was always going to produce a counter reaction by Hungary, which under Orbán has always argued that its democracy is as good as anywhere else in Europe, and that any comments or actions reflect different political ideologies,” he said.

“But the real political fight is still to come when the EU gets into the final phase of agreeing the next multi-annual financial framework. Here, a lot is at stake for Orbán if funding is made conditional on rule of law, which a number of western countries want to push for.”

Europe must stop this disgrace: Viktor Orbán is dismantling democracy

What, then, should the EU do? 

Immediately, Weber should not be made commission president – mainly because he does not have the top-level governmental experience, but also because he has legitimated Orbán’s dismantling of Hungarian democracy by keeping Fidesz in the EPP. 

The EPP itself, following a report by its three “wise men” (who will be three blind mice if they don’t see in Hungary what I have briefly summarised here), should finally boot out Fidesz. 

This action has much wider importance, since a moral and political imperative of our time is for civilised centre-right parties to draw a clear line between them and xenophobic, populist extremists.

Then the EU must stop this tragic farce of its own funds being used to undermine European values. 

It should appoint as European public prosecutor the Romanian Laura Codruţa Kövesi, who knows exactly what post-communist, east European corruption looks like, and make signing up to scrutiny by that European public prosecutor a condition for receipt of those funds. 

It should also move to distribute more EU funding directly to local government and civil society, rather than letting it be used as a huge, centralised slush fund by a corrupt party-state.

Not least, all European institutions and heads of government must keep the spotlight on this tragedy in the heart of Europe. 

Orbán himself is never constrained by excessive politeness; nor should they be. What the EU does about Hungary matters not just for Hungarians but for Europe as a whole. 

The continent of Europe may have many different kinds of regime, but the European Union must be a community of democracies.