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PASTOR GENERAL'S REPORT, APRIL 5, 1985
PAGE 7
ON THE WORLD SCENE
IBERIA JOINS THE MARKET At the end of last week, on March 30, the European
Community heads of state and government took the last steps to open the way
for Spain and Portugal to enter the EC on January 1, 19ij6. A compromise was
worked out with Greece whereby it will be granted compensation for expected
product competition from the two Iberian countries. Two other Mediterran
ean nations, France and Italy, were also granted adjustment aid, but it was
Athens' objections which had been most difficult to deal with. The follow
ing excerpts from an editorial in the April 3, 1985 CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONI
TOR give an overview of the impact of the expansion of the EC from ten to
twelve next year:
The admission of Portugal and Spain into the European Common Mar
ket marks an important historical turning point for Europe•••• A
new 12-nation Common Market, instead of the current 10-nation
market, will eventually become one of the largest cohesive trad
ing communities in the world, with a combined population of over
325 million people. Moreover, the linkup--when it becomes offi
cial early next year--will cement most of affluent and industrial
northern and western Europe with the less affluent and more agri
cultural regions of southern Europe. The linkup also provides
western Europe an important new political and economic "bridge"
to North Africa, in the sense that the Iberian Peninsula--cul
turally and historically--has as much looked southward over the
centuries to the Mediterranean Sea and North Africa as to the Eu
ropean Continent itself••••
The admission of the two nations into the Common Market will not
come without major challenges for the rest of the trading commu
nity. The two nations are among the poorer nations of Europe.
Both have high unemployment. That means that the rest of the
Economic Community will presumably have to provide special finan
cial assistance for the two nations over time. Moreover, both
are major agricultural producers.
It was this latter element
that led Greece for so long to oppose their entry into the Common
Market••••
Will the inclusion of the somewhat poorer heavily agricultural
nations of southern Europe impede Europe's movement toward unifi
cation? The initial impetus for the Common Market began with the
industrial nations of Europe. The nature of the trading communi
ty has thus changed substantially since 1957.... Still, it is
hard to discount the significance of the Common Market's new
linkage with Portugal and Spain. How does one measure a historic
milestone? Many political rulers over the centuries have dreamed
of a United Europe. The Continent is still a long way from such a
vision. But all the same, being able to drive from Paris east
into West Germany, or southeast into Italy, and now, southwest
into the Iberian Peninsula, through a common trading community,
must be considered no little achievement in the long march of
European history.
For Spain, the entry into the Community is even more of a political mile
stone than an economic one. It marks the end of Spain's long semi-isolation
from the rest of Europe. An interesting analysis of this was published in