Word: giscards
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BELGIUM Democracy Rules Under the chairmanship of former French President Valéry Giscard d'Estaing, representatives of the 15 current members of the European Union, as well as the 13 states applying to join, met to discuss reforms to the 45-year-old organization. Even as the Convention discussed how to make the E.U. more democratic and efficient, critics denounced the decision to allow a 12-member Presidium, not the full 105-delegate meeting, to decide the agenda...
...institutions without giving up the democratic control that now resides mostly in national capitals? How to untangle the often overlapping competences of local, regional, national and Continental governments? At a scheduled pace of one session a month under the stern leadership of former French President Valéry Giscard d'Estaing, the Convention has a Herculean task to complete within a year's time...
...same heads of government, meeting last December at the Palace of Laeken in Brussels, plumped for Giscard to head the Convention. Though he is certainly an ideal avatar of French grandeur, with his aristocratic bearing and keen intelligence, many have questioned Giscard's credentials for pointing the E.U. toward a future of greater democratic legitimacy. Before Thursday's session kicked off, many Convention members were up in arms over Giscard's proposed rules of procedure, which give the 12-person Presidium strong powers for setting the debate. "Giscard knows he's not a popular man in this house," says Andrew...
...Disunity over the measure was not limited to the left, however. Several leading conservatives - including former Gaullist Premier Edouard Balladur and former President Valéry Giscard d'Estaing - broke ranks to vote for the bill, while 30 others aided it by abstaining. That conservative support reflected beliefs that French political and economic modernization lies in extending previous transfers of decision-making power to regional authorities. Earlier French devolution programs were productive. But in tailoring decentralization to regional particularities, the Corsica bill challenges constitutional tenets of national indivisibility and equality...
...member states' fiscal behavior. But the idea behind that is more political than economic: that consultations on numbers will evolve into decision making in concert, first on domestic policies and then in the foreign and defense fields. "When we have the same currency," says former French President Valery Giscard d'Estaing, "we will feel the need for common institutions...