INTEGRATION AND SOVEREIGNTY
When studying integration, it is very important not to confuse the legal or institutional form of the integration process with the actual level of integration of a social system.
To the casual observer, the sort of unity under discussion in the integration process resides in the formation of common political institutions with the power to make binding decisions, which unite the previously independent units. Thus, integration would be interpreted as the process by which the formerly independent units hand over a fraction of their sovereignty to common institutions. Here we touch upon the sovereignty of states and the eventual transfer of a part of this sovereignty to another political authority.
Sovereignty is an attribute of a state, which refers to its right to exercise absolute jurisdiction over its own territory. It is the claim to political authority based on territory and autonomy. In international relations, states as sovereign units have the right to be independent with respect to other states. A sovereign state claims a right to exercise internal sovereignty over its territory and external sovereignty in terms of relations with other states, no one has the right to tell a state how to conduct its domestic or foreign affairs. States differ in power, but as sovereign entities they are legal equals. In other words, sovereignty is a legal term describing the formal authority of a state, but it does not provide information about what a state actually does or the extent of its capacities.
Thus, taking integration as a measure of sovereignty would imply that all states are integrated to the same degree, seeing that all states are equally sovereign. But is this really the case? Are all states integrated to the same degree? The answer to this question is definitely no. But that does not take away the fact that all states are sovereign. This means that we need to look at the actual capacity of a social system to take effective collective decisions, to solve problems and resolve conflicts among its members. Putting it differently, we need to observe integration as a measure of political unity. This way, we get totally different results. Not every state has the same capacity to solve problems or to resolve conflicts. In a similar vein, the stipulations of a treaty creating an international organization might well require a sovereignty transfer of the participating states, however, whether this guarantees that the organization in question will be able to exercise its authority is a different question altogether.
Thus, it is necessary to distinguish what the legal texts stipulate, and the actual level of integration of a social system. This need is especially felt during the early phases of integration, which are in general characterised by a relative lack of legal rules and institutions. Besides, it is evenly possible that states are willing to transfer a part of their sovereignty to a higher authority, but that this does not render this higher authority capable to do what it is supposed to do.
Another point is that if a state is able to transfer sovereignty to another authority, this state is equally capable of reversing this transfer. The unity resulting from integration does not simply entail the creation of more or less sovereign political institutions.
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