• Hotznplotzn@lemmy.sdf.org
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    6 hours ago

    The law and politics of a hypothetical application by a country geographically outside of Europe

    […] a European state does not mean one limited to the continent of Europe. Before 1985, Greenland was—via Denmark—part of the European Union’s predecessor the European Economic Community (EEC) despite being on the North American continental shelf […] Indeed, the European Union expressly recognises nine “outermost regions”—some as far away as the Indian Ocean—as part of the European Union. And in addition to this there are 13 overseas territories with a special relationship with the EU, including Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon, which is just off the coast of, well, Canada […]

    In essence, a European state need not, from a geographic perspective, be confined to Europe or even part of Europe. It would appear being European is state of mind […]

    The real answer is not formal, but political. If Canada really wanted to join, and the member states and the European institutions wanted Canada to join, then a way would be found. The definition of “European state” could be fudged […]

    What could […] evolve [as an alernative to Canada’s EU membership] is an entity that joins together the European Union with Canada and other non-members such as the UK, Norway and Iceland—and perhaps even Greenland—and that this entity could be placed on a formal footing. This would be outwith the EU treaties but would complement the EU bloc. And it would not then matter if the “Europe” label applied or not.

  • BestBouclettes@jlai.lu
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    2 days ago

    It would be fucking funny for Canada to join the EU, adopt the Euro and get into Schengen before the UK.

  • MoonlightFox@lemmy.world
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    2 days ago

    This would be great and hilarious.

    Kinda like how Putin wanted less NATO influence and then Finland and Sweden joined after the Ukraine war.

    FAFO.

  • galoisghost@aussie.zone
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    2 days ago

    Australia is really missing the boat here. Too busy trying to be a small target instead of getting ahead of the game. We’re already part of Eurovision FFS

  • Lemmist@lemm.ee
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    2 days ago

    That would be cool. And I am not an EU country citizen, but from a country that has some chance to become one eventually.

  • intelisense@lemm.ee
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    2 days ago

    This would be nice, but it’s not going to help Canada that much in the stupid trade war that Trump just started for the same reason the U.K. was never going to make up for trade lost with the E.U. by forging new trade agreements with the U.S.