The European Union is based on a large set of values, with roots in antiquity and in Christianity which over 2.000 years evolved into what we recognize today as the foundations of modem democracy the rule of law and civil society. This set of values has its own clear moral foundation and its obvious metaphysical roots, regardless of whether modern man admits it or not. Thus it cannot be said that the European Union Iacks its own spirit from which all the concrete principles on which it is founded grow. It appears, though, that this spirit is rather difficult to see. It seems too hidden behind the mountains of systemic, technical, administrative, economic, monetary and other measures that contain it. And thus, in the end, many people might be left with the understandable impression that the European Union - to put it a bit crudely - is no more than endless arguments over how many carrots can be exported from somewhere, who sets the amount, who checks it and who eventually punishes the delinquent who contravenes the regulations.
That is why it seems to me that perhaps the most important task facing the European Union today' is coming up with a new and genuinely clear reflection on what mi ght be called European identity, a new and genuinely clear articulation ofEuropean responsibility, an intensified interest in the very. meaning of European integration in all its wider implications for the contemporary world, and the recreation of its ethos or if you like, its charisma.

Simply reading the Maastricht Treaty, despite its historicai importance, will hardly win enthusiastic supporters for the European Union. Nor will it win patriots, people who will genuinely experience this complex organism as their native land or their home, or as one aspect of their home. If this great administrative work, which obviously should simplify life for all Europeans, is to hold together and stand various tests of time, then it must be visibly bonded by more than a set of rules and regulations...

I would welcome it, for instance, if the European Union were to establish a charter of its own that would clearly define the ideas on which it is founded, its meaning and the values it intends to embody..

If the citizens of Europe understand that this is not just an anonymous bureaucratic monster that wants to limit or even deny their autonomy but simply a new type of human community that actually broadens their freedom significantly, then the European Union need not fear for its future..."

(Extract from the speach made by the President of the Czech Republic to the European Parliament in Strasbourg on March 8th, 1994)