Is the European Union a Country?

The European Union is not a sovereign country, despite performing many functions normally associated with one. Its members share political institutions, economic rules, freedom of movement, and, in many cases, a currency and open internal borders. The central question is why these similarities do not make the EU a sovereign state.

The EU had 28 member states at the time of the video in 2016. The United Kingdom had voted to leave but had not completed its withdrawal. The explanation therefore describes the EU before Brexit.

The Schengen Area allows travel between participating European countries without routine internal border controls. Not every EU member belonged to Schengen. Four members were legally required to join but had not yet done so, while two had treaty exemptions.

The Eurozone consists of EU countries that use the euro as their sole legal currency. Some other members were required to adopt the euro after meeting specified economic conditions, while two countries held treaty exemptions allowing them to remain outside the currency union.

EU citizens can generally live and work across member states without obtaining ordinary work visas. Together with common economic and aviation markets, these rights give the EU several practical characteristics of a unified country, even though its members remain separate states.

The European Parliament is directly elected by citizens of EU member states. Each member country elects Members of the European Parliament (MEPs), giving the EU a representative institution spanning national borders.

The European Parliament cannot independently initiate and enact EU legislation. The European Commission proposes legislation, while the Parliament and Council of the European Union participate in approving it. This distributes legislative authority among different institutions.

The European Commission performs functions resembling those of an executive branch. It develops legislative proposals and operates within the EU's wider governing structure, although its authority differs from that of a national government.

The Council of the European Union represents member-state governments rather than directly elected European citizens. It brings together national government ministers, while the Parliament represents citizens through elected MEPs. Both institutions must approve legislation under the ordinary legislative procedure.

The EU has institutions comparable to those of a national government. Its political structure includes separate institutions, agencies, leaders, economic arrangements, and a legislative process. The existence of these institutions makes the EU more integrated than an ordinary international organization.

Being a country and being a sovereign state are not necessarily the same thing. Scotland is considered a country but is not independently sovereign. It forms part of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, which holds sovereignty internationally.

The Declaratory Theory of Statehood identifies four requirements for sovereign statehood. These are a permanent population, defined territory, an independent government, and the capacity to conduct relations with other states. The video examines the EU against each requirement.

The EU clearly meets the permanent-population requirement. More than 500 million people lived within its member states at the time. If treated as one country, the EU would have ranked third globally by population and near the top of the world economy by GDP.

A sovereign state's territory does not have to be free of competing territorial claims. The video uses North and South Korea, which both claim territory controlled by the other, to demonstrate that overlapping claims do not automatically prevent statehood.

The EU has a recognizable territory, although that territory also belongs to its member states. Every area considered EU territory falls within an existing national jurisdiction. The overlap complicates its classification but does not necessarily disqualify it from having defined territory.

The United Kingdom demonstrates that overlapping political territories can exist within a sovereign state. Its territory comprises England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland, each possessing a distinct political and national identity. The video uses this arrangement to show why the EU's overlapping territorial jurisdictions are not, by themselves, decisive.

The United States provides another comparison through its federal system. American states possess their own governments and territorial jurisdictions while operating under a larger sovereign federal government. The video argues that political territory can belong simultaneously to different levels of government.

The EU's open internal borders make its territory function much like that of a single country. Removing routine border controls between participating states reduces the practical visibility of national boundaries, even though those boundaries and national jurisdictions continue to exist.

The EU's strongest obstacle to sovereign statehood is the independence of its government. The Declaratory Theory requires a government possessing an essential degree of independence rather than merely exercising authority delegated by another sovereign power.

The EU derives its governing authority from its member states. Its institutions operate through powers granted by sovereign national governments. Consequently, the states remain the ultimate source of the EU's authority rather than being politically subordinate to an independently sovereign European government.

The video distinguishes the EU from sovereign states by examining where political authority originates. In its explanation, sovereign governments ultimately derive legitimacy from their people, while the EU's authority is granted through agreements among already sovereign countries.

Member states can legally withdraw from the European Union. The EU has an established framework for leaving the organization, as demonstrated by the United Kingdom's decision to pursue withdrawal. This makes membership legally reversible rather than necessarily permanent.

Constituent parts of sovereign countries generally do not possess the same straightforward legal right to leave. The video contrasts EU withdrawal with separation from countries such as the United Kingdom, where independence would ordinarily require constitutional or political changes rather than simply invoking an existing membership-withdrawal procedure.

John Locke's concept of the Right to Revolution provides a different justification for political separation. The philosopher argued that people may resist or replace governments that fail to protect their rights or become threats to those rights. The video distinguishes this moral justification from the EU's formal legal withdrawal process.

The EU's continued existence ultimately depends on its members choosing to preserve it. Because the organization was established through agreements among sovereign states, those states retain the ability to withdraw. The video treats this dependence on member consent as a defining difference between the EU and an independently sovereign government.

The EU nevertheless partially satisfies the independent-government requirement in practical terms. Its institutions perform many ordinary governmental functions, including developing rules, administering common policies, and coordinating economic activity. The weakness lies primarily in the ultimate source of their authority.

The EU satisfies the requirement of being able to conduct foreign relations. It maintains diplomatic relationships with countries outside the union and participates in international agreements and organizations.

The EU has diplomatic representatives and receives representatives from other governments. Ambassadors, diplomatic missions, and formal agreements allow it to act internationally as a distinct political entity, rather than requiring every external relationship to operate exclusively through individual member states.

Most foreign relations remain the responsibility of individual EU members. France, Germany, and other members continue conducting their own diplomacy. The EU's collective international relationships exist alongside these national arrangements rather than entirely replacing them.

Meeting the practical criteria for statehood does not automatically make an entity sovereign. The EU possesses a permanent population, identifiable territory, functioning government, and foreign-relations capabilities. Nevertheless, the video concludes that these characteristics are insufficient to establish it as a sovereign state.

Sovereign statehood depends partly on collective political recognition. Unlike a naturally occurring physical phenomenon, statehood is a category created and maintained by human institutions. Its definition therefore depends on political acceptance rather than exclusively on measurable characteristics.

The video compares sovereignty to money as an example of collective belief creating practical authority. Currency functions because people recognize its value, while borders and governments function because societies recognize their authority. The comparison explains why formal statehood criteria alone cannot settle every question of sovereignty.

Existing sovereign countries serve as the principal institutions recognizing new sovereign states. Rather than determining recognition through a worldwide public vote, the international system relies heavily on whether established states acknowledge another entity's sovereignty.

International recognition helps determine whether an entity is treated as a sovereign state. The extent to which existing sovereign countries recognize another entity matters to its standing in international society. The video presents this recognition as a crucial element missing from the EU's claim to sovereign status.

The EU is not internationally recognized as a sovereign state. Although it acts independently in certain areas, other countries do not treat it as a single sovereign country replacing its members. The video identifies this absence of recognition as a decisive reason it remains a union rather than a state.

The EU was not designed primarily to become an independent sovereign country. Its political arrangements allow member states to cooperate closely while retaining their sovereignty. The video argues that sovereign statehood is neither the EU's established status nor its stated institutional objective.

Political integration and sovereignty are separate questions. The EU can centralize substantial economic, legislative, and diplomatic functions without becoming a country. Its example shows that the extent of common government does not necessarily determine where ultimate sovereignty resides.

Supranational organizations and subnational governments can both resemble sovereign states. The EU exercises authority above its members in certain areas, while constituent governments within federal countries exercise substantial authority below the national level. Both arrangements complicate attempts to distinguish countries using governmental functions alone.

American states illustrate the difficulty of drawing a strict boundary between sovereign and non-sovereign political entities. They possess territorial jurisdictions, permanent populations, governments, and significant constitutional powers. The video argues that they satisfy many practical characteristics associated with countries despite remaining part of the United States.

The discussion extends to whether the United States itself should be classified as a country. Wendover Productions collaborated with RealLifeLore on a companion examination of American federalism and statehood, exploring how individual American states compare with sovereign countries.

Wendover Productions experienced approximately hundredfold subscriber growth during 2016. The creator reported beginning the year with about 3,000 subscribers and ending it with nearly 300,000, establishing the channel's rapid expansion during the year in which this video was released.