Good day all and happy belated birthday to
/MensLib!.
So, we’ve had some substantial growth over the past year, which is great. But that also means that some of the issues that plague the sub are becoming much more noticeable. One of these problems is how we talk about race.
There seems to be this underlying assumption that when we talk about “men”, we are talking about
white men specifically unless stated otherwise. That’s something that we’ve wanted to avoid here as it’s a pretty prevalent sentiment in most gender discussions, whether that be in the feminism camp or, especially, with the men’s rights activist camp. We try to talk about issues concerning non-white men as well, meaning that we often discuss race and racism.
That said, there is one aspect of race that we haven’t and desperately need to tackle. And that is the concept of
whiteness.
So, what is “whiteness”? Whiteness can be best described as a set of privileges, experiences, and characteristics attached to the white race and those who are deemed white while simultaneously excluding those who are perceived as non-white.
So, much like race, which is mostly agreed upon by
anthropologists as not having a biological basis, whiteness itself is a… ahem…
social construct. Race is much like currency in that it doesn’t inherently have value and it only has value because we arbitrarily assign it value.
This, obviously, isn't to say that white people don't exist. Irish, British, Germany, Swedish and other European nationalities exist. White people in the US, Canada, and Australia do indeed exist. However, the idea of a clear genetic set of traits that would constitute someone being deemed "white" is hotly contested if not outright denied.
The concept of “race” as we colloquially define and understand it did not exist until relatively recently in human history. Before that, people classified and identified themselves based on things like nationality and tribe.
When African peoples were brought over during the slave trade, their languages, traditions, and cultures were systematically erased in favor of a collective black race. Several generations of slavery led to many African Americans not being able to easily trace their lineage to a specific country, unlike many white people. In lieu of this, “blackness” was constructed as a contrast to whiteness; an “other”. It was adopted by black Americans to identify a shared experience and history in a world that denigrates those of African descent in favor of white people of European descent.
Whiteness is built on exclusion.
How does whiteness manifest? How does it persist? Through legislation, infrastructure, social and class mobility, language, and certain flavors of pseudoscience, whiteness establishes itself as the dominant and default experience and perspective, normalizing itself while racializing and othering non-whites.
Legislative endeavors such as the
Pocahontas Exception and the various Naturalization Acts have sought to create delineations of different racial and ethnic groups, thus endowing certain (namely white) individuals with rights and privileges not afforded to other racial groups. The most sought after of these rights is citizenship, wherein some wished citizenship in the States and elsewhere attempted to appeal to racist sensibilities with varying success. The legal and social status of "white" served as a mighty temptation for which many abandoned their own cultural roots and kin to obtain.
And this is to say nothing of Jim Crow laws, the
Chinese Exclusion Act, the
Japanese incarceration camps during WWII,
Operation Wetback, and the legalized compulsory sterilization in
the US and even
Canada. And of course, there’s the contemporary camps holding immigrants at the US southern border and the US criminal justice system, which while not explicitly targeting black and brown individuals with policing,
still has massive bias towards them by
linking one’s race with their predilection for criminality.
Wealth, land, and resources were largely accumulated by the US and Europe through centuries of exploitation of African slaves, Indigenous peoples, settlers, immigrants and nations. The exploitation that led to the acquisition of these commodities consisted of rather brutally violent means like the spread of disease, war, expulsion, slavery and even attempts at genocide.
The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade produced copious amounts of profit due to the abundance of the unpaid labor of African slaves. Even after the "abolishment" of slavery, an exception for prisoners was explicitly carved out in the 13th Amendment which disproportionally affects black and Latino people. This allows for the continuous exploitation of the labor of, primarily, people of color, despite being a supposed "post-racial" society. Slavery, in the United States, is still very much legal. This, combined with other policies and endeavors by governing bodies like
redlining has ensured that generations of white families--including the poor and working-class ones--
have more wealth than their black counterparts despite attempts to
close that gap.
On the subject of redlining, wealth distribution also has its effects on neighborhoods in two prominent ways:
gentrification and
white flight. The movement of wealthy and middle-class whites between neighborhoods helps to cement racial stratification along class lines. This affects black, Asian, Latinx, and other non-white families.
Class stratification also worsens the education and career opportunities of certain racial groups. Good education is denied or severely limited for poor blacks--though even in school, black students still
suffer--while Asian people are pitted against them as the “
model minority” despite them
often not meeting the standards placed upon them by the white ruling class as a “model minority”. Affirmative action, a practice often
misunderstood by opponents as “the thing that gives black people jobs and spots in good schools even when they don’t deserve them, thus depriving qualified white people of getting those opportunities”, is arguably the main force driving the wedge between Asian and Black people despite
white women being the disproportionate benefactors while also staunchly opposing it.
Modern methods of maintaining a racial hierarchy are mostly subtle with little-to-no open calls for outright discrimination but can trace their origins to more explicit means. While anthropologists and geneticists are mostly in agreement that the classification of “race” doesn’t have much, if any, biological basis, great pains have been taken to ascribe “scientific” (now rightfully dubbed pseudoscience) foundations onto race to expressly justify the hierarchies that have already been put into place.
The taxonomy of race has gone through numerous iterations, many of which revolve around skeletal--particularly cranial--measurements. The central idea of white (read: primarily descendant from Europe) superiority preceded attempts to justify it through science, much like with religion before the Enlightenment Period.
Two of the most well-known dubious areas of science popularized during the Enlightenment were Phrenology and Physiognomy. Both pseudosciences sought to derive personality traits, intelligence, and propensity for moral actions from skull shape and size (Phrenology) and facial features (Physiognomy). It is not a coincidence that these fields of study, championed by white men, attributed negative personality traits and the inclination to perform immoral acts to those with non-white facial features and bone structures, while the features linked to virtue and high intelligence were, conveniently, those commonly held by those of European descent.
Currently, "race science" has made an
unfortunate and
unwelcome comeback through the revitalization of the IQ debate. The intelligence quotient, originally used as a measure to determine the developmental needs of students,
has since been co-opted by eugenicists and race scientists alike once coming stateside, creating a false narrative of the intellectual inferiority of those of African descent whether being in or outside the US.
This is important to mention because a common occurrence in racial discourse is the denial of the existence of non-American racism or downplaying of its severity. While the US has its own brand of racism that is abhorrent on its own, make no mistake. White supremacy is not solely a US phenomenon; it is a global one. Colonialism, imperialism, and race-based discrimination along with their effects can be felt far outside the borders of the United States.
Racist myths and conspiracy theories like The Great Replacement and White Genocide are heavily Euro-focused, centered on a looming threat of Muslim and North African invasion of majority-white European nations like France and Sweden that is thought to bring violent crime, sexual assault (of white women) and “extinction” of white people in their supposed homelands.
Much like how “American” is often
assumed to have the unspoken identifier of “white” unless said otherwise, many countries and citizens in Europe draw racial lines along who is and isn’t French, German, British, etc. While it may be more subtle, there still exists an
association between “European” and “white”. It’s also worth noting that racial lines are drawn across
religion as well, with whiteness more associated with Christianity while Muslims and Jews are othered in both the US and Europe.
There’s also the
deportation of numerous UK citizens, racial disparities in
British schools, Haiti
paying debts to France as compensation for its slave owners that lost property, the Holocaust and other atrocities and controversies.
These institutions coalesce into a set of biases that prioritize whiteness, white people, and the mythologized and whitewashed “
Western Civilization” above all others. It influences perceptions and modes of interaction between white people and non-white people.
Bias against non-Anglo Saxon AKA "white-sounding" names is known to
influence hiring practices, barring non-white people from obtaining employment despite being qualified.
Linguistics and
beauty standards also play a role. Even lighter skin among racial and ethnic minorities is considered
more desirable. Indeed, one’s proximity to whiteness affects their lot in life.
Biases also occur in the application of technology and medicine, disciplines often thought to be havens of objectivity. Lack of acknowledgment of racial biases or systemic racism often colors our
use of algorithms that we rely heavily on their ubiquity, leading to
disastrous results. Even among healthcare professionals, people tasked with ensuring that we live healthier lives and are healed from injury,
carry biases against non-white people resulting in varying
health outcomes. Ironically enough, this lackluster treatment of pain in Black and Latinx communities has given rise to the
opioid crisis, a health crisis that is identified as such due to its impact on poor white communities.
These biases can be extremely dangerous. Fear, resentment, and misunderstanding towards non-white bodies have been at the crux of black and brown suffering. It is fueled by an unwillingness and inability to accurately assess the humanity of non-white people, which speaks to an ever-present
racial empathy gap. Now, while the number of studies
suggesting a dehumanizing factor in racist thinking are vast, some say that it is, in fact,
removal of dignity that fuels racist atrocities. Nevertheless, non-whites have, in some way, been deemed as lesser people of lesser status than of whites.
Racism exists in a plethora of modes, not just hatred as many of us have been raised to believe. Animosity, indifference, deflection, and dismissal are all possible manifestations of racism. These manifestations are what people of color must contend with when interacting with white people in racial contexts.
White Fragility The institutions previously mentioned have simultaneously afforded white people with protections from race-based difficulties while also providing psychological and sociological defenses against adequately addressing the depths and sources of these protections. The insolation from racial stimuli and stress has created a state of mind called
white fragility. Think of the reactions to black people simply making the crisis of police brutality against black bodies known to the public, disregarding any violence on the part of protesters (if it’s referenced at all). The message that black people’s lives are worthy of respect and dignity is appropriated, twisted, and repackaged to show support for the very entity that is causing said crisis (Blue/Police Lives Matter). Or, the focus on black people is diminished and expanded, therefore erasing the unique racial tension laden within the problem (All Lives Matter).
Think of the reactions to non-whites actively or passively congregating in their own spaces without the explicit presence of white people, despite numerous
white spaces that non-whites have to navigate on a daily basis just by virtue of living and that is seen as mundane and ubiquitous.
Think of the reactions to black success and representation in entertainment and business, particularly film and games.
Think of the reactions to being asked not to use a slur that has been used to denigrate black people for centuries.
Think of the reactions to Black History Month consisting of calls for a White History Month.
These reactions may seem benign on the surface level but when examined within the context in which they occur, they reveal a subtle desire to bring equilibrium to the racist system that we live in where whiteness is centered and placed at the top. The lack of deference and challenges to white centrality, authority, superiority, and comfort elicit such reactions and defenses. This is what is collectively known as white fragility. It serves to deny people of color the means to properly express their frustrations with a society that has been built on their degradation and that is bolstered by their subservience.
Now, of course, this doesn’t mean that white people cannot face problems of their own and that they can’t express their frustrations with them. Class consciousness is important. However, countering claims of the existence of white privilege with statements of one’s socioeconomic status is flawed because while class and race are often intertwined, they are ultimately separate factors. While a white person can indeed be poor, they are still white. What this means is that
on average, a poor white person will have a less stressful (though still stressful) life than a poor black person. And the problems that the poor white person has (even if none of them are self-inflicted) will most likely not be due to their race. This is why class reductionism--the assertion that class is the ultimate, sole, or most important form of oppression--is destructive. It ignores how racism--and even sexism and homophobia--transcend class lines.
In fact, these class struggles are often weaponized by more affluent white people against racial and ethnic minorities by drawing upon latent racial animosity among impoverished and Evangelical whites.
The Southern Strategy,
in many ways, helped to galvanize white people into supporting policies that hurt their own livelihoods with the promise of preventing minorities from gaining too much power and influence, citing them as the cause for white economic woes.
Preserving whiteness is not only hazardous to non-whites, but also to the many whites that work to maintain it.
What does this have to do with masculinity and Men's Lib? Quite a lot, actually. Race and gender frequently intersect with each other and, so too, do patriarchy/sexism and white supremacy/whiteness. One would be remiss in not noticing how much white supremacist ideology and whiteness centers around the concerns of white men specifically.
For example, think of the image that pops into one’s mind when we say “man”. More often than not, the man in our minds is white. It speaks to how we center whiteness even in our discussions of gender. It’s sort of like how we think of a man when we think “person” or “human”.
In a much more material example, while pseudoscience has formed some of the bedrock of racial discrimination and exclusion, it has done similarly in regards to gender, placing men (especially white men) above women through
faulty explanations and theories. These also extend to the mythologized alpha-beta dichotomy that is often pushed in incel, PUA, and red pill circles despite its
non-existence..
Another parallel is what can be described as male fragility. Now, this isn’t a condemnation of men having and expressing emotions of frustration in its entirety. Much like with white fragility, male fragility is expressed when the patriarchal system is challenged. For example, crying because ones loved one has passed away is a healthy expression of vulnerability while crying because a franchise that was previously male-dominated is attempting to garner a wider audience by casting women in leading roles is not. Anger at being
personally insulted is expected while anger at women expressing frustration with living in a world that puts their safety and comfort aside in favor of protecting the egos of men is foolhardy.
This plethora of parallels presents itself pristinely within the pathologies of white supremacy. Within white supremacy exists a microcosmic rendition of patriarchy, where white men hold the ultimate seat of authority over white women. White supremacy seeks the dominance of not just white people, but white men most of all. This isn’t to say that white women aren’t
instrumental in promoting and propagating white supremacy. But there is a strong current of
misogyny within the ideology that can’t be ignored.
Several racist conspiracy theories and policies are based on the masculine and sexual anxieties of white men. Chinese immigration was
severally limited and opposed not only out of fear of white working-class jobs being stolen but were justified with the pretext of protecting white women from lecherous outsiders who brought sexual violence. This same pretext led to numerous lynchings of black men in the US, formed the basis of fearmongering during the refugee crisis in Europe, and is the underlying vehicle believed to drive the white genocide myth. It’s worth noting that despite the fear of non-white sexual predators, black; immigrant; and indigenous women routinely suffered sexual violence at the hands of colonists and slave owners through
stereotyping and sexual objectification.
Whiteness and, by extension, white supremacy is a
dangerous pathology that leads to a
horrific magnitude of suffering. Lives have been lost--both by non-whites and whites alike--in order to maintain its presence and hold on society. The white supremacists that one may be most familiar with--the KKK, the Nazis, the Alt-Right, etc.--are merely extensions of a system that already prioritizes white identities over others.
They are the inevitable conclusion.
So, what is the point of all of this? As stated at the beginning of this piece, I wanted to bring this topic up as it was long overdue. I and the other mods along with some of our users of color have noticed a startling number of incidents in which people like Nazis have been excused as simply troubled individuals along with cases of POC being talked over and railroaded about their experiences with race. The mere mention of white culpability in racism and lack of POC attention to and deference to white people on a website that is predominantly white elicits some extremely troubling vernacular and denial of POC experiences.
To be absolutely clear, none of what I have written should be interpreted to mean that white people are inherently evil. It should also not read as a long-winded expression of hatred towards white people on my part. This was more of an educational endeavor, mainly to contextualize why we, as a society and as a subreddit, tend to empathize with burgeoning and even all-out Nazis when we probably shouldn’t.
This is why pointing to people like Daryl Davis as the gold standard for dealing with racial injustice is a problem. It relies upon the deference to whiteness and white people that is expected of people of color which affords white supremacists with the empathy and humanity that is already taken for granted but is often denied to people of color. It assumes that all or even most people of color have the resources and assurance that would allow them to communicate with them without fear of losing one’s life or peace of mind. It ignores the instances of systemic racism that are much more pervasive, much like curing a symptom rather than the disease.
This is also why invoking Dr. Martin Luther King’s legacy and (mis)quoting him when black people are enraged and aren’t the nicest towards white people is also an issue. It ignores just how little the white population approved of King even after his death. It ignores how even his non-violent protests were seen as threatening. It ignores his stances on white moderates who wished for black people to wait out their oppression, placing white feelings over black lives.
Now, some may be thinking that my writing will somehow push potential allies away and even towards the alt-right. Some may think that I’m doing a terrible job of bringing in new converts to the Men’s Liberation cause.
This assumes that my goal is to convert people. It isn't and it never was. I'm simply explaining the state of affairs. That is not an invitation to tell me or any person of color how one should be more welcoming to people who need to be "convinced" that non-white people are human beings while they're teetering on the edge of becoming a white nationalist. This centers the feelings of racist white people above the feelings of those who are being actively hated and oppressed by them.
Also, think about this statement. What you are essentially saying is that white people are
justified in holding the humanity and fair treatment of minorities for ransom by doubling down on racism when a minority isn't exceptionally nice and accommodating when pointing out racial injustices. It's placing white people's feelings and comfort over that of minority wellbeing, which is part of the problem addressed in this entire screed. The job of catering to the emotional sensibilities of white people, especially white men, usually falls on the shoulders of minority groups and women so as not to bruise egos. In fact, while writing this piece, I keep finding myself worrying about how I can spare the feelings of readers when I know that my wellbeing takes precedence. Some may think that this a good thing and that I should reconsider my message because of that. But I won’t.
In any case, the people who these white men are most likely to listen to or even the
only people that they'll listen to… is other white men. This is okay for a starting position but the people who have the institutional power and, therefore, need to have this conversation with white people… are other white people.
Further reading and information:
Seeing White podcast series White Fragility: Why It's So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism and
What Does It Mean to Be White?: Developing White Racial Literacy by Robin DiAngelo
So You Want To Talk About Race by Ijeoma Oluo
Why I’m No Longer Talking to White People About Race by Reni Eddo-Lodge
The White Racial Frame: Centuries of Racial Framing and Counter-Framing by Joe R. Feagin
Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America by Ibram X. Kendi
The History of White People by Nell Irvin Painter
EDIT: I find it interesting that multiple people in this thread find the terms "whiteness" and "white supremacy" too inflammatory and confusing and want me to change the terminology to get white people more onboard. Almost like the whole section on white fragility has some validity to it.
EDIT 2: It's also interesting that there are people who think that this space isn't the place to talk about racial issues. This enforces the perspective that white people are the default and that non-white people are "special cases" and that they should be relegated elsewhere.
EDIT 3: Also adding
What Does It Mean to Be White?: Developing White Racial Literacy by Robin DiAngelo for further reading thanks to
FillerTank There is a lack of transparency from Brussels in declaring the international origin of its rules and regulations. For example, in September 2013 the EU released Regulation (EU) No 1169/2011 (
https://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=OJ:L:2011:304:0018:0063:EN:PDF) which prohibited the use of the EU flags on retail packets of meat. If research is carried out further on the subject, you find that this rule actually comes from Codex Stan 1-1985 (
http://www.fao.org/input/download/standards/32/CXS_001e.pdf). Portions of the Codex standard were copy and pasted into the EU Regulation. Further, the legal base of this standard was the WTO Agreement on Rules of Origin. Yet, the EU Regulation does not once mention this. This is what I meant above by "lack of transparency". Another example would be the "Plant Reproductive Material Law"--originating, but not exclusively, from OECD rules, regulations and guidelines. Another one would be Council Directive 2001/113/EC (
https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=CELEX:32001L0113&from=en) relating to fruit jams, jellies and marmalades. The originator of this one is Codex again through Stan 79-1981 (
http://www.fao.org/input/download/standards/11254/CXS_296e.pdf).
The "three sisters" recognised by the WTO Sanitary and Phytosanitary Agreement (SPS) are the Codex Commission, the International Plant Protection Convention and the Office INTERNATIONAL des Epizooties. They are the de-facto bodies which set the regulations for trade in animals and animal products throughout the world. The three organisations work intimately in setting their standards, particularly through the Animal Production Food Safety Working Group (
https://www.oie.int/doc/ged/D3658.PDF).
On the other hand, it would be unfair to not mention sector-specific organisations. For example, the transboundary movements of hazardous waste (Council Decision 93/98/EEC/Regulation (EC) No 1013/2006) actually originated from the Basel Convention. The Convention was adopted by the EU in 1992. Another one would be the Globally Harmonised System of Classification and Labelling of Chemicals (GHS) by the UNCED--now adopted as EU law (Regulation (EC) No 1272/2008) (
https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/HTML/?uri=CELEX:32008R1272&from=EN).
These international standards are not voluntary, either. The WTO Technical Barriers to Trade Agreement (TBT)--ratified by the EU in 1994--states that members shall (apart from scientifically justifiable exemptions) use relevant international standards in preference to their own (Article 2.4). The Sanitary and Phytosanitary Agreement (SPS) (Article 3) says the same. International standards-setting bodies, like Codex, have legislative primacy to the EU. This is what I like to call the conveyor belt of globalisation. Globalisation is not optional for a first-world industrial country in the long run--it is an unstoppable, inevitable force. This is also why the Norway "all the pay, not none of the say" argument is not correct--Norway has an input in the conception and formation of these 'soft laws'. EU membership is less relevant on this conveyor belt of soft law.
Standards for goods and services underpin the integrity of the Single Market, but most people do not fully understand the generators of these standards. You have national standards organisations like the British Standards Institute (UK) and Standard Norge (Norway) which approve standards for machines, equipment, chemicals and other products and own the copyright to publishing their respective national standards. These national standards organisations negotiate with each other to form harmonised standards and then, finally, international standards which are incorporated into the Single Market acquis. National standards organisations also represent their countries at the European Committee for Standardisation (CEN) and International Organisation for Standardisation (ISO). ISO is the organisation which, according to itself, ensures that goods and services are safe, reliable and good quality--this is also helps harmonise and facilitate trade between countries, not just within the Single Market but globally too.
Standard Norge is a member of the CEN and ISO and is responsible for Norwegian influence of European and global standardisation work in all areas except telecommunications and electrotechnicals. Over 2,000 experts in Norway from the business community, police authorities and and employee and consumer organisations participate in this standardisation work. They spend around £20M a year doing this work (
https://www.iso.org/membe1994.html). ISO--based in Geneva outside the European Union--is comprised of over 3,000 technical bodies and is described as a Transnational Private Regulator (TPR) which has published over 20,000 standards (technology, business, food safety, computers, agriculture, healthcare, etc.) since its conception. The members of ISO meet once a year at the General Assembly to coordinate their strategic objectives. According to ISO, "ISO International Standards impact everyone, everywhere" (
https://www.iso.org/about-us.html).
ISO international standards are what drive European standards created by the three European Standards Organisations (ESOs): CEN (which we mentioned above), CENELEC and ETSI. The standards community has just as significant an impact from Norway as it does from any other EU member state in developing Single Market standards. Here's an example of this system in action.
In 2014, the EU brought in a requirement for CE marking of steel construction products under the Construction Products Regulation (
https://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=OJ:L:2011:088:0005:0043:EN:PDF). If you look into the recitals, this regulation actually came from CEN Eurocodes (see: Recital 18). This standard was developed in conjunction with the ISO, giving them a global application. If we look to the Vienna Agreement of 1991, the EU through CEN recognised the primacy of International Standards (through ISO) to its own (see WTO Code of Conduct). It is committed to co-ordinating its own standards with those of ISO. This establishes a hierarchical dominance of ISO--rendering the EU subordinate to it. Since Norway is a member of the ISO, it is incorrect to claim it "has no say" when, in fact, quite the opposite is true--Norway is sat at the top of the food chain. (
https://boss.cen.eu/ref/Vienna_Agreement.pdf)
Electrotechnical standards are driven primarily by the International Electrotechnical Commission, which CENELEC co-operates with through the Frankfurt Agreement--a new agreement signed recently in 2016 (
ftp://ftp.cencenelec.eu/CENELEC/Guides/CLC/13_CENELECGuide13.pdf). It re-iterates the hierarchical principle I outlined earlier:
...this new agreement preserves the spirit and approach conveyed by the Dresden Agreement, in particular the strategic commitment of CENELEC to supporting the primacy of international standardization. It includes several update aiming to simplify the parallel voting processes, and increases the traceability of international standards adopted in Europe thanks to a new referencing system. (https://www.cenelec.eu/aboutcenelec/whoweare/globalpartners/iec.html)
If CENELEC wants to create a new standard in Europe, it first has to go to the IEC (usually) and offer what is called a New Work Item. The IEC can then choose whether to accept the standard or reject it to be scrapped or modified by CENELEC and then re-introduced at a public enquiry stage. Sometimes, a standard may not be submitted but it must be justified--the Frankfurt Agreement, however, strongly recommends the NWI to be offered. The EFTA Secretariat can also submit an NWI to IEC--again, the "all the pay, none of the say" argument is incorrect. (
https://boss.cenelec.eu/homegrowndeliverables/propnewwork/Pages/default.aspx). If the NWI is accepted, a process called parallel voting takes place. If the outcome is positive, CENELEC ratifies the standard and IEC publishes the international standard. This system provides more evidence for the workings of the TBT Agreement.
EU legislative monopoly is a myth.
Norwegian Foreign Minister Ine Eriksen Søreide: "Even though Norway is not a member of the EU",” she said, "we will be active participants rather than passive observers", in trying to influence EU policy. (
http://www.newsinenglish.no/2018/05/11/norway-first-in-new-eu-strategy/) (
https://www.regjeringen.no/globalassets/departementene/ud/dokumenteeu/eu_strategy.pdf)
Two Europe-wide regional bodies are the Council of Europe and the United Nations Economic Commission Europe. The former is more of a stand-alone international cul-de-sac group but UNECE is a hierarchical entity as one of five UN regional commissions, it is based in Geneva outside of the European Union and reports to the UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC). UNECE consists of 56 members including most of Europe, the USA, central Asia, Canada and Israel and its job is to nurture economic integration between its members.
UNECE is essentially the originator of all technical standards to do with transport (docks, railways and road networks) within the Single Market (
http://www.unece.org/leginsttrans.html). UNECE and the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) are responsible for pollution and climate change issues and hosts five conventions spanning from transboundary air pollution to the Aarhus Convention (
http://www.unece.org/env/welcome.html). UNECE is also the originator of agricultural quality standards (
http://www.unece.org/housing-and-land-management/about-us/working-group-on-a-possible-framework-convention-on-sustainable-housing.html) and (
http://www.unece.org/leginstagri.html). UNECE is a key developer of the global harmonised system (GHS) for the classification and labelling of chemicals (
http://www.unece.org/trans/dangepubli/ghs/ghs_welcome_e.html).
UNECE is also essentially the originator of vehicle safety and environmental impact (air and water pollution) standards via the UNECE Transport Division, which provides a Secretariat for the World Forum for the Harmonisation of Vehicle Regulations (WP.29) (
http://www.unece.org/trans/main/welcwp29.html). All participating countries (EU is included in this) have signed a 1998 agreement voluntarily giving UNECE the legal framework of propagating type approvals for vehicles and their components. Essentially what this means is that WP.29 is the originator of standards which allows cars to be traded within the signatory states and which permits the sale of safety-critical spare parts. WP.29 currently has 57 signatories including the EU, Japan and South Korea. Here is a more detailed article on WP.29:
https://www.reddit.com/ukpolitics/comments/8xyy1n/unece_wp29_is_one_example_of_the_benefit_of/ The UNECE instruments of relevance are called "UN Regulations" and these vary from headlamps to crashworthiness and environmental compatibility to tyres and wheels. What the EU does is copies and pastes these UN Regulations into the Single Market acquis--the EU is very clear about this in this case. For example, Regulation No 73/2007 on the uniform provisions concerning the approval of goods vehicles, trailers and semi-trailers with regard to their lateral protection, the EU tells us: "Only the original UN/ECE texts have legal effect under international public law. The status and date of entry into force of this Regulation should be checked in the latest version of the UN/ECE status document TRANS/WP.29/343" (
https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/HTML/?uri=CELEX:42010X0513(04)&from=EN). More importantly, it's role is also exposed in DIRECTIVE 2007/46/EC (
https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=CELEX:32007L0046&from=EN). UNECE is supreme to the EU with respect to these releavnt matters it decrees upon.
Incredibly, there is even a Government report which acknowledges this:
In many instances, EU action needs to be seen in the context of international arrangements at the UN Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE). (
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/278966/boc-transport.pdf)
And, remember, UNECE does not just deal with automotive regulation--it deals with agricultural regulation too. For example, when the "bendy banana" and "curvy cucumber" directives were dropped (this is when the EU abolished 26 of 36 marketing standards for fruits and veggies), the media made a great deal of this (
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/2453204/Bent-banana-and-curved-cucumber-rules-dropped-by-EU.html). These were then replaced with General Marketing Standards (GMS)--you can read about this here
https://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=OJ:L:2011:157:0001:0163:EN:PDF). These GMS's are actually UNECE standards! (
http://www.unece.org/trade/agstandard/fresh/ffv-standardse.html). So in this case, the EU didn't actually drop regulations at all for the benefit of consumers but it bumped up the official standards setting to UNECE, which is now the supreme body in terms of agricultural standards. They even have their own Cucumber Standard (FFV-15) "concerning the marketing and commercial quality control of cucumbers" (
http://www.unece.org/fileadmin/DAM/trade/agstandard/standard/fresh/FFV-Std/English/15_Cucumbers.pdf). No pictures, I'm afraid :3. So for cucumbers to be traded within the Single Market, they must conform to those UNECE standards.
UNECE creates standards relating to transport, agriculture and air and water pollution. This gives it a significant amount of regulatory power and influence over the EU. It also had a role in the controversial ISDS mechanisms found in the TTIP via the UNCITRAL international arbitration rule, but that's off-topic. One could imagine one day UNECE and other international standards organisations completely taking over and overhauling the Single Market acquis through the WTO TBT Agreement (that which EEA EFTA States and EU States follow) as the conveyor belt of globalisation and harmonisation of standards rolls on.
UNECE remains virtually unknown to people thanks to the ignorance of politicians and the wider media.
Also thanks to Dr Richard North and EFTA4UK!
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