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  • Where, is the European Union? Obviously here somewhere, but much like the the European

  • continent itself, which has an unclear boundary, the European Union also has some fuzzy edges

  • to it.

  • To start, the official members of the European Union are, in decreasing order of population:

  • * Germany * France

  • * The United Kingdom * Italy

  • * Spain * Poland

  • * Romania * The Kingdom of the Netherlands

  • * Greece * Belgium

  • * Portugal * The Czech Republic

  • * Hungary * Sweden

  • * Austria * Bulgaria

  • * Denmark * Slovakia

  • * Finland * Ireland

  • * Croatia * Lithuania

  • * Latvia * Slovenia

  • * Estonia * Cyprus

  • * Luxembourg * Malta

  • The edges of the EU will probably continue to expand further out as there are other countries

  • in various stages of trying to become a member.

  • How exactly the European Union works is hideously complicated and a story for another time,

  • but for this video you need know only three things:

  • 1. Countries pay membership dues and

  • 2. Vote on laws they all must follow and

  • 3. Citizens of member countries are automatically European Union citizens as well

  • This last means that if you're a citizen of any of these countries you are free to live

  • and work or retire in any of the others. Which is nice especially if you think your country

  • is too big or too small or too hot or too cold. The European Union gives you options.

  • By the way, did you notice how all three of these statements have asterisks attached to

  • this unhelpful footnote? Well, get used to it: Europe loves asterisks that add exceptions

  • to complicated agreements.

  • These three, for example, point us toward the first bit of border fuzziness with Norway,

  • Iceland and little Liechtenstein. None of which are in the European Union but if you're

  • a EU citizen you can live in these countries and Norwegians, Icelanders, or Liechtensteiner(in)s

  • can can live in yours.

  • Why? In exchange for the freedom of movement of people they have to pay membership fees

  • to the European Union -- even though they aren't a part of it and thus don't get a say

  • its laws that they still have to follow.

  • This arrangement is the European Economic Area and it sounds like a terrible deal, were

  • it not for that asterisk which grants EEA but not EU members a pass on some areas of

  • law notably farming and fishing -- something a country like Iceland might care quite a

  • lot about running their own way.

  • Between the European Union and the European Economic Area the continent looks mostly covered,

  • with the notable exception of Switzerland who remains neutral and fiercely independent,

  • except for her participation in the Schengen Area.

  • If you're from a country that keeps her borders extremely clean and / or well-patrolled, the

  • Schengen Area is a bit mind-blowing because it's an agreement between countries to take

  • a 'meh' approach to borders.

  • In the Schengen Area international boundaries look like this: no border officers or passport

  • checks of any kind. You can walk from Lisbon to Tallinn without identification or need

  • to answer the question: "business or pleasure?".

  • For Switzerland being part of Schengen but not part of the European Union means that

  • non-swiss can check in any time they like, but they can never stay.

  • This koombaya approach to borders isn't appreciated by everyone in the EU: most loudly, the United

  • Kingdom and Ireland who argue that islands are different. Thus to get onto these fair

  • isles, you'll need a passport and a good reason.

  • Britannia's reluctance to get fully involved with the EU brings us to the next topic: money.

  • The European Union has its own fancy currency, the Euro used by the majority, but not all

  • of the European Union members. This economic union is called the Eurozone and to join a

  • country must first reach certain financial goals -- and lying about reaching those goals

  • is certainly not something anyone would do.

  • Most of the non-Eurozone members when they meet the goals, will ditch their local currency

  • in favor of the Euro but three of them Denmark, Sweden and, of course, the United Kingdom,

  • have asterisks attracted to the Euro sections of the treaty giving them a permanent out-out.

  • And weirdly, four tiny European countries Andorra, San Marino, Monaco & Vatican City

  • have an asterisk giving them the reverse: the right print and use Euros as their money,

  • despite not being in the European Union at all.

  • So that's the big picture: there's the EU, which makes all the rules, the Eurozone inside

  • it with a common currency, the European Economic Area outside of it where people can move freely

  • and the selective Schengen, for countries who think borders just aren't worth the hassle.

  • As you can see, there's some strange overlaps with these borders, but we're not done talking

  • about complications by a long shot one again, because empire.

  • So Portugal and Spain have islands from their colonial days that they've never parted with:

  • these are the Madeira and Canary Islands are off the coast of Africa and the Azores well

  • into the Atlantic. Because these islands are Spanish and Portuguese they're part of the

  • European Union as well.

  • Adding a few islands to the EU's borders isn't a big deal until you consider France: the

  • queen of not-letting go. She still holds onto a bunch of islands in the Caribbean, Reunion

  • off the coast of Madagascar and French Guiana in South America. As far as France is concerned,

  • these are France too, which single handedly extends the edge-to-edge distance of the European

  • Union across a third of Earth's circumference.

  • Collectively, these bits of France, Spain and Portugal are called the Outermost Regions

  • -- and they're the result of the simple answer to empire: just keep it.

  • On the other hand, there's the United Kingdom, the master of maintaining complicated relationships

  • with her quasi-former lands -- and she's by no means alone in this on such an empire-happy

  • continent.

  • The Netherlands and Denmark and France (again) all have what the European Union calls Overseas

  • Territories: they're not part of the European Union, instead they're a bottomless well of

  • asterisks due to their complicated relationships with both with the European Union and their

  • associated countries which makes it hard to say anything meaningful about them as a group

  • but...

  • in general European Union law doesn't apply to these places, though in general the people

  • who live there are European Union citizens because in general they have the citizenship

  • of their associated country, so in general they can live anywhere in the EU they want

  • but in general other European Union citizens can't freely move to these territories.

  • Which makes these places a weird, semipermeable membrane of the European Union proper and

  • the final part we're going to talk about in detail even though there are still many, more

  • one-off asterisks you might stumble upon, such as: the Isle of Man or those Spanish

  • Cities in North Africa or Gibraltar, who pretends to be part of Southwest England sometimes,

  • or that region in Greece where it's totally legal to ban women, or Saba & friends who

  • are part of the Netherlands and so should be part of the EU, but aren't, or the Faeroe

  • Islands upon which while citizens of Denmark live they lose their EU citizenship, and on

  • and on it goes.

  • These asterisks almost never end, but this video must.

Where, is the European Union? Obviously here somewhere, but much like the the European

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