But I don't read the final paragraph as a complaint about Europeans being deprived of freedom which the rest of the world gets to enjoy.
Rather, I think it is pointing out the moral dubiousness of imposing regulations to protect "people", where "people" only means those who have EU passports. The implication is that the moral basis ("ethical obligation") for these regulations is weak.
The inconsistency is easily remedied either by getting rid of the regulations, or by making them apply to markets outside Europe as well as within. Of course, I favor the latter approach.
Interestingly, despite the article's implication that European companies are free to seduce consumers outside of Europe with ads for cigarettes, booze, cars, and so forth, I was surprised to find that no European car companies are mentioned in this (granted, short) article, "Car makers pour advertising dollars into China". Even so,
Volkswagen's high-end line, climbed 25 percent to 30,188, while Bentley sales soared 137.8 percent to 126 units. ... Sales of imported BMW sedans, including the much-more expensive 7 Series flagship cars, jumped 83.9 percent. ... Mercedes-Benz also reported strong growth, with sales up 40 percent in China. Global auto makers report soaring Q1 China sales_English_Xinhua
Sales of imported BMW sedans, including the much-more expensive 7 Series flagship cars, jumped 83.9 percent. ...
Mercedes-Benz also reported strong growth, with sales up 40 percent in China.
Global auto makers report soaring Q1 China sales_English_Xinhua
which utterly jibes with what I see every day on the streets of Hangzhou.
And finally, the EU's authority outside its borders derives only from the soft power of setting standards within its very large marketplace.
I think I must not be reading your point correctly, but surely the EU can impose laws and regulations on the activities of EU-based companies even outside its borders, right? A language is a dialect with an army and navy.
I think I must not be reading your point correctly, but surely the EU can impose laws and regulations on the activities of EU-based companies even outside its borders, right?
No, not really: unlike the US, the EU doesn't seem to consider itself entitled to regulate the acts of legal entities based in other countries in those countries. It's very likely Volkswagen China Inc that is adveristing and selling there.
Everyone else in the world can drive at high speeds, smoke and drink to their hearts' content.
The main point in it (to me) is that elsewhere people are free, (while in Europe, as the entire article has underscored, they are told what to do like children). Compared to this, the final point about EU companies applying (or profiting by) local laws outside the EU, seems to me, as I said, a side-swipe.
As to your reading re "moral dubiousness", then we'd have to say that it was morally dubious to abolish the death penalty in one country (or state of the US) because it didn't apply to citizens elsewhere. That democracy and the rule of law themselves were morally dubious, because they don't apply to all people, everywhere.
I think you did misread me: I was pointing out that corporations can and do establish subsidiaries or sister companies that are based in the countries they want to do business in, or in tax or corporate havens, and those companies operate under the law of the land they're set up in. To what extent the original corporation can be monitored and held to account for the activities of foreign-based companies it can take care to be legally separate from, seems moot. Not that I'd personally be against it.
I understand better now: just as the EU cannot impose democracy, the rule of law, the abolition of the death penalty on countries outside its borders, it cannot impose business regulations on companies operating outside its borders (even if they are based within Europe).
Still, in order to be eligible for subsidies, the EU must make it a condition for European companies (and their overseas subsidiaries and partners) to follow the same advertising and marketing regulations that they are bound to within Europe. Otherwise, I feel such inconsistency does undermine the "ethical obligation" supposedly behind these regulations to protect consumers (unless we admit that people outside the EU are not worth protecting, too). A language is a dialect with an army and navy.
it cannot impose business regulations on companies operating outside its borders (even if they are based within Europe).
No: when they are not based within Europe.
Do you know of any country (since, in this case, EU legislation must be transposed into each member state's legislation, it's the countries that have sovereignty) that can legislate on business activities in another sovereign state?
Yes, of course the EU can bring pressure to bear in other ways. And should. But, when a major trading area improves regulation within its borders, that looks to me like progress, not an ethically dubious position re the rest of the world.
