Sample Speeches

The U.S. and Europe: Seeking Comm on Ground
After dinner remarks by David L. Aaron
Under Secretary of Commerce for International Trade

European Legal Studies Center Conference
Columbia Law School, New York, New York

April 16 , 1999

It is worth noting here that Europe is not yet a country, and that makes dealing with Europe somewhat more difficult -- particularly in regulatory matters.

Henry Kissinger famously asked, A When you want to talk to Europe , who do you call? " In trade policy, we now largely know the answer -- Leon Brittan.

But in regulatory matters, it ' s less clear. Europe lacks an FDA, an FAA, an SEC and other institutions essential for a unified market to function efficiently. Moreover, individual country interests are still crucial, and individual economic and political circumstances still play major roles.

But overall, the European Union is an increasingly unified economic force, and a critical economic partner for the United States .

The current high-profile trade disputes between the U.S. and Europe are, as I said, grit in the gears rather than spanners in the works. They might not stop the machinery, but they must be purged or they can do serious damage.

Let me expand on two that have high priority: aircraft noise and data privacy.

On aircraft noise, the EU Council will consider at its meeting on April 29 a regulation that would ban use in Europe of A hushkits " -- essentially jet engine mufflers -- or replacement engines to meet international noise reduction standards. Interestingly, this rule would affect only U.S. products -- to the tune of a billion dollars. And it would allow the amount of European equipment that is just as noisy to increase .

Air transport is the quintessentially global industry, and it would be extremely damaging to balkanize international aviation rules. I ' m not being alarmist. The European Commission is readying several more proposals to impose unilateral standards on aircraft. The international community cannot accept this.

Instead, the EU should be working through ICAO to develop new and tougher worldwide standards. If they are willing to do so, they will find us willing partners.

I will present to them a plan to work together on an accelerated basis to present ICAO with a proposal for more stringent noise rules. We endorse the President of ICAO ' s call for postponement of EU action to adopt or implement the regulation. This would avoid necessary bilateral responses and create the essential prerequisite for productive work in ICAO.

Data privacy is another major issue that involves a difference in regulatory approach. The EU has adopted a privacy directive that creates a comprehensive umbrella of regulation, including data privacy czars in each country. The U.S. has evaluated and rejected that approach, concerned that this could actually lead to invasions of privacy. We prefer to target laws at individual privacy problems. These laws are supplemented by industry self-regulatory codes, backed up by the Federal Trade Commission and state fair trade laws.

We have been discussing this matter for a year. The issues are technically complex and culturally profound. Te European system assumesa mainframe world and did not anticipate the Internet. We have different traditions and distinct historical concerns about privacy.

The bottom line, though, is that we are both committed to protecting privacy.

Accordingly we have tried to bridge the gap by means of a set of safe harbor principles governing the major issues --notice to an individual that information is being given out, choice of whether or not to allow it, third-party transfer, enforcement and so on.

A U.S. firm subscribing to the safe harbor principles would be deemed to be providing adequate privacy protection, and would be allowed to continue receiving data from European sources. I hasten to add that the principles would cover only data exchange with Europe . They are emphatically not a template for any government action to change the U.S. privacy regime.