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4 The European Union: a force for peace in the world The Taoiseach Bertie Ahern, TD Introduction Taoiseach Bertie Ahern’s lecture in March 2004, on ‘The European Union: a force for peace in the world’, came at a critical juncture in the institution’s history; and in the Northern Ireland peace process. Importantly, he was speaking in his capacity as President of the European Council, a position held by Ireland, as it did by rotation amongst member states, from 1 January until 30 June that year. By then, he had intimate and extensive experience of government at
The European Union after Brexit addresses the ways in which Brexit has changed and will change European Union politics: the forces, mechanisms and stakes of an unprecedented transformation of the European polity. How will the EU operate without one of its key diplomatic and international military partners? What will happen to its priorities, internal balance(s) of power, and legislation without the reliably liberal and Eurosceptic United Kingdom? What are the effects of the Brexit negotiations on the EU? In general, what happens when an ‘ever closer union’ founded on a virtuous circle of economic, social, and political integration is called into question? This book is largely positive about the future of the EU after Brexit, but it suggests that the process of European integration has gone into reverse, with Brexit coming amidst other developments that disrupt the optimistic trajectory of integration. Contributors focus on areas spanning foreign policy, political economy, public policy, and citizenship, with chapters covering topics such as international trade, the internal market, freedom of movement, the European legal system, networks, security relations, social Europe and the impact of Brexit on Central and Eastern Europe. Chapters are grounded in comparative politics, political economy, and institutionalist approaches to politics and economics.
According to this book, Romania's predatory rulers, the heirs of the sinister communist dictator Ceauşescu, have inflicted a humiliating defeat on the European Union. The book argues that Brussels was tricked into offering full membership to this Balkan country in return for substantial reforms which its rulers now refuse to carry out. It unmasks the failure of the EU to match its visionary promises of transforming Romania with the shabby reality. Benefiting from access to internal reports and leading figures involved in a decade of negotiations, the book shows how Eurocrats were outwitted by unscrupulous local politicians who turned the EU's multi-level decision-making processes into a laughing-stock. The EU's famous ‘soft power’ turned out to be a mirage, as it was unable to summon up the willpower to insist that this key Balkan state embraced its standards of behaviour in the political and economic realms. The book unravels policy failures in the areas of justice, administrative and agricultural reform, showing how Romania moved backwards politically during the years of negotiations.
Issues concerning women European Union issues 234 15 ➤ Descriptions of the main issues facing the European Union ➤ Review of these issues ➤ Speculations as to the future course of the issues THE DEMOCRATIC DEFICIT AND INSTITUTIONAL REFORM The nature of the democratic deficit The issues concerning individual institutions of the European Union are described in chapter 14, on EU Institutions. However, a number of general remarks can be made at this stage. The main concerns which politicians from member countries and commentators have include the following
2444Ch2 3/12/02 2 2:01 pm Page 29 Andreas Maurer and Wolfgang Wessels The European Union matters: structuring self-made offers and demands Self-made demands from the EU: analysing the impact of Maastricht The evolution of European integration since 1950 has been considerable. The European Union has gained in stature, taking on and aspiring to new functions across the policy spectrum and challenging the conceptualisation of the evolving structure for joint problem-solving, deliberation and decision-making. The evolution of the Union: stages of constitution
Britain and Issues concerning the European womenUnion Britain and the European Union 249 16 ➤ The background to British membership ➤ The main impacts of British membership ➤ The ways in which the party system has been affected by the EU ➤ Future prospects for British involvement THE STORY OF BRITISH MEMBERSHIP Britain stays out When serious discussions began to establish a successor to the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC) in 1956, Britain made it clear that it was not intending to join any new organisation. Prime Minister Harold Macmillan, a
188 AREAS 12 The European Union alex warleigh Democratization has suddenly become a fashionable theme in both the practice and the study of European integration.1 Since the Treaty on European Union (TEU) of 1991, which both raised the profile of the integration process and substantially extended the scope of powers enjoyed by the European Union (EU; the Union), the Union has become far more controversial. Received wisdom dictates that it suffers from a (generally unspecified) ‘democratic deficit’, which was scarcely noticed beforehand. Paradoxically, however
190 Destination Europe 9 A new European Union A state without the means of some change is without the means of its own conservation. (Edmund Burke)1 Summary A series of EU summits – Amsterdam in 1997, Berlin and Helsinki in 1999 and Nice in 2000 – focused on the need for inner reform of the institution against the prospect of future enlargement and new competences. The general tendency was for increased intergovernmentalism, that is, more power in the hands of the EU’s Council of Ministers and greater influence for the European Parliament. The Helsinki Summit
word in Brussels; it would be 40 years before the EEC would start talking about defense again. Anthony Eden, the British foreign minister, then came to the rescue of the continent, proposing that Italy and Germany sign the Brussels Pact, which in turn transformed into the Western European Union (WEU). However, as the WEU was merely a talk shop without military capability, European security was exclusively left in NATO’s hands. In 1955, Germany was also admitted into NATO. By the 1970s, the United States – which had supported the creation of both the ECSC and the
This book explains how and why the European Union has started to intervene in the cultural policy sector—understood here as the public policies aimed at supporting and regulating the arts and cultural industries. It is a comprehensive account of the Communitarisation process of the cultural policy sector. Before 1992, no legal basis for EU intervention in the field of culture appeared in the Treaties. Member states were, in any case, reluctant to share their competences in a policy sector considered to be an area of national sovereignty. In such circumstances, how was the Communitarisation of the policy sector ever possible? Who were the policy actors that played a role in this process? What were their motives? And why were certain actors more influential than others?