This book gives a detailed analysis of the making of the Treaty of Nice, the current treaty of the European Union, adopted in 2000. It analysis the interests and strategies of the various actors, including the 15 Member States, during the negotiations and tries to explain the main institutional changes: re-weighting of votes in the Council of Ministers, future changes in the composition of the European Commission, extended use of qualified majority voting and easier conditions for a smaller group of Member States going faster in the integration process ('enhanced cooperation').

The study of European integration produced much scholarly debate in the 1950s and '60s. The following two decades saw few works on European integration that included more elaborate discussions of theory and methodology; most studies in that period were fairly descriptive. In recent years there has been renewed theoretical interest in European integration. This book, however, is one of the first to discuss and apply various political-economy approaches explicitly to integration, including classical integration theory and modern public choice theories. Areas covered include common policies and...

The radical changes taking place in the international scene during the late 1980s have presented the European Communities with important new challenges. The twelve Member States agreed that the only way to respond effectively to this new situation was to speed up the European integration process, and in December 1990 two Intergovernmental Conferences were inaugurated, focusing respectively on the development of an Economic and Monetary Union and a Political Union. It was the difficult task of the Luxembourg and Dutch Presidencies to channel the often very diverging positions of the different...

This book examines transatlantic security relations in recent years. The end of the Cold War in the late 1980s brought a change in these relations, but they remain important for Europe s security. Despite efforts to develop a European security policy within the European Union, the continent still largely depends on the United States for its security, as demonstrated by the NATO involvement to deal with the civil wars in Bosnia and Kosovo in the 1990s.
The lessons from those conflicts had the EU move towards an autonomous defence policy from 1999 and the Lisbon Treaty has recently...

Transatlantic economic relations remain extremely important for the European Union as well as for other countries in the world. When it comes to trade and foreign direct investment, the EU and the United States remain arguably the world s most powerful actors, despite the financial crisis which started in the United States in 2007 and subsequently spread to Europe and to the Eurozone in particular. This crisis has created great economic strain on both Europe and North America, with politicians trying to muddle through and disagreeing on which strategy to adopt. The dominance of the Atlantic...

Successive enlargements of the EU have constituted major events in the history of European integration. They affect the Union s institutions, policies and policy-making processes and, because of the impact of these changes, enlargements have often been controversial. The major enlargement in 2004, which took the EU from 15 to 25 member countries, was followed by Romanian and Bulgarian membership in 2007 and Croatian membership in 2013.
It is often argued that there is now enlargement fatigue, and progress towards the next step seems slow. However, a number of countries, especially in the...

Do you have the facts about religious freedom in schools? As a long time secondary school math teacher, I endeavor to teach the facts. If you want the facts how to speak up for your faith, and how to deal with contemporary issues in America's schools, then Standing on the Word is a must read for you Dr. Dean Finley Christian Educator's Association International. Finn Laursen is an example of an educational leader that exemplifies integrity. His wisdom and down-to-earth approach to educational concerns is practical, while still inspiring and motivating. I am honored to recommend this great...