The European Union Fifty Years after the Treaties of Rome

摘要: Indeed, the promise of a'wider European Union'has raised serious questions about the nature and direction of the integration process. The'Eastern Enlargement'has generally been seen as a qualitative leap for the EU, promising-or threatening, as the view may be-to transform it. Concerns that the enlarged Union, if not reformed substantially, would find it difficult to take decisions and maintain a reliable legal framework led to several attempts to reform the treaties. The most wide-ranging proposals, and the most significant step-change in the language of integration, came with the proposed Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe, which EU Heads of State or Government signed in 2004. This Constitutional Treaty is a sign of how far the EU has developed from its modest beginnings as a small international organisation. It has taken the long road through a gradual and often slow process to arrive at the kind of …