This article seeks to explain the varying, and sometimes intriguing, outcomes of the past three revisions of the Treaty concerning the Community’s Common Commercial Policy (CCP). The analysis particularly focuses on the development of competence and decision rules, i.e. the process of...

Analysing the distribution of power among political actors is at the heart of political science. I propose a way of analysing changes to the institutional equilibrium of the EU institutions as well as changes in the relationship between the supranational level and the member states from a...

The Treaty on Stability, Coordination and Governance in the Economic and Monetary Union (TSCG) removes the unanimity requirement for entry into force. This innovation is possible because, technically, the TSCG I not an EU Treaty. It is not constructed as a reform of the EU Treaties following...

The EU constitutional process has ascribed a new role to civil society not only as a partner in governance but also as a constituent of the emerging EU polity. Civil society appears in this process primarily as the structure of voice that is articulated in relation to EU governance and that...

The chasm separating elite and popular opinion on the achievements and finality of European integration was never so visible as after the negative referendums on the Constitutional and the Lisbon Treaties. The public attitude prevailing in the past has been characterized as one of permissive...

The aim of this paper is the study of the enhanced cooperation mechanism in the framework of the Lisbon Treaty as it applies to the Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) and the Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP) of the EU. The concept of enhanced cooperation was introduced into the...

The paper discusses the Early Warning Mechanism (EWM) to be introduced by the Lisbon Treaty, the incentives of the national parliaments to use it and the limited opportunity it opens for bringing Europe closer to its citizens. It is suggested that the EWM provides Europe with a chance to develop...

Looking back at eight years of controversies over Europe's future, this paper develops a new research agenda towards a political sociology of EU constitutional politics. As a preliminary step, we make the case for reflexivity, that is, for a critical appraisal of intellectual practice in the...