This book assesses the many changes that have occurred within the European Parliament and in its external relations since the Lisbon treaty (2009) and the last European elections (2014). It is undoubtedly the institution that has evolved the most since the 1950s. Despite the many crises experienced by European integration in the last years, the Parliament is still undergoing important changes in its formal competences, its influence on policy-making, its relations with other EU institutions, its internal organisation and its internal political dynamics. Every contribution deals with the most recent aspects of these evolutions and addresses overlooked topics, providing an overview of the current state of play which challenges the mainstream intergovernmental approach of the EU. This project results from research conducted at the Department of European Political and Governance Studies of the College of Europe. Individual research of several policy analysts of the European Parliamentary Research Service (EPRS) have contributed to this endeavour.

Jan Werts brings a unique perspective to the European Council. As a journalist, he has reported on the spot from virtually every European Council meeting since the start in the 1970s, a witness to countless episodes of last-minute arm-twisting and creative compromise. As a scholar, he wrote the first ever doctoral dissertation on the European Council, published in 1992. In 2008 another book carried the story forward to the verge of the start of the permanent presidency. In this latest book, against the background of the broad sweep of the history of the European Council, he focuses especially on the sequence of crises that began around the time of his previous book the Greek debt and broader euro crises, the migration and refugee crisis, Brexit and Covid among them.

This work traces the development of the European decision-making process in the European Community in minute detail, from the Summit Meeting in Paris (1957) to the most recent European Council meeting. Special account is taken of the momentous and at times controversial changes brought about in this process, in particular by the Single European Act. As well as consulting numerous well-known and respected sources on European affairs, the much-travelled author draws on his personal experience as a journalist, presenting new and original conclusions on, for example, the legal status of the European Council's communiques and decisions. The issues touched upon afford much food for thought and are all the more stimulating when seen against the background of the internal market heralded for 1993 and the ever-changing events in Eastern Europe.Following a description of the roots of the European Council, the author deals with: # the organizational rules and functioning of the European Council, emphasizing the importance of European Political Cooperation # the legal nature and form of the European Council and its relations with the Community institutions # the meetings and their results # the progress made in decision-making over the years # the future of the European Council. The book is completed with relevant documentation, a comprehensive bibliography, a table of cases of the Court of Justice of the EC, a table of articles (EEC Treaty and SEA), a subject index and an index of names.

Translated by Ciaran Cronin. In the midst of the current crisis that is threatening to derail the historical project of European unification, Jürgen Habermas has been one of the most perceptive critics of the ineffectual and evasive responses to the global financial crisis, especially by the German political class. This extended essay on the constitution for Europe represents Habermas’s constructive engagement with the European project at a time when the crisis of the eurozone is threatening the very existence of the European Union. There is a growing realization that the European treaty needs to be revised in order to deal with the structural defects of monetary union, but a clear perspective for the future is missing. Drawing on his analysis of European unification as a process in which international treaties have progressively taken on features of a democratic constitution, Habermas explains why the current proposals to transform the system of European governance into one of executive federalism is a mistake. His central argument is that the European project must realize its democratic potential by evolving from an international into a cosmopolitan community. The opening essay on the role played by the concept of human dignity in the genealogy of human rights in the modern era throws further important light on the philosophical foundations of Habermas’s theory of how democratic political institutions can be extended beyond the level of nation-states. Now that the question of Europe and its future is once again at the centre of public debate, this important intervention by one of the greatest thinkers of our time will be of interest to a wide readership.

An analysis of the repeated existential crises affecting the resilience of the European Union in the twenty-first century.

This handbook comprehensively explores the European Union’s institutional and policy responses to crises across policy domains and institutions – including the Euro crisis, Brexit, the Ukraine crisis, the refugee crisis, as well as the global health crisis resulting from COVID-19. It contributes to our understanding of how crisis affects institutional change and continuity, decision-making behavior and processes, and public policy-making. It offers a systematic discussion of how the existing repertoire of theories understand crisis and how well they capture times of unrest and events of disintegration. More generally, the handbook looks at how public organizations cope with crises, and thus probes how sustainable and resilient public organizations are in times of crisis and unrest.

The European economy is emerging from its deepest recession since the 1930s. This volume, which brings together economic analysis from the European Commission services, explains how swift policy response avoided a financial meltdown. Europe also needs an improved co-ordinated crisis-management framework to help it respond to any similar situations that may arise in the future. Economic Crisis in Europe is a much-anticipated volume which shows that the beginnings of such a crisis-management framework are emerging, building on existing institutions and legislation and complemented by new initiatives.

This book asks how the European Union can tackle the constitutional conundrum caused by the Euro crisis.

A state-of-the-art consideration of the European Union's crisis response mechanisms based on comparative fieldwork in a number of cases.