hard copy OUT OF PRINT June 1999

hard copy OUT OF PRINT April 1999

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European defence post-Kosovo
by Charles Grant, June 1999

The European Union has long talked about building a defence capability, but done very little about it. In the first week of June 1999, however, two events gave a boost to the EU's military aspirations. At the Cologne summit EU leaders agreed on a scheme that would enable the EU to deploy military force. At the same time NATO's victory over the Serbs – after 11 weeks of bombing – created favourable circumstances for the implementation of that scheme. Yet much work remains to be done before the EU can become a credible military organisation.

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Scotland Europa:
Independence in Europe?
by Matthew Happold, April 1999

There is a question mark over the future of the nation-state in Europe. National monetary
sovereignty has been transferred to the European level in most EU states. Over the next ten years the EU will have a stronger role in defence and foreign policy, immigration and law enforcement. The very policies that supposedly define the concept of national sovereignty are no longer the exclusive domain of national governments. At the same time devolution is accelerating in some parts of the EU. Regional politicians have long dreamt of creating a 'Europe of the regions', in which sub-national governments, in an alliance with Brussels, replace nation-states as the building blocks of an ever closer union.

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The EU budget: An agenda for reform
by John Peet and Kitty Ussher, February 1999

The nastiest arguments in the European Union, as in any family, are the ones about money. Communautaire sentiment soon evaporates when prime ministers start to haggle over the budget. Lady Thatcher knows that as well as anyone. She first wielded her handbag against other EU leaders in December 1979, in Dublin, when she famously demanded “my money back”. She then felt no compunction about obstructing most other European business until she finally won Britain a permanent budget rebate at Fontainebleau in 1984.

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