• Treaty of Rome (first Treaty)
  • First step, put into place a self-reinforcing process to become more and more integrated
  • fate that it will bring people together
• Treaty of Lisbon (2009)
  • similar preamble
  • same idea that MS will cooperate more and more across different policy areas
• White paper on the future on Europe
  • different scenarios of cooperation
  • some with renationalisation of competences
  • more realistic ideas

1. Long-term
   • Historical perspective:
     • integration is process of de-differentiation → in place for centuries, slow but decisive process
     • nation-states are entities that consolidates all the boundaries
       • before you had different entities (ex: different economic, military unions, church)
     • European Integration ends this boundary coincidence, ends power of nation-state
   • EI as a process of state-building
     • military threat: war made state → war funding made functional demands, strong incentives to centralize administrative power
     • economic gains
     • national identity construction
       • states had to create common attachment → education, flags, etc.
   • EU uneven development
     • strong regulatory actor, even impacts non-EU countries if they want to trade
     • very little fiscal power, little political authority
     • incomplete institutions, some policy areas not complete
   • processes impacting the future of European integration
     • generational change: different understanding of EI, grew up under different circumstances → generational replacement linked to implementation of policies
     • security challenge → additional push for state-building, give more importance over economic factors
     • geopolitical external factors give push to make EU a stronger actor as well
     • climate change: challenge that everyone faces & will bear the costs of → could push countries together
       • also comes at a cost: certain people/countries more affected → creates different preferences, makes it more difficult to pass new action plans / legislation
     • Migration: Europe attracts many people, not able/unwilling to integrate many bc no common immigration policy
     • Aging societies: Have to maintain a welfare state
     • Inequality gaps, also transcend borders → international taxation, cooperation
2. Medium-term
   • Recurring pattern of integration
     • incompleteness of European governance institutions
     • failing-forward:
       • intergovernmental solutions causing the crisis they were supposed to solve
       • EU leaders have different preferences & can only agree on lowest common denominator solutions
   • impacts of long-run processes
     • young generations have a tendency to be more pro-integration
     • might support integration where they see interdependence between countries
       • more cost-efficient production of public goods
     • increasing sense that nations cannot provide solutions in some areas, even among not politically interested people
     • Green transitions requires transitions in different sectors, no clear spillover if no push for green transitions → despite pressure no common solution yet
   • Crises don’t come at zero-cost: failing forward has impact on public opinion
3. Short-term
   • Climate change most prominent in Northern Europe
   • most people want 50/50 EU & national level
   • fighting terrorism, migration & climate change most wanted at EU level → perceived as most efficiently solved at EU level → more support for integration
   • a lot variation between countries for EU support
   • reform packages less accepted if they include things like climate change → even if perceived to be solved more efficiently at EU level
   • struggle to translate perception of interdependence to support for policies
   • more fragmented EI needed