ABSTRACT
At the most basic level, the Council provides for the formal representation of member states in the European Union. National ministers, attending Council meetings, arrive with positions derived from domestic preferences regarding the issues under consideration. Yet this almost immediately leads to one fundamental tension in the work of the Council: given that member state positions on policy-proposals are rarely ever identical, the Council is not simply an-or even the-decision-making organ of the Union, but also the main forum for negotiation in the EU.
