ABSTRACT
The first general conclusion one can draw from the preceding case studies is that the EU is assuming a progressively more important role in economic diplomacy. This shift has not happened overnight as a result of specific decisions in treaty negotiations, but as a slow and often uneven response to developments both within and outside the EU. The EU’s role in external trade, which is held up as the classic example of a case of EU ‘actorness’, was only established over decades. It is true that the Treaty of Rome established EEC exclusive competence for the common commercial policy from the start, but as a practical issue it took many years before the EU established a role in all trade policy. In the case of international environmental policy, the role of the EU has also emerged progressively over decades rather than years, and in the case of financial regulation, the EU has yet to achieve the kind of recognition it has in trade or even environmental diplomacy.
