ABSTRACT
In the 1990s we have witnessed a major transformation in the nature of European integration: the gradual emergence of an agenda for the ‘constitutional reform’ of the European Union. After the ratification debates which followed the signing of the Maastricht Treaty, the Reflection Group helped to set the agenda for the 1996-7 Inter-Governmental Conference (IGC). The Amsterdam Treaty essentially deals with the fundamental structural arrangements for future EU decision making. This, in itself, is no small matter: it indicates that we are witnessing not only a quickening of structural reform in the EU - indeed a trend towards continuous reform - but also a move away from the preoccupation with policy (Single Market, EMU) in past IGCs, towards genuinely institutiona reform. It seems as if the EC/EU has gone full circle: after the 1955 EPC/EDC failure there was a move away from political integration and a concentration on the laborious process of market integration (customs union, ‘ 1992’ programme, EMU), only to return in the 1990s to confront the accumulated back-log of ‘political’ and institutional issues.
