ABSTRACT

The European area both produces and consumes the largest amount of alcohol in the world (WHO, 2014). As a result, the need to strike a balance between protection of economic interests and protection of people’s health creates considerable tensions between different policy stakeholders, including the alcohol industry and alcohol control advocates. Alcohol duties are set nationally but are governed by EU tax harmonization directives and trade agreements that set clear parameters within which nation states operate. Article 168 of the Treaty of Lisbon (2009) devolves health policy to member states while a role is retained for the EU in coordinating and complementing national policies that are ‘directed towards improving public health, preventing physical and mental illness and diseases and obviating sources of danger to physical and mental health’ (European Union, 2001). As this chapter will demonstrate, the dynamic relationship between centralized regulation, devolved powers, national and regional cultures and competing stakeholder interests creates a raft of difficulties in establishing coordinated alcohol policy across the EU.