ABSTRACT
This chapter analyses the beginnings of EU police cooperation in the 1970s. It traces the historic process leading to the establishment of the Trevi Group and investigates to what extent cross-border interdependencies, politicisation and policy entrepreneurship shaped state integration preferences. As key actors in the creation and design of the Trevi Group, the chapter particularly looks at the preference development of Germany, France and the United Kingdom (UK). It finds that preferences differed significantly across Member States, integration dimensions and time, depending on the absence or presence of the respective explanatory factors. While high interdependence acted as necessary condition and starting point for the development of pro-integration preferences in support of European police cooperation, asymmetries in the impact of the respective driving factors across countries caused integration preferences of differing strengths and shapes. The respective strength of single drivers ultimately determined not only preference formation on vertical and horizontal integration as well as the functional scope of European police cooperation but also the probability of preference di- or convergence among Member States. Accordingly, governments deliberately adopted strategies of differentiated integration in the negotiation phase for TREVI's establishment to advance cooperation in the present and possibly integration in the long run.
