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"The global financial crisis, which started in the United States in 2007, spread to Europe in 2009. It especially hit Portugal, Ireland, Italy, Greece, and Spain, countries which have introduced the single currency, the euro. These eurozone countries no longer have monetary policy autonomy, so they do not have the option of devaluation to increase competitiveness. The crisis has shown that the Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) created in 1993, and which led to the single currency in 1999, is faulty. Its built-in asymmetry, with centralised monetary policy and decentralised fiscal policy, should be expected to create problems. Part of the response to the crisis so far has been incremental moves towards fiscal and banking union, which will mean a deepening of European integration at a time when many observers believed that a certain equilibrium had been reached after the entry into force of the Lisbon Treaty in 2009. This book focuses on these developments as well as analysing other economic policies that affect the general economic welfare of the EU, including agriculture, trade and immigration policies. The book puts the eurozone crisis into the wider context of deepening and widening."--Publisher's website.

Transatlantic economic relations remain extremely important for the European Union as well as for other countries in the world. When it comes to trade and foreign direct investment, the EU and the United States remain arguably the world's most powerful actors, despite the financial crisis which started in the United States in 2007 and subsequently spread to Europe and to the Eurozone in particular. This crisis has created great economic strain on both Europe and North America, with politicians trying to muddle through and disagreeing on which strategy to adopt. The dominance of the Atlantic co

Part I. Introduction: the Lisbon Treaty: the treaty-making process -- Part II. The role of Germany -- Part III. The roles of other big member states -- Part IV. The roles of new and small member states -- Part V. The Irish referendum -- Part VI. Conclusions: the making of the Lisbon Treaty: national preferences, inter-state bargaining and theoretical debates

This book gathers leading international scholars to examine the institutional choices and innovations of the Lisbon Treaty and discuss the likely effects that of the changes that it set out to accomplish. Will the changes meet the declared goals of a more efficient and democratic Union which will allow the EU to act internationally with greater coherence and efficiency? If institutions matter, how much do they matter? How significant is the Lisbon Treaty? What kind of leadership will be available in the post-Lisbon EU?

This book has chapters on all the treaties establishing the European Communities in the 1950s as well as subsequent treaties reforming these community treaties (Merger Treaty, Budget Treaties, and the Single European Act) followed by chapters on the Maastricht Treaty establishing the European Union in 1993 and subsequent amendments thereof through the Amsterdam, Nice and Lisbon treaties. The authors are all established and well-known scholars of European integration. The book thus traces the 'constitutional' foundation of the European Union (EU) over time and analyses these development from a comparative perspective: who were the main actors, what were their preferences and which institutions did they design to deal with common problems and challenges? Despite the rejection of the proposed Constitutional Treaty in referendums in France and the Netherlands in 2005 the 'constitutionalization' of the EU has continued. The book tries to answer both the 'how' and 'why' questions of this fascinating process.

Tracing the evolution of federalist theory and the EU, this book brings together a distinguished array of experts from around the world to debate the pros and cons of treating the EU in a comparative context. Contributors ask whether a constitutional equilibrium has been reached in the EU, and examine policymaking in areas such as employment, health, environment, security, and migration.