The New Intergovernmentalism States and Supranational Actors in the Post-Maastricht Era

The twenty years since the signing of the Maastricht Treaty have been marked by an integration paradox: although the scope of European Union (EU) activity has increased at an unprecedented pace, this increase has largely taken place in the absence of significant new transfers of power to supranational institutions along traditional lines. Conventional theories of European integration struggle to explain this paradox because they equate integration with the empowerment of specific supranational institutions under the traditional Community method. New governance scholars, meanwhile, have not filled this intellectual void, preferring instead to focus on specific deviations from the Community method rather than theorizing about the evolving nature of the European project.

The New Intergovernmentalism challenges established assumptions about how member states behave, what supranational institutions want, and where the dividing line between high and low politics is located, and develops a new theoretical framework known as the new intergovernmentalism.

The fifteen chapters in this volume by leading political scientists, political economists, and legal scholars explore the scope and limits of the new intergovernmentalism as a theory of post-Maastricht integration and draw conclusions about the profound state of political disequilibrium in which the EU operates. This book is of relevance to EU specialists seeking new ways of thinking about European integration and policy-making, and general readers who wish to understand what has happened to the EU in the two troubled decades since 1992.

1. The New Intergovernmentalism and the Study of European Integration, Christopher Bickerton, Dermot Hodson, and Uwe Puetter
Part I: Changing Conceptions of Law and Politics Post-Maastricht
2. A Union of Member States: State Transformation and the New Intergovernmentalism, Christopher Bickerton
3. The Roles of Law in a New Intergovernmentalist European Union, Paul James Cardwell and Tamara Hervey
4. Institutionalist Dynamics behind the New Intergovernmentalism: The Continuous Process of EU Treaty Reform, Thomas Christiansen
Part II: Selected EU Policy Domains Since 1992
5. The New Intergovernmentalism and Experiential Learning in the Common Security and Defence Policy, Michael E. Smith
6. Integrating in Justice and Home Affairs: A Case of New Intergovernmentalism Par Excellence?, Sarah Wolff
7. The New Intergovernmentalism in Financial Regulation and European Banking Union, Lucia Quaglia and David Howarth
Part III: EU Institutions in the Post-Maastricht Period
8. The European Council: The Centre of New Intergovernmentalism, Uwe Puetter
9. The Commission and the New Intergovernmentalism: Calm within the Storm?, John Peterson
10. The Court of Justice's Dilemma: Between 'More Europe' and 'Constitutional Mediation', Marie-Pierre F. Granger
11. Legislative and Judicial Politics in the Post-Maastricht Era: The Intergovernmentalist Paradox in the Council of Ministers, Marzena Kloka and Susanne K. Schmidt
12. The European Parliament: Adversary or Accomplice of the New Intergovernmentalism?, Johannes Pollak and Peter Slominski
13. De Novo bodies and the New Intergovernmentalism: The Case of the European Central Bank, Dermot Hodson
Part IV: Critique and Conclusions
14. Understanding the New Intergovernmentalism: Pre- and Post-Maastricht EU Studies, Simon Bulmer
15. Conclusions: The Post-Maastricht Period and Beyond, Christopher Bickerton, Dermot Hodson, and Uwe Puetter