Abstract
The sixth major intergovernmental conference (IGC) of the European Union2 started 29 March 1996. Preceding this conference, three main developments led to a vivid reform debate among experts, academics, and the EC institutions: First, during the difficult ratification process of the Maastricht Treaty, it became obvious that the “Maastricht Union” marked a still unsatisfactory stage of the institutional development at the European level. The pertinent issue of the democratic deficit and lacking legitimacy of the Union’s decisionmaking structure were highlighted during numerous debates at both European and national levels; also the call for more transparency in the working of the institutions, the question of subsidiarity and hence the division of competences/powers between the Union and its Member states were discussed intensively. Second, the perspective of a Union further enlarged to the East and South made it clear that the institutional mechanisms designed for a Community of only six members which had until then only been adapted mechanically, without changing the original principles, would not match up with the needs of a Union of some 28 Member states. Third, the formal agenda of the IGC as agreed upon in the Maastricht Treaty (Article N) has been widened accordingly to the two first developments. During 1995/96, these three developments converged into a genuine constitutional debate, and some thought that it might well be that the negotiations during the present IGC would lead to a qualitative leap in the development of the Union.
A previous version of this paper has been presented in the workshop “The Political Theory of European Constitutional Choice” at the ECPR Joint Sessions of Workshops Oslo 29 March — 3 April 96; I am most grateful to the participants of this workshop for their valuable input. The paper is based on a book written by Gerda Falkner and me (Falkner/Nentwich [1995],) and on two working papers of the Vienna 1996 IGC research group (Griller/ Nentwich/Falkner/Droutsas/Forgó) dealing with the initial positions (IEF Working Paper No. 20, June 1996) and the interim results of the Dublin-II summit (IEF Working Paper No. 25, January 1997).
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Nentwich, M. (1998). The EU Intergovernmental Conference 1996/97: The Moment of Constitutional Choice for a Democratic Europe?. In: Føllesdal, A., Koslowski, P. (eds) Democracy and the European Union. Studies in Economic Ethics and Philosophy. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-662-03622-8_5
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