Neill Nugent Knihy

Systematically revised and rewritten throughout and updated to cover the impact of the Lisbon Treaty, this highly-successful and ground-breaking text remains unique in analyzing the EU as a political system using the methods of comparative political science.

This fourth edition has been revised to bring it up to date with developments in the late 1990s. It provides an introduction to the evolution of the EU and its institutions and policy processes. There is a section on integration theory.

Based on exhaustive research, this book explains how the European Union makes decisions in seven major policy sectors. Written in a clear, user-friendly style, it brings the EU alive for a student and non-specialist audience. The book's central themes are that informal norms often matter more than formal rules, agency often matters more than structure, and abrupt change often punctuates deadlock. It offers a theoretically-based introduction to the lively, humorous and fascinating politics of a unique experiment in modern governance.

Leading scholars explore the complex questions arising from the ongoing transformation of Europe through the deepening and widening effects of European integration. Based on authoritative analyses, the book takes account of the many national, transnational and international processes and contexts in which European integration has become embedded.

A major new theoretical and empirical contribution to our understanding of the influence of EU institutions vis-á-vis governments in the major decisions about both widening and deepening the European Union. Engagingly written and based on significant new archival research and original interviews, Derek Beach offers both a new history of the major treaty negotiations of the EU and a new leadership model of European integration.

This book provides an analysis of the European Neighbourhood Policy by focusing on the impact of norms of justice and home affairs on EU external relations. Drawing on the literature of 'new governance' it designs a framework for analysis which clarifies the contents, tools and processes of the external dimension of EU justice and home affairs.