30 years after Maastricht: Still the era of integration without supranationalisation?

Abstract

The last decade of contemporary European Union (EU) studies scholarship has seen intensified debate about the major determinants of institutional politics and reforms. Even though coming from different strands within the EU studies literature, a number of scholars have converged in the understanding of key moments of institutional change in the post-Maastricht period as instances of integration without supranationalisation. Major events, such as the institutional reforms of the Treaty of Lisbon, the euro crisis, the struggles surrounding EU migration policy and the erosion of democracy and the rule of law, as well as the EU’s management of the COVID-19 pandemic have triggered new research output which makes reference to this baseline argument. The panel uses the 30th anniversary of the entering into force of the Treaty of Maastricht as an opportunity for reflecting on the validity of key approaches which have been associated with the debate about integration without surpanationalisation. It assembles key protagonists of the core state powers, discursive institutionalism and new intergovernmentalism approaches, as well as of related debates within the domain of comparative federalism. The individual contributions review the original foundations and hypotheses of the approaches in the light of more recent research findings. In addition, the contributions to this panel address the EU’s responses to climate change, the outbreak of war within the EU’s immediate neighbourhood, the prevailing patterns of inter-institutional relations in the outgoing 2019-2024 institutional cycle. Finally, the panellists will debate the relevance of the respective theoretical approaches in view of the accelerating discussion on further EU enlargement.

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