The State of the Union

The European Union now counts 27 members, but almost none of the fears, which accompanied the enlargement negotiations has proven valid: citizens from new member countries did not flood Western European labor markets and send millions of low- skilled workers into unemployment, West European capitalists did not colonize Central and Eastern Europe and new member states did not paralyze the Union's institutions and decision- making processes.

At first glance, enlargement seems to be a success story. However, there is a dark side as well: it is now much more difficult than ever to agree on treaty reforms. The Nice Treaty was signed in 2000, but since then, no progress has been made: all attempts to reach a consensus after enlargement remained unsuccessful due to national vetoes and negative referendum results. Despite a successful enlargement, the EU now seems to be more strained by enlargement than ever before.

Our project tries to evaluate the state of the Union after 2004: how did decision- making processes and the functioning of the major institutions (Commission, Council, Parliament and Court) change, and which consequences for the relations between them and national institutions (governments, parliaments and constitutional courts) did this have? We pay special attention to Poland, the biggest of the new member states, one of the most active ones (but not necessarily the most efficient one): how does integration affect parliamentary democracy? How efficient is Poland in the EU's institutions? When and why did Polish ministers win or lose votes in the Council? What is the impact of Polish members of the European Parliament? How did policy focuses of the EU's key institutions shift after enlargement? Can we identify new coalitions or even blocks of member countries emerging after enlargement, or has the EU become an anarchic forum, producing random outcomes, which are impossible to predict?