EU treaties

Current treaties

European integration is at present based on four founding treaties

• The Treaty establishing the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC), which was signed on 18 April 1951 in Paris, entered into force on 23 July 1952 and expired on 23 July 2002.
• The Treaty establishing the European Economic Community (EEC).
• The Treaty establishing the European Atomic Energy Community (Euratom), which was signed (along with the EEC Treaty) in Rome on 25 March 1957, and entered into force on 1 January 1958.
  • These Treaties are often referred to as the "Treaties of Rome". When the term "Treaty of Rome" is used, only the EEC Treaty is meant.
• The Treaty on European Union, signed in Maastricht on 7 February 1992, entered into force on 1 November 1993.
  • The Maastricht Treaty changed the name of the European Economic Community to simply "the European Community". It also introduced new forms of co-operation between the Member State governments - for example on defence, and in the area of "justice and home affairs". By adding this inter-governmental co-operation to the existing "Community" system, the Maastricht Treaty created a broader structure which is more overtly political as well as economic. This is the European Union (EU).
  • The three aspects of the structure:

1. Economic Community, also known as the common market (with partially supranational structures);
2. the Common Foreign and Security Policy (purely intergovernmental structures);
3. Justice and Home Affairs (purely intergovernmental structures);

are known as the "three pillars" of the European Union.

The founding treaties have been amended when new Member States acceded in

• 1973 (Denmark, Ireland, United Kingdom);
• 1981 (Greece);
• 1986 (Spain, Portugal);
• 1995 (Austria, Finland, Sweden);
• 2004 (Cyprus, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Lithuania, Latvia, Malta, Poland, Slovenia, Slovakia).

There have also been more far-reaching reforms bringing major institutional changes and introducing new areas of responsibility for the European institutions:

• The Merger Treaty, signed in Brussels on 8 April 1965 and in force since 1 July 1967, provided for a Single Commission and a Single Council of the then three European Communities.
• The Single European Act (SEA), signed in Luxembourg and The Hague, and entered into force on 1 July 1987, provided for the adaptations required for the achievement of the Internal Market.
• The Treaty of Amsterdam, signed on 2 October 1997, entered into force on 1 May 1999.
  • It amended and renumbered the EU and EC Treaties.
  • Consolidated versions of the EU and EC Treaties are attached to it.
  • The Treaty of Amsterdam changed the articles of the Treaty on European Union (the Maastricht Treaty), identified in that document by letters A to S, into numerical form.
• The Treaty of Nice, signed on 26 February 2001, entered into force on 1 February 2003. The Treaty of Nice, the former Treaty of the EU and the Treaty of the EC have been merged into one consolidated version.

European Constitution

On 18 June 2004, all 25 member states represented by their Prime Ministers or Presidents in the European Council approved a draft European Constitutional Treaty.

This European Constitution as it is informally known will consolidate, simplify and replace all existing treaties underlying the European Union after it has been approved by all 25 member states. As many of those are planning referendums, this approval process is likely to be fraught with difficulty and it will take a couple of years at the very least.

In the meanwhile, or if the European Constitution will not have enough momentum to gain approval in all member states, the EU will continue to work on the basis of the current treaties described above.

Acknowledgement

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