Transnational European Union Towards a Common Political Space Routledge Research in Transnationalism Series

At the beginning of the twenty-first century, the European Union is an increasingly dense transnational social and political space. More and more non-governmental organisations develop transnational links, which are usually more intensive within the EU, even if they often extend beyond its borders to the wider world.

This multi-disciplinary volume explores the importance of these structures, actors and relations for EU and European governance in the context of the theoretical debate about European integration in the social sciences. This book delivers:

• theoretical chapters examining and discussing the main conceptual perspectives to studying the transnational EU to provide a current overview
• empirical case studies of transnationalism in practice on transnational party, trade union and police cooperation to transnational education policy-making and transnational consensus-building in EMU governance.

This volume will be of great interest to students in social sciences, contemporary history and law.

Contents, Notes on Contributors, Acknowledgements, List of abbreviations, The European Union as a transnational political space: Introduction, Wolfram Kaiser and Peter Starie, Part 1. Conceptual Perspectives Chapter 1. Transnational Western Europe since 1945: Integration as political society formation, Wolfram Kaiser, Chapter 2. Transnational networks: Informal governance in the European political space, Karen Heard-Lauréote, Chapter 3. Transnational socialization: Community-building in an integrated Europe, Frank Schimmelfennig, Chapter 4. Transnational business: Power structures in Europe’s political economy, Bastiaan van Apeldoorn, Part 2. Transnationalism in Practice, Chapter 5. Trade unions as a transnational movement in the European space 1955-1965: Falling short of ambitions?, Patrick Pasture Chapter 6. The alliance of European Christian democracy and conservatism: Convergence through networking, Karl Magnus Johansson Chapter 7. German political foundations: Transnational party go-betweens in the EU enlargement process, Dorota Dakowska, Chapter 8. Transnational actors in the European Higher Education Area: European opportunities and institutional embeddedness, Erik Beerkens Chapter 9. Copweb Europe: Venues, virtues and vexations of transnational policing, Monica Den Boer Chapter 10. Transnational consensus building in EMU economic governance: Elite interaction and national preference formation, Daniela Schwarzer, Index.

Wolfram Kaiser is Professor of European Studies at the University of Portsmouth and Visiting Professor at the College of Europe in Bruges. His most recent books include (ed. with J. Elvert) European Union Enlargement. A Comparative History (2004); Christian Democracy in Europe since 1945 (2004); Using Europe, Abusing the Europeans. Britain and European Integration 1945-1963 (1999). He is currently writing a book on transnational Christian democracy in 20th century Europe.
Peter Starie is Principal Lecturer in Politics at the University of Portsmouth. He has mainly published on policy networks and European integration.