Summit collapse: ongoing crisis for the enlarged EU

The paper argues that the collapse of the European Council Summit in Brussels on 13 December 2003 and the failure to agree the new constitutional treaty throws the Union into a major and unprecedented crisis. Attempts by many EU politicians to talk the severity of the crisis down will not help in building a rapid and effective response to it. The Laeken ambitions of a new treaty to ensure a more democratic EU closer to the people, an efficient enlarged EU and a Union with a real voice in global affairs, lie in ruins for now. And this is indeed a crisis about enlargement, since it was the new EU of 25 that, in an unprecedented manner, failed to find a compromise to finalise the two years of work spent drawing up the constitutional treaty draft. Time will tell if the current crisis is a real turning point in the Union's development or if, in the end, it will be seen as a damaging, messy but ultimately surmounted crisis. The real losers for now are political relations in the new EU; public opinion; EU debate; democracy; and the EU's role in the world. Losses will be greater still if the new treaty is never agreed.