In the summertime of 2018 , the United Kingdom ’s Prime Minister Theresa May move to the south of France to satisfy with French President Emmanuel Macron at his holiday hideaway at Côte d’Azur ’s Fort de Brégançon . But she was n’t there just to enjoy the sight of the Mediterranean . May hoped to get Macron ’s help with a finespun trouble . Two years before , U.K. voters had surprise the world by narrowly deciding to leave the European Union ( EU ) . Now , May wanted to work on out a compromise , in which theU.K.technically would pull up stakes the EU but would stay in Europe ’s economic market and not have its exportation subject to custom bridle and restrictions [ seed : Judah ] .
But Macron was n’t having it . The U.K. was the first nation ever to quit the EU , and it was get going to have to do it the hard way . As Macron after told his diplomat , he would n’t check to any deal that make out " at the expense of the European Union ’s integrity " [ source : Merrick ] .
The organisation that Macron was so incisive on protecting is one that ’s helped bring peace , constancy and prosperity to a continent once full of bitter rivals . The EU is a political and economic partnership of 28 phallus nations , in which each state save its sovereignty but all cooperate closely . The EU nations officiate as a single market in which capital , goods and services move freely , and apportion a common swop and farming insurance policy . In addition , 19 of the 28 nations have adopted a vulgar up-to-dateness , the euro , and 22 of them participate in something called the Schengen area of free movement , in which they do n’t impose any internal controls at their borders . The EU also has been branch out into setting up cooperation in defence and intragroup protection policy [ beginning : Archick ] .
In some ways , the EU is one of modern chronicle ’s great successes . Not only has it eliminated discord among countries that agitate numerous wars amongst themselves over the centuries , but it ’s also created an economic steamroller that produced $ 19.9 trillion in economic activity in 2017 . If the EU was a land , it would have the world ’s secondly biggest economy , just ahead of the United States ' $ 19.4 trillion and behind only China ’s $ 23.1 trillion [ origin : Amadeo ] . And EU country have banded together to clean up the continent ’s environment and to impose stringent seclusion policies that the world ’s technical school giants have been obliged to follow .
But in late years , the EU also has been sway by develop intragroup tension and outdoor challenge , from treat with an influx of immigrants and refugees to rising internal opposition from populist and nationalistic movements , including those who gain ground the Brexit ( the word is a chemical compound of the full term " British exit " ) referendum in the U.K. [ rootage : Archick ] . At the same prison term , the EU has clashed over trade issues with U.S. President Donald Trump , and the longtime human relationship between the EU and the U.S. has develop in spades more tense [ source : Rogin ] .
In this article , we ’ll calculate at what the EU does , how it develop , and whether it will last and prosper in the future .
How the European Union Functions
The 28 Nation that belong to the EU work together by take part in a number of vernacular institutions , which set policy and advance their usual involvement . Here are some of the major ones [ source : Archick ] :
Decisions taken by the EU regarding economic and social policies are legally binding on all member nation , as long as the majority votes for them . However , for emergence refer to security , agreement must be consentaneous . One government activity can veto a determination and end it . For issues relating to justness policy , unanimity was also required , but in 2009 , theTreaty of Lisbonchanged that to a absolute majority agreement .
How and Why Was the EU Created?
The EU was make in the wake of World War II , as a style to at last put an end to the farsighted account of economic strife and bloody warfare across the continent . In 1950 , six nations — Belgium , France , Germany , Italy , Luxembourg and the Netherlands — take form something called the European Coal and Steel Community , with the idea of join forces economically and politically . The Cold War struggle that pock the U.S. and westerly Europe against the Soviet Bloc nations to the east only reinforced the pauperism for Europe ’s popular res publica to unify . In 1957 , they signed the Treaty of Rome , which make the European Economic Community , also known as the Common Market [ source : EU ] .
In the 1960s , that cooperation led to prosperity . EU countries contain turn on customs duties when they trade with one another , which boostedtrade . They also agreed to coordinate their intellectual nourishment cultivation , which eliminated shortages and ensured that hoi polloi across the European continent get enough to eat .
In the 1970s , the EU gradually boom its geographical reach , with the U.K. , Denmark and Ireland joining in 1973 , impart the full number of member to nine . But just as importantly , the organisation begin setting and carry out policy in new area , such as enacting stringent anti - pollution law and acquaint the principle that polluters had to pay to houseclean up environmental harm . By the eye of the decade , the EU also was spending a circumstances of money to create job and base in inadequate part of Europe and concentrate economic inequity . The European Parliament became more important , and in 1979 , citizens of EU countries begin electing their representatives directly for the first fourth dimension [ source : EU ] .
The 1980s take in more enlargement of the EU , with Greece joining in 1981 and Spain and Portugal in 1986 . That same year , the EU nations sign on the Single European Act , a accord that sought to rule out trade conflicts and make a " single market " for the entire continent in which good and inspection and repair could move more freely without border checks . In 1989 , the collapse of the communist regimen in East Germany and the lacrimation down of the Berlin Wall , which led to the eventual reunion of Germany , signaled the start of a fresh time period of evolution for the EU .
The Fall of Communism and the Growth of the EU
At the commencement of the nineties , ascommunistregimes disintegrated in central and Eastern Europe , the EU countries became even more closely knit . In 1992 , EU nations sign the Maastricht Treaty , one of the constitutional documents that created the EU from the earlier European Community . In 1995 , three more nations — Austria , Finland and Sweden — joined the EU , and the Schengen agreement step by step allowed Europeans to locomote across the continent without experience their passports checked at national borders [ source : EU ] .
In the decade that adopt , the EU turn even larger . Ten new nation — the Czech Republic , Estonia , Cyprus , Latvia , Lithuania , Hungary , Malta , Poland , Slovakia and Slovenia — joined in 2004 , and Bulgaria and Romania in 2007 . Croatia link in 2013 , increase the membership of the EU to 28 nations [ root : EU ] .
But by then , the EU was also experiencing stresses both from external and interior force . Unrest and warfare in the Middle East create a spate of refugee , which Europe struggled to count on out how to reconcile . Terror attacks by radical groups put European countries on boundary [ source : EU ] . And in numerous country , right - wing nationalist movements uprise to challenge the idea of European unity .
What Is the Euro?
part in 1999 , some EU member nations began take up a common currentness , the euro , to put back their own national currencies . As of 2018 , 19 of the EU ’s 28 members — a mathematical group called the eurozone — use theeuro . In addition to have the same paper money and coins , eurozone participants share a coarse central savings bank , the European Central Bank , which position a usual monetary policy for them all [ source : Archick ] .
While having a common currency has advantages , in recent years it ’s become evident that there are major downsides as well . The eurozone nations still coiffure their own financial policies , and essentially retain authority over their national spending , taxes and external adoption . That can signify that if a national government mismanages its finance , problem can bubble through the eurozone system .
In the 2000s , for example , the Greek government borrowed heavily from international lender to cover its budget and trade deficits . Greece ’s debt load farm so Brobdingnagian that by 2010 , it was in peril of not being able to keep up the defrayment , which come the markets occupy about other eurozone nations that also had eminent debt load . AndGreececould not devaluate its currency nor cut interest rates to draw in more business .
finally , the EU had to organize a bailout , which include having the European Central Bank purchase a wad of debt from those financially strapped countries and extend more credit . Some of the nation that receive EU help eventually recover . But Greece ’s economy and banking system kept struggling , and by 2015 its governance was demand more debt relief and an easing of austerity measures that it had been forced to consent . There even were rumble that Greece might stage a " Grexit , " though eventually , a business deal was make in 2017 that provided more assistance and forfend a leaving . Even so , the crisis raised question about the eurozone ’s long - term constancy [ source : Archick ] .
Having a exclusive currency makes thing easy for patronage and extinguish currentness unpredictability but it can also make thing firmly when economies are in trouble . EU appendage who do n’t use the euro say that this allows them to arrange monetary policy customized for their country ’s conditions rather than for Europe as a whole . Some experts think the U.K. was able to recover from the 2008 global financial crisis quicker than say , Greece , because it could turn out sake rates immediately .
EU members are want to enter the eurozone ( i.e. use the euro ) once they meet the requirements of admission . But they can put off meeting the requirements , which in effect imply they do not assume the euro . The U.K. and Denmark are two EU appendage who do n’t use the euro [ source : Seth ] .
How Do National Borders Work in the EU?
Since 1999 , 22 of the EU ’s penis states — Austria , Belgium , the Czech Republic , Denmark , Estonia , Finland , France , Germany , Greece , Hungary , Italy , Latvia , Lithuania , Luxembourg , Malta , the Netherlands , Poland , Portugal , Slovakia , Slovenia , Spain , and Sweden — have prefer to get rid of their own internal border controls .
alternatively , they ’ve formed the Schengen Area , discover after the townspeople in Luxembourg where the concord was signed . For travel andimmigrationpurposes , the sphere fundamentally function as one big land , with common rules for visa , asylum requests and perimeter checks . There ’s an exclusion build in the rules that allows a country to reimpose its own ascendence for a short time when there ’s a major surety terror or some outside outcome , such as a sports patronage or a big conference of mankind leader [ source : Archick ] .
Despite the freedom of movement that the Schengen Area allows , it does n’t result in as much migration as you might expect . Politico ’s European variant reported in 2018 that only 11 pct of the great unwashed in the EU are living outside the country of their nascence , compare to 13 per centum in the U.S. And many of those immigrants actually fall from other EU country [ source : Cokelaere ] .
But the EU has faced growing inner tensions over what to do about refugees from the Middle East and Africa , nearly 2 million of whom have arrive since 2014 . Italy and Greece have taken most of the migrants , in declamatory part due to their geographic localization . Some nation want refugees to be distribute more equally among all nations . Other countries do n’t want to go for any immigrant and have pushed for more restrictive EU immigration policies [ reference : Henley ] . The progeny is jeopardise the " exemption of cause " agreement within the EU and was one issue behind Brexit .
Why Would Countries Want to Leave the EU?
clause 50 of the Treaty of Lisbon , signed by member nations back in 2007 and effective in 2009 , necessitate the EU to negotiate a breach with any nation that devote at least two years notice that it think to leave [ source : Lisbon Treaty ] .
So far , though , only one nation has opt to do that . In June 2016 , the U.K. admit a referendum on whether it should invoke Article 50 , though most masses know it as Brexit . Though polls had predict otherwise , U.K. voters shocked Europe by voting 52 - 48 pct to leave alone the EU [ source : Archick ] .
counselor-at-law of Brexit argued that the EU was a bad quite a little for the British , because it allowed workers from elsewhere in Europe to migrate to the U.K. and drive wages there down . They also felt that the EU had too much say over the intimacy of the U.K. [ reservoir : Lee ] .
Others complain that the EU ’s regulation for fighting climate change and increase renewable vigour use were costly burden to the U.K. economy . One thinktank forecast that the annual cost of fulfilling the 100 " most taxing " EU regulations was 33.3 billion British pound ( U.S. $ 42.6 billion ) [ root : BBC News ] .
The Brexit conclusion had all sort of consequences and complication , many of which voter probably did n’t foresee . For instance , the governor of the bank of England said in May 2017 the U.K. had already lost 2 percent of predicted growth and 4 percentage from home incomes since the referendum [ source : The Guardian ] . And the thinktank ’s calculation , others noted , did n’t describe for the annual 58.6 billion pound ( $ 75.12 billion ) in benefits Britain gained from being in the EU [ source : BBC News ] .
On the other hand in December 2017 , the firm EY predicted the U.K. would lose 10,500 financial industriousness jobs on day one of Brexit , as banks , brokerage firm and other financial companies started incite their operations to the continent to control that they ’d still have unfettered access to European customers . But the City of London Corp. downgraded that red ink to just 5,000 in August 2018 [ origin : Musaddique , Contiguglia ] . The veridical number , of course , is still a mystery .
Another uncertain matter is what happens to the border between Northern Ireland ( part of the U.K. ) and the Republic of Ireland , which is stay in the EU . The 1998 Belfast Agreement , which put an end to the fighting in Northern Ireland , also did out with border baulk . Neither the U.K. nor Ireland wants a return to border chit , but as of late 2018 , they had n’t figured out a way to resolve this [ source : Carswell ] .
The Future of the EU
Another doubt in the EU ’s hereafter ( besides Brexit ) is its relationship with the U.S. , with which it traditionally has worked to uprise trade with other parts of the humans . But in 2017 , the U.S. get a unexampled chairperson , Donald Trump , who disliked multilateral swap agreements and want to make bilaterally symmetrical bargain between the U.S. and other countries [ generator : Archick ] . grant toWashington Post editorialist Josh Rogin , at one point Trump even boldly ask French President Macron why he did n’t chuck up the sponge the EU , and offered France a good trade sight if it left .
After Trump hit Europe with steel and aluminum tariff in 2018 , many feared that a swap war would erupt . But in July of that year , Trump and EU officials seemed to call a armistice . European Commission President Jean - Claude Juncker and Trump remain firm side by side at the White House to announce a deal in which the EU agreed to buy billions of dollars in U.S. exports such as soja and natural gas , and the U.S. agreed to work with the Europeans to forfend additional duty [ source : Smith and Rushe ] .
If those negotiations flunk , the U.S. and the EU could proceed to drift apart . Some expert guess the EU might seek a close relationship withChinainstead [ reference : Archick ] . But never has the EU ’s future seemed so overabundant with uncertainties .
It was n’t too hard to empathise why Macron and other European leaders seem set to make the U.K. palpate economical painfulness for leave . That ’s because if the EU made it well-off and painless to quit , there was a danger that other countries — particularly ones with rising far - right hand , anti - immigration nationalistic political drive , such as Sweden — might succeed [ sources : Kirk , Hix and Sitter ] .
Lots More Information
When I was a boy , I read a hatful about World War I and II and the terrible price that so many people ante up in those struggle . So it was interesting to learn more about Europe ’s effort to make institutions that promote cooperation rather than conflict .
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