Abstract
This paper presents an assessment of the Nice Treaty from the perspective of a European civic society in the making. The paper consists of two parts. The first part traces the overall change of emphasis by the Member States in making EU polity during three Intergovernmental Conferences (IGCs) at Maastricht, Amsterdam and Nice. Broadly speaking, more emphasis is now being put at a European level on creating a civic society rather than just an economic market: there is a quest for more “democratic” decision-making, creating an area of “freedom, security and justice”, proclaiming an EU “charter of fundamental rights”, and developing a European security and defence policy. The same change of emphasis is also traceable, I would argue, in the case-law made by the European Court of justice in the 1990s: European citizens' role in making their civic society at a European level is becoming more evident.
The second part of this paper will assess the new institutional arrangements as a result of the Nice Treaty in the light of the civic shift by the EU polity. Though the paper takes note of several positive achievements in EU institutional reform under the Nice Treaty, it is pointed out that the Nice Summit failed to tackle new problems which have grown from the civic change of emphasis in EU governance: in particular the decision-making process at the Council is still on a (mainly economic) sector-by-sector basis, and this method cannot adequately meet trans-sector (“horizontal”) complex issues which are arising more frequently, even in the traditional field of market regulation, such as trade and environment protection, and development and regulation of biotechnology products. The paper suggests that the agenda for a new IGC scheduled for 2004 should include the reform of the decision-making method by sector based Councils, which might entail consolidation of some sectoral Councils to establish a few major “horizontal” Councils.
