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Luuk van Middelaar

Luuk Van Middelaar

The Passage to Europe: How a Continent Became a Union Hardcover – July 23, 2013

by Luuk van Middelaar (Author)

4.5 36 ratings

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The untold story of the crises and compromises that united a continent

As financial turmoil in Europe preoccupies political leaders and global markets, it becomes more important than ever to understand the forces that underpin the European Union, hold it together and drive it forward. This timely book provides a gripping account of the realities of power politics among European states and between their leaders. Drawing on long experience working behind the scenes, Luuk van Middelaar captures the dynamics and tensions shaping the European Union from its origins until today.

It is a story of unexpected events and twists of fate, bold vision and sheer necessity, told from the perspective of the keyplayers – from de Gaulle to Havel, Thatcher to Merkel. Van Middelaar cuts through the institutional complexity by exploring the unforeseen outcomes of decisive moments and focusing on the quest for public legitimacy.

As a first-hand witness to the day-to-day actions and decisions of Europe’s leaders, the author provides a vivid narrative of the crises and compromises that united a continent. By revisiting the past, he sheds fresh light on the present state of European unification and offers insights into what the future may hold.

Print length

392 pages
Language

English
Publisher

Yale University Press
Publication date

July 23, 2013
Dimensions

6.5 x 1.5 x 9.5 inches
ISBN-10

9780300181128
ISBN-13

978-0300181128
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Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

This supremely erudite account of Europe's transformation by van Middelaar (Politicide), a Dutch philosopher and advisor to the European Council president, demonstrates that integration "failed to put an end to power politics between member states," with continual crises testing the legitimacy of the union since the 1950s. Charles de Gaulle's instinctive realpolitik made him fiercely protective of French sovereignty, leading to a constitutional crisis in 1966 . Other quandaries-whether a European Army was desirable and practicable to face the Soviet Union , or how best to navigate German reunification after 1989 -make the author pose an apt question: "Is Europe real, or does it exist only on paper?" Otherwise brilliant, the book suffers from the philosopher's instinct toward the abstract over the concrete. Van Middelaar writes awkwardly of the continent's citizens as an amorphous mass, referring to the creation of a "new European public that speaks in unison." When chances do arise to explore public opinion as the product of flesh-and-blood humans-a challenge to the Maastricht Treaty in the German Constitutional Court being a salient opportunity-van Middelaar retreats into political theory . Nevertheless, his encyclopedic knowledge of and intimacy with European affairs will make even a specialist blush with envy.

Review

"A discerning, balanced, gracefully written book, flavoured with the insights of political science but filled with the meat of European Union history over six decades."—Tony Barber, Financial Times -- Tony Barber ― Financial Times

“Philosophically informed and historically sensitive. . . . [offering] a subtle and detailed account of the evolution of the Union.”—Larry Sidentop, Times Literary Supplement -- Larry Sidentop ― Times Literary Supplement Published On: 2013-11-29

"[The book] has much to teach those who want to understand the EU’s recent political dynamic."—The Economist ― The Economist

"An erudite alternative to the persistent drumbeat about the coming, market-driven disintegration of the European Union . . . . An intriguing presentation of views seldom reported so readably and in such depth."—Kirkus Reviews
― Kirkus Reviews

“His encyclopedic knowledge of and intimacy with European affairs will make even a specialist blush with envy.”―Publishers Weekly ― Publishers Weekly

“The book I most valued was Luuk van Middelaar’s The Passage to Europe, a brilliant account of the development of the European Union. The most insightful book on Europe since Larry Siedentop’s Democracy in Europe, and essential reading before voting in the referendum.”
—Vernon Bogdanor, Times Higher Education Supplement, Book of the Year -- Vernon Bogdanor ― Times Higher Education Supplement Published On: 2013-12-19

“The author, a senior EU official, combines inside knowledge with the insights of a philosopher . . . His discussion . . . is illuminating and remarkably readable.”—Roger Morgan, Times Higher Education Supplement -- Roger Morgan ― Times Higher Education Supplement Published On: 2013-12-19

Product details

ASIN ‏ : ‎ 0300181124
Publisher ‏ : ‎ Yale University Press (July 23, 2013)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 392 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 9780300181128
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0300181128
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.76 pounds
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6.5 x 1.5 x 9.5 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #2,560,336 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #1,466 in Foreign & International Law
- #1,834 in International Diplomacy (Books)
- #4,863 in European Politics Books

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4.5 36 ratings

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Luuk Van Middelaar
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Luuk van Middelaar (b. 1973) is a Dutch political philosopher and currently the speechwriter and an advisor to the president of the European Council, Herman Van Rompuy. He published his first book, Politicide, in 1999. Since its original publication, The Passage to Europe has received the Socrates Prize for the best Dutch philosophy book and the European Book Prize 2012.
Education
Van Middelaar has a PhD in philosophy from the University of Amsterdam (2009). He studied history and philosophy at the Rijksuniversiteit Groningen (1991-1999), including a year at Sorbonne in Paris (1993-1994), and did a postgraduate in Political studies at the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales in Paris (1999-2000).
Other books and articles
The author’s first book, Politicide, is a critical study of post-war French political philosophy. It was widely acclaimed in the Netherlands and won the Prix de Paris in 1999. It was re-edited in 2011; French and Brazilian translations are in preparation.
Since running the book section of the philosophical monthly Filosofie Magazine while still a student (1996-1998), Van Middelaar was a regular contributor of essays and book reviews to de Volkskrant and Trouw (2000-2006), had a two-weekly foreign affairs column in NRC Handelsblad (2008- 2009) and has published articles in Le Monde, the Wall Street Journal, Die Welt. He has contributed to numerous book volumes and peer-reviewed academic journals, such as the European Constitutional Law Review.
Van Middelaar also was the guest editor of an academic volume on utopian thought, practice and architecture: Utopie. Utopisch denken, doen en bouwen (2003).
Academic research
From 2000 to 2002, Van Middelaar was a researcher at the Centre Raymond Aron of the E.H.E.S.S. in Paris. From 2007 to 2009 he was a researcher at the University of Amsterdam’s Germany Institute (DIA).
Political experience
Since early 2010, Van Middelaar has been working as the speechwriter and an advisor to European Council President Herman Van Rompuy. The author worked twice before as political advisor: in 2002-2004 in the private office of European Commissioner Frits Bolkestein and from 2004 to 2006 as political secretary of the liberal VVD group in Dutch parliament, advising group leader Jozias van Aartsen.
Personal
Luuk van Middelaar is married to artist Manon de Boer. They have one child, Julius (born 2009).
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Luuk van Middelaar
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CMW

Brilliant analysis of EU history

Reviewed in the United States on January 29, 2022

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Highly recommended for anyone seeking a more in-depth analysis of EU integration. He covers the usual historical narrative with an overlay of an insightful framework to explain the power of governments, member states and institutions. I usually read a couple books simultaneously, but I put everything down to focus on this. One of the best books I’ve read on the EU.

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H. Peter Nennhaus

The European Union is not perfect yet

Reviewed in the United States on March 17, 2023

While the creation of the EU has been a blessing, its evolution was still a convoluted, painful, and imperfect undertaking. Several countries really wanted it only halfway and found it hard to surrender some of their sovereignty with much finger-pointing at Brussels. They ended up with a complicated structure that has no army and no international impact or foreign policy to speak of. This report is based on a voluminous amount of sources and is exhaustive, factual, and rational. It is, however, wordy and at times comes close to philosophizing and by reevaluating events from different standpoints it becomes repetitive and is therefore tiresome to read. Also, it was published ten years ago, so it is dated.
The reader is not convinced that the present structure of Europe is the best possible. Much more efficient would have been a federation with federal armed forces and a police force under federal law, yet retaining most of the other governing tasks by the member countries. That would have been similar to the freedom of citizens in your hometown who are kings in their home but follow public law and in case of conflict resolve it peacefully by going to court or calling the police. That would have greatly eased the work in Brussels, eternal peace would have been guaranteed and other countries could have freely joined the Union. It looks, until further changes are made, Europe will merely limp along.

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Filip

A must read for anyone interested in past and future ...

Reviewed in the United States on May 4, 2018

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A must read for anyone interested in past and future political, societal and economic developments on the European continent (the so-called Old World) against the backdrop of globalization and increasing geopolitical tensions.

One person found this helpful

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Joseph DUNNE

Excellent read. Very perceptive

Reviewed in the United States on June 26, 2014

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Provides a stimulating qualitative, philosphical and politcal framework for the enquiry into issues of European identity. It is also very clearly written and easy to read.

One person found this helpful

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Maria Stoicheva

An excellent read representing a trend in contemporary EU studies

Reviewed in the United States on December 27, 2014

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An excellent read representing a trend in contemporary EU studies, which offers analytical perspective without relying extensively on quantitative data and sources.

One person found this helpful

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Richard Condon à Bruxelles

Fascinating

Reviewed in the United States on August 3, 2013

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This is an original and interesting view of European unification. It should be compulsory reading for British and other Eurosceptics.

2 people found this helpful

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James T. Ranney

Excellent book.

Reviewed in the United States on November 4, 2013

Sometimes the best books on "the law" are written by non-lawyers, and this is an example. The author is part-philosopher and part-historian, and does an excellent job of conveying the basic underpinnings of the EU experiment. Does a good job of conveying how the EU has taken on a life of its own.

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Alan Barker

Finding a new language for Europe

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on August 25, 2014

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Luuk van Middelaar is a political philosopher, but he's impatient with scholarly solitude. His hero is Machiavelli, not just because he's a good writer but because he understands that politics is about how events shape our political systems - and not the other way round.

This remarkable book uses all the tricks of the writer's trade to tell the extraordinary story of the European Union. Van Middelaar's approach combines lucidity with a knack for metaphor; as a result, the tale he tells is clear and - shout it loud - deeply enjoyable.

We need, says van Middelaar, a new vocabulary for Europe. The fights in the Union have always been about words. De Gaulle and Thatcher, for example, both resisted the translation of Assembly into Parliament, a word that threatened their sacred notion of sovereign states. They lost.

Since then, says van Middelaar, the European project has been described in terms of what he calls 'two spheres': an outer sphere (the club of nation states) and an inner sphere (the unified community). Van Middelaar draws our attention to a third sphere: `the intermediate space' between the ambitions of the federalists and the scaremongering of the eurosceptics. This third sphere - visible most obviously as the European Council - is potentially the most creative of the three. Van Middelaar knows this intermediate space well: since December 2009, van Middelaar has been a member of the cabinet of Herman Van Rompuy, the European Council's first permanent president.

This middle space is deeply paradoxical. The European Council has no legislative power, but it's charged under the Lisbon treaty with defining "the general political directions and priorities" of the Union. Prime ministers and national presidents can enter this space only if they're members of the Union; but their conversation is not bound by the treaty of membership.

This curious space, van Middelaar suggests, is where new hybrid European institutions and agreements can be made. It's where European and national interests meet; the place - perhaps the only place - where European leaders can rise above the rule-bound institutionalism of the community and their own local agendas.

Van Middelaar detects a kind of invisible glue holding Europe together; a glue manufactured by the language of deliberation and debate, carefully spread by the European Council. And it seems, sometimes, to work; witness the Union's survival of the euro crisis in the last year or so.

"Reinforce the intermediate sphere": that is what van Middelaar has tried to do in his four years at the Council.

Europe's most urgent task currently is to engage with its citizens, for whom the Union remains distant, monolithic and irrelevant. We need a vision for Europe. Many are now calling for a new language to conjure that vision; something more than platitudes, brochures and directives.

If anyone can help us find the words we need, it is Luuk van Middelaar.

A longer version of this review appears at:

http://justwriteonline.typepad.com/distributed_intelligence/2013/09/finding-a-new-language-for-europe-luuk-van-middelaar-in-conversation-with-frank-van-hoorn.html

6 people found this helpful

John Wormald

Informative and challenging - an important book

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on February 2, 2021

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This is a very systematic account of how the European Union came into being, in effect a reference work. It is not a casual work and needs to be read attentively. The author is well versed in the ways of the EEC and the later EU, and of national politics in his home country, The Netherlands. He also has the intellectual structure for tackling such a challenging task, through his work as a philosopher. His conceptual approach to the structures and mechanisms of Europe and how they have evolved is very helpful and illuminating: the outer sphere of the independent nation states that make up geographical Europe; the inner sphere of the European institutions, developed almost out of sight of the different national politics (read Jean Monnet's memoirs to confirm this); and the intermediate sphere that has grown up in the quasi vacuum between them, based on the meetings together of heads of state or of government of the Member States of the Union. Politics coming back in to fill the void. I found this immensely explicative and instructive. I had difficulty with his other construct, around the move from unanimity in decision taking in European institutions to qualified majority voting. His distinction between a requirement for unanimity in a constituent assembly approving a constitution, and a majority being OK in a constituted body somewhat escaped me. Especially as he quotes the acceptance of a majority decision in the ratification of the US Constitution by the several States. That said, this book should be essential reading for any would-be student of the European Union, that awkward halfway house between a loose confederation (a Europe des Patries) and a true federation. And for anyone who wants to see the other side of the Brexit controversy.

3 people found this helpful

Andrew Pearson

History rather than political theory

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on July 12, 2021

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This was an interesting read, essentially telling the story of the EU three times from different perspectives. It's clear and informative on the history; it's also refreshingly honest about some of the less salubrious chapters in that history. Despite references to Hobbes and Machiavelli, and the author's background as a political philosopher, the book is remarkably thin on theory. You don't get any sense of what the EU is for, and what it is intended to achieve; despite much of the book being preoccupied with the difference between majority voting and unanimity, there isn't really a serious attempt to explain the advantages and disadvantages of these, or to delve properly into historical motives.

The best section of the book is the third, a discussion of the sources of public legitimacy and the struggles which the EU faces in generating these. That section by itself is strongly recommended and would be a five-star book by itself.

All in all a fine work of history, refreshingly willing to dispense with hagiography and to present the underside of the leaves; as a discussion of "why the EU?", at best incomplete.

One person found this helpful

T. Watkins

What it says on the tin

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on May 27, 2016

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This book is just what I hoped it would be, and just what I needed. In Britain, we have been having a long debate about Europe and the EU, but always from the British point of view. I have been frustrated to hear a number of British people, ordinary folk and leading politicians, saying that we joined a common market, and we were never told that the EU involved closer political and economic union. I knew that this was simply not true, but I needed to learn much more about the EU, how it came into being, and how it has developed. After all, Britain came late to the EU: at first, we were not interested, and when we got interested we were for a time blocked from entry. So this Dutch author, coming from one of the founding countries, looked like a good guide. Coming from a small country, he does not represent any of the 'big beasts' in the EU. He is a political philosopher, and he lays out the details of the formation and development of a unique political, social and economic experiment, based on his own deep knowledge. It represents such a different perspective on the EU from what we are accustomed to getting in half-baked sound-bites on radio, TV and in the press. It's fascinating stuff, but don't expect it to be a simple and straightforward story. It's convoluted and complicated, because the governments and politicians who have contributed to the building of the EU have found it difficult, and they have not all been of one mind. But the book does what its title flags up - charts how the EU has come to be what it currently is.

4 people found this helpful

JB

Entender de donde venimos para saber a dónde nos dirigimos

Reviewed in Spain on November 27, 2020

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Lo acabo de empezar, pero me parece el autor brillante.
Las primeras paginas demuestran su altísimo conocimiento de la historia de la UE.
Es más, describe la historia y evolución de la UE sin tecnicismos y sin incidir en legalismos, lo que facilita a aquellas personas no juristas su comprensión.
El autor analiza y describe de una manera espectacular la UE.

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The Passage to Europe: How a Continent Became a Union Hardcover – July 23, 2013

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