European Union @ 50 - from the Foreign Policy Association

European Union @ 50 meets March 18
Recommended Readings from the Foreign Policy Association

The Government and Politics of the European Union
The leading text in its field, The Government and Politics of the European Union offers a clear and comprehensive explanation of the historical development and ongoing evolution of the European Union (EU). As in previous editions, this sixth edition presents an account and analysis of the origins of the Union, the key treaties, the main institutions and political actors, and the EU's policies and policy processes. The book, in short, explains where the EU has come from, what it now does, and how it does it.

A Time to Lead: For Duty, Honor and Country
Four-star General Wesley K. Clark became a major figure on the political scene when he was drafted by popular demand to run for the Democratic nomination for President of the United States in 2003. But this was just one of many exceptional accomplishments of a long and extraordinary career. Here, for the first time, General Clark uses his unique life experience-from his difficult youth in segregated Arkansas where he was raised by his poor, widowed mother; through the horror of Vietnam where he was wounded; the post-war rebuilding of national securityand the struggles surrounding the new world order after the Cold War-as a springboard to reveal his vision for America, at home and in the world.

The United States of Europe: The New Superpower and the End of American Supremacy
Now comprising 25 nations and 450 million citizens, the EU has more people, more wealth, and more votes on every international body than the United States. It eschews military force but offers guaranteed health care and free university educations. And the new “United States of Europe” is determined to be a superpower. Tracing the EU's emergence from the ruins of World War II and its influence everywhere from international courts to supermarket shelves, T. R. Reid explores the challenge it poses to American political and economic supremacy. The United States of Europe is essential reading.

The Last Days of Europe: Epitaph for an Old Continent
What happens when a falling birthrate collides with uncontrolled immigration? The Last Days of Europe explores how a massive influx from Asia, Africa, and the Middle East has loaded Europe with a burgeoning population of immigrants, many of whom have no wish to be integrated into European societies but make full use of the host nations' generous free social services.

Testimony: France in the Twenty-first Century
“This book presents my analysis of the difficulties France faces. It outlines my proposals for putting France back on the path toward economic growth, social justice, and modernity. And it addresses many of the common domestic, international, economic, and social challenges that advanced democracies like France and the United States must confront.” So writes French President Nicolas Sarkozy in the new preface to the American edition of his best-selling memoir.

America and Europe after 9/11 and Iraq: The Great Divide
American foreign policy toward Europe is merrily rolling along the path of least resistance, in the belief that there is nothing really amiss with the European-American relationship that multilateralism will not fix. Not true, argues Kashmeri. The alliance is dead, cannot be fixed, and must be renegotiated. It has not grown to accommodate Europe's emergence as a major power. A kind of United States of Europe, with foreign priorities different from those of the United States, has arrived at America's doorstep. But America is still forging foreign policy for Europe using Cold War realities; both Democrats and Republicans expect the European Union to fall into step, and report for service as needed--under American leadership. Europe, however, has other plans, and as it becomes more powerful on the world stage, competing visions of European leadership have emerged. The Iraq War has brought them into stark relief. For example, as Kashmeri points out, the Atlantic divide over Iraq was more about French-British competition for leadership of Europe than it was about a division between American goals and European goals. He portrays British foreign policy as out of touch with reality, as a policy that has done a disservice to the United States as a result of the Blair government's exaggerated and self-serving view of the British-American "special relationship." Kashmeri concludes with prescriptions for forging a new alliance based on a "special relationship" with the European Union. This agenda is inspired by the thoughts of the leaders who spoke to the author specifically for this book, among them former president George H. W. Bush, former British prime minister John Major, James A. Baker III, Wesley K. Clark, Brent Scowcroft, Paul Volcker, U.S. Senator Chuck Hagel, and Caspar W. Weinberger.

The Cube and the Cathedral: Europe, America, and Politics Without God
Paris's modernist La Grande Arche de la Défense and the Gothic Cathedral of Notre-Dame serve as metaphors for papal biographer Weigel's (Witness to Hope) examination of what has happened to Europe in the last several decades and its significance to Americans. Weigel, an American Catholic theologian who has lived and worked on the continent, defines the "Europe problem" as the sharp divergence of European views on democracy, the world and politics from those held by Americans like himself.

Why Europe Will Run the 21st Century
Those who believe Europe is weak and ineffectual are wrong. Turning conventional wisdom on its head, Mark Leonard, one of the UK's most visionary thinkers, argues that Europe is remaking the world in its own image.

Of Paradise and Power: America Vs. Europe in the New World Order
This past summer, in Policy Review, Robert Kagan reached incisively into this impasse to force both sides to see themselves through the eyes of the other. Tracing the widely differing histories of Europe and America since the end of World War II, he makes clear how for one the need to escape a bloody past has led to a new set of transnational beliefs about power and threat, while the other has perforce evolved into the guarantor of that �postmodern paradise� by dint of its might and global reach. This remarkable analysis is being discussed from Washington to Paris to Tokyo. It is esssential reading.