BRITAIN AND THE NEGOTIATION OF THE MAASTRICHT-TREATY - A CRITIQUE OF LIBERAL INTERGOVERNMENTALISM

This article critically examines the liberal intergovernmental (LI) ap proach to bargaining in the European Union. It explores its analytical and predictive power in relation to the British negotiation of three dossiers in the 1991 Intergovernmental Conference (IGC) on Political U nion: social policy, foreign and security policy and enhancing the pow ers of the European Parliament (EP). It casts doubt on the LI explanat ion of national preference formation and contends that there are three weaknesses of the LI approach: the notion of preference formation; th e assumption that governments are purposeful and instrumental actors; and the liberal intergovernmental conception of bargaining. More gener ally, the article casts doubt on the value of LI claims to explanatory as well as predictive value.