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Based on interviews with some of the EU´s most important leaders, this book is designed to probe and elucidate what they think. The goal of the book is to find out whether they believe that the current period in the history of the European Union constitutes a ´crisis,´ and if so, what kind of crisis is it?.

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PART I: INTRODUCTION Trials by Fire: The European Union and its Crises PART II: EUROPEANS´ THINKING ABOUT CRISIS Economics, For Better or Worse? Enlargement: Triumphs and Trials Flight of the Member States? Institutions: Virtues, Vices, and Rebalancing Bringing the People with Us? EU Futures? Part III: NEW CRISES TEST THE IDEAS OF OUR "EUROPEANS" EU Elites and the Union´s Crises. An Analytic Summary The Great Recession: Reality Tests For ´European´ Thoughts

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"George Ross´s publication provides a fascinating insider´s view on the European Union´s successes, the crises it has gone through, and the challenges it faces. Above all, it is a stark reminder of the need to bring European citizens on-board to consolidate the European project." - Pascal Lamy, Director General, World Trade Organization

"The European road staked out by elites towards an implicitly federal destination has lost direction with each succeeding crisis. By what is it to be replaced? In an original book of interviews, 80 key figures deliver their reflections, their diagnosis, and their doubts. Essential reading for understanding the current crisis."

- Philippe Pochet, General Director of the European Trade Union Institute (ETUI) and Visiting Lecturer at the Université catholique de Louvain (UCL), Belgium

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GEORGE ROSS is Ad Personam Jean Monnet Chair and Visiting Professor of Political Science at the University of Montreal, Canada and Faculty Associate of the Minda de Gunzburg Center for European Studies at Harvard University, USA. He was previously Chair of both the European Union Studies Association of the US (EUSA) and the Council for European Studies. Among his recent publications are What´s Left of the Left? with James Cronin and James Shoch (2011), Euros and Europeans: EMU and the European Model of Society with Andrew Martin (2005), and Jacques Delors and European Integration (1995).

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