Why the EU?
The European Union: Origins, Institutions & Everyday Life
Course 1 · Chapter 1 · Why the EU? Scope & Sources
The European Union is in the news constantly and understood remarkably little. People argue about it, vote on it, and complain about it or defend it, often without a clear picture of what it is, what it does, or how it differs from a dozen other European organisations with similar names. This opening chapter sets out what the EU is and is not, explains how this course differs from the politics course that already exists on the site, shows how to handle the many confident claims made about the EU, and lists where to read. Because the EU is a live political argument, the course reports what happened and what each side says, and does not recommend a position.
Why This Course?
The site already has a course on how the EU's institutions work: European Politics Fundamentals. It takes the Commission, the Parliament, the two Councils and the Court in detail, and follows a real law through the system. This course asks different questions. How did a coal and steel agreement between six countries become a union of twenty-seven? What changed at each stage? And what does any of it mean for someone buying a phone charger, crossing a border or studying abroad? Where an institution matters to the story, this course gives a short plain-language description and a pointer to the matching chapter of European Politics Fundamentals, and does not repeat it.
A One-Paragraph Version
The European Union (EU) is a political and economic union of independent European states, which at the time of writing has 27 members (check the current number). It grew from the European Coal and Steel Community of 1951 and the Treaties of Rome of 1957 (Chapter 2), through the common market, the single market and the euro (Chapters 3 and 4), and through successive enlargements (Chapter 6). Its members agree treaties that give common institutions power to make laws in some areas, which apply directly in every member state. It is neither a country nor a loose club of cooperating governments, which is exactly why people describe it so differently. These are the basic facts. Each is developed in a later chapter, with dates checked as they appear.
Five Names That Get Confused
| Term | What it is | Not to be confused with |
|---|---|---|
| Europe | A continent, with no single government. It includes countries that are not in the EU, such as Norway, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and Ukraine | The EU, which covers only part of it |
| The European Union | The union of 27 states described above | A federal country or an army (it is neither) |
| The Council of Europe | A much larger human-rights and legal organisation based in Strasbourg, founded in 1949, with around 46 members (check). It created the European Convention on Human Rights and the European Court of Human Rights | The Council of the EU or the European Council, which are EU bodies |
| The eurozone | The EU countries that use the euro, around twenty (check, since it has grown in recent years) | The EU itself, since some members keep their own currency |
| The Schengen area | Countries that have abolished routine passport checks between them. It includes most EU members and some non-members such as Norway, Iceland and Switzerland (check the current list) | The EU, since some EU members, notably Ireland, are not fully part of it |
What the Course Covers
| Chapters | Theme |
|---|---|
| 2–4 | Origins: from the coal and steel community to the single market, Maastricht and the euro (1945–2002) |
| 5–6 | Borders and people: Schengen and free movement, then enlargement towards the east |
| 7 | Crises from 2008 to the present |
| 8–9 | Everyday life: money, shopping and consumers; travel, study, work and place |
| 10 | Capstone: what the Union is for |
Record, Claim and Euromyth
Few subjects produce as many confident statements as the EU, from supporters, critics, governments, newspapers and the institutions themselves. Three kinds of statement need different handling.
Record
Treaty dates, the text of a law, a vote tally, an official figure. These can be checked in the EU's legal database and in reliable reference works.
Claim
"The EU costs us X a week", "the EU has kept the peace for seventy years" or "Brussels decides everything". Each may rest on a real fact, but also on a choice of what to count and what to leave out. A claim needs its assumptions examined, not simply a yes or no.
Euromyth
A story about the EU that is false, or true only in a stretched form. The label is itself sometimes used unfairly to dismiss a real complaint, so each case should be judged on its facts.
The Bent Banana Test
The most famous Euromyth is that "Brussels banned bent bananas" or required cucumbers to be straight. The real position is more interesting than either the myth or a flat denial.
- The record. The EU did adopt marketing standards that sorted certain fruit and vegetables into quality classes, including bananas and cucumbers, with descriptions such as a minimum quality and, for the best class, being free of abnormal curvature (check the regulations and dates).
- The stretch. No ban on selling bent bananas existed. The standards described classes for trade, and produce outside them could still be sold in other ways (check).
- The later change. Many of these detailed standards for fruit and vegetables were relaxed or repealed around 2009 (check).
The lesson is a method and not a verdict: find the original text, see what it actually required, see what changed, and then decide whether the story was fair. The same test is applied to claims throughout the course.
Where to Read
- EUR-Lex. The EU's legal database, where treaties, regulations and directives can be read in full. It is the place to check what a law actually says.
- The EU's own site and institutions' pages. Good for facts and official explanations, and an official source with a natural interest in presenting the Union well.
- Eurostat and Eurobarometer. The EU's statistics office and its opinion surveys, useful for figures about the economy, trade and what people think (check the survey date).
- National newspapers and broadcasters. Coverage varies a great deal by country, which is itself part of the story.
- Histories and academic studies. Look for histories of European integration, which set events in context and often disagree with each other.
- Think tanks and campaign groups. Valuable for argument, and each has a position, so read them as advocates and confirm important figures elsewhere.
Exercises
Explain in a sentence each how the EU differs from (a) Europe, (b) the Council of Europe, (c) the eurozone and (d) the Schengen area.
Sort these into record, claim or Euromyth, and say why: (a) the Treaties of Rome were signed in 1957; (b) "the EU has kept the peace in Europe for seventy years"; (c) "Brussels has banned bent bananas".
Choose one thing you believe the EU requires, write it down, then look for the original text on EUR-Lex or the EU's site. Note whether the source agreed with you, corrected you or showed the rule had changed.
Quick Reference
- EU: a union of 27 independent states, sharing some decisions through common institutions
- Roots: the Coal and Steel Community (1951) and the Treaties of Rome (1957)
- Not the same: Europe, the Council of Europe, the eurozone, the Schengen area
- Companion course: European Politics Fundamentals, for how the institutions work
- Handling claims: separate record, claim and Euromyth; go back to the original text
- Best first check: EUR-Lex, read alongside the EU's own pages with their interest in mind
- Check: membership numbers, the Schengen list and the banana-standards dates
Next chapter: From Coal and Steel to Rome: 1945–1957, which looks at how and why six countries first agreed to pool part of their sovereignty.