The European Council 1974-1986: Evaluation and Prospects

'Le sommet européen est mort, vive le Conseil européen.'
With these words on 10 December 1974 the French President, Valéry Giscard D'Estaing, announced the creation of a new institution: the European Council. Ever since, policy-makers have been trying to come to grips with this new phenomenon, a major characteristic of which seems to be its ambiguity and resistance to proper classification and analysis.
In 1984 the European Institute of Public Administration organized a research project in which the authors of this volume participated in elucidating the different facets of this new body, the legal existence of which has only recently been recognized by the Single European Act. The results of this research were presented at the second Erenstein Colloquium organized by the editor in October 1984.
A number of central issues were addressed in the research group and the results of its research are presented in this volume. In the chapters by W. Wessels, P. Moreau Defarges, J-P. Jacqué and D. Simon, G. Bonvicini and E. Regelsberger and finally J-M. Hoscheit, issues like the identification of the factors which led to the creation of the European Council, its impact on the institutional framework of the EC, organizational and managerial aspects, and questions as to the efficiency and legal status of the European Council guided the research work and inspired a number of scenarios for the future development of this European institution.