– Inside the sausage factory

Laws are like sausages, said Bismarck. You don’t want to watch them being made. But following the progress of the European constitutional convention has really been rather instructive.

The conduct of the preparatory work for the forthcoming Inter-Governmental Conference (for that is what the convention is) has been so much more interesting than from its predecessors, such as the Dooge Committee before the Single European Act or the Westendorp Group in the run-up to Amsterdam. Some of...