The EU Constitution: in Search of Europe's International Identity

Professor de Búrca delivered the Fourth Walter van Gerven Lecture on 26 November 2004. She analysed how the Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe adds to Europe’s search for an international identity. She submits that the boldest of the novel features of the new Constitution, and the weight of significance of the changes which it has introduced, lie in the external domain. De Búrca launches the challenging question whether the emphasis on Europe’s “global role” and its international identity will be the factor that ultimately will be capable of triggering the public imagination in such a way as to generate sufficient support for the ratification of the Constitution and – in the long term – to generate a sense of European solidarity, rather than the internally focussed changes brought about by the constitutional treaty.