Jacques Delors has been the most successful President of theEuropean Commission in the history of the European Community. Theevents of his time in Brussels may have constituted the best chanceyet to create a new supranational order to consolidate Europeanpolitical and social arrangements. Jacques Delors and EuropeanIntegration reconsiders the last decade of EC history, and theMaastricht period in particular, from the point of view of Delors'sunfolding strategy. The book's remarkable data sources include the author'sobservations of the day-to-day work of the Commission under Delorsand access to key personnel and documents. The author explores theways in which Delors and his team tried to capitalize upon thecomplex openings in Europe's political opportunity structures fromthe mid-1980s. The "1992" programme to complete the Single Marketgalvanized European energies and contributed to renewed optimism.Maastricht and its sequels have proven less successful. Jacques Delors and European Integration follows processesaround the Maastricht Treaty from inside, observing the complexsystem of European institutions at work. What kind of turning pointwill Maastricht turn out to be? The book attempts to reach aconclusion about what, in retrospect, will certainly be seen as oneof the most daring experiments at transnational politics of moderntimes.