Maastricht Treaty and the EU

This anxiety took a variety of forms, at several levels. On the most emotional level, Maastricht could be viewed as symbolizing some degree of loss of national sovereignty (especially for the smaller European Union (EU) countries), and even perhaps an impending loss of national identity. At a more practical level, Maastricht called for the integration of economies which, though all "developed" in the broad sense, differ far more in their levels of development than do, say, even the richest and poorest of American states.

More specifically still, Maastricht posed unresolved issues of European currency management. When the negotiations that led to Maastricht began, the Cold War division of Europe was still i

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e to German monetary conservatism, "Germans need to be convinced that the ECU is at least as strong as the D-Mark." Looking at the history of repeated devaluations and inflation among their neighbors, the Germans have a very real fear that monetary unification might import inflation into Germany. It is thus notable that German public opinion remains among the least convinced in Europe that some degree of monetary union will in fact take place in the near future In a poll asking whether at least three EU countries would adopt a single currency by the year 2000 (without directly inquiring into whether this should take place), the average response for the EU as a whole was 47 percent "yes" and 46 percent "no;" the corresponding German response was 34 percent "yes" and 61 percent "no." Turning from the purely intra-European arena, one area of persisting German anxiety has been the relationship between the D-Mark and the dollar. Over the entire period of floating exchange rates, since 1968, the dollar has dropped from a valuation of 4 D-Marks, its setting during the postwar era of fixed rates, to 1.3837 D-marks to the dollar, as of April 20, 1995. Since the dollar remains the world reserve currency, the impact of its be
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Some common words found in the essay are:
EU United, Deutsche Bundesbank, Mechanism ERM, D-Mark Looking, D-Mark European, Maastricht Treaty, West German, Spain Portugal, Deutche Bundesbank's, Union EU, german economy, german monetary, european currencies, anchor currency, relative d-mark, deutsche bundesbank, economist march, integration europe, strong d-mark, d-mark dollar, / d-mark relationship, economic integration europe, targets practice abandoned, dollar / d-mark, money-supply targets practice,
Approximate Word count = 2776
Approximate Pages = 11 (250 words per page)