One look back to Maastricht as an obligation for the future

The milestones for the today‘s structure of the EU and for the implementation of euro  were founded with the signature of the Maastricht Treaty  on February 7th, 1992. The Treaty altered three former European treaties and created the European Union.  From the point of the actual discussion about the European future it makes sense to go back for 30 years.

The Maastricht Treaty defined such structure of the European Union,  which Austria joined  in 1995. The new union, based on three former associations, brought with it several novelties. The implementation of  the euro and related  so called „Maastricht Criteria“ obliged member countries to  severe financial discipline. The competences regarding economic and fiscal policies expanded to  the common European level with the implementation of mutual foreign and security policies and the stronger cooperation in the home affairs and legislative fields.  The Maastricht Treaty is the milestone of the European integration in spite of several other treaties, which were signed in the following years.

 Then  was the European citizenship established, which made equal to a certain extent the EU citizens in other EU countries with domestic citizens. On the institutional  level the role of the EU Parliament as a directly elected representation of EU citizens in relation to the  member countries grew significantly.