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Guild, Elspeth --- "The evolution of the concept of union citizenship after the Lisbon Treaty" [2012] ELECD 1137; in Morano-Foadi, Sonia; Malena, Micaela (eds), "Integration for Third-Country Nationals in the European Union" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2012) 3

Book Title: Integration for Third-Country Nationals in the European Union

Editor(s): Morano-Foadi, Sonia; Malena, Micaela

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9780857936813

Section: Chapter 1

Section Title: The evolution of the concept of union citizenship after the Lisbon Treaty

Author(s): Guild, Elspeth

Number of pages: 13

Abstract/Description:

What does EU citizenship mean and what do citizens want from it? This question perplexes the European Union for many reasons. The first and most important has been that citizenship of the Union was created by the Maastricht Treaty amendments to the EEC Treaty. It did so in a most ambiguous way–not least by stating that the rights of citizens apart from that to move and reside were those found elsewhere in the treaty. This rather uncertain start for the status meant that it has taken more than twenty years for the status to gradually gain stature as the Court of Justice of the European Union began to provide clarification. Since this citizenship’s creation, there has been much discussion about its meaning and indeed whether it is in fact a citizenship at all as it appears to lack the fundamental international law characteristics of citizenship that the individual is absolutely protected from expulsion from his or her country. Little changed for citizenship of the Union when the last major revision of the EU treaties took place in 1999 (the Amsterdam Treaty). However, the long and slow process which has led to the Lisbon Treaty (almost ten years ending on 9 December 2009) has, in my opinion fundamentally changed the content and meaning of citizenship of the Union.