Vladislav Sotirović: What is the EU?
The European Union (the EU) is officially characterized by a purposeful diffusion of political authority between supranational and intergovernmental institutions. Based on the idea of (quasi)shared leadership, it formally relies on a delicate institutional balance guarding declared equality between its ever more diverse members and managing potential and real tensions between the more and less populated and developed states. Such tensions are present in any federal construct and have been a key concern since the “original six” (EU6) founded the (West) European Coal and Steel Community (the ECSC) in 1951 (the Benelux, West Germany, France, and Italy).