How best to understand the responses of the European Community's member states to the new conditions prevailing in Europe at the end of the Cold War?

The book claims that the beliefs behind symbolic agreements provide a greater understanding of European integration than a focus on the material motivations of agreements of substance. It breaks new ground by arguing that intergovernmental cooperation amongst EC states in the immediate post-Cold War period was achieved through the agreement of symbolic, yet insubstantial new policy areas. It further suggests that ten years after the end of the Cold War in Europe these symbolic agreements are becoming more substantial, this moving the focus away from material gains and towards subjective beliefs.

The book covers five cases of European cooperation in the period 1989-2000: climate change policy, asylum policy, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development and defence policy. All five cases indicate the move from largely symbolic to increasingly substantial intergovernmental cooperation amongst European Union member states.