Treaty of Maastricht
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The Treaty of Maastricht was a treaty signed between European countries, in the Dutch city of Maastricht, on 7 February 1992. This treaty made possible further integration between European states, and made possible the existence of the European Union, doing better than previous treaties such as the Treaty of Rome. European integration went even further with the Treaty of Lisbon which was signed in 2007 and became effective in December 2009.
The treaty said that it needed to be ratified (agreed upon) by each country according to their constitution. In France, Denmark and the Netherlands, this needed Referendums [1]. The treaty introduced a single currency(the Euro), but Denmark and the United Kingdom did not have to use it. Germany was the last country to agree upon the treaty.
Any citizen of a country in the European Union is a citizen of the European Union.[2]
The single currency was first asked for by François Mitterrand in 1983, but Germany did not agree to it until 1990[3]. The German leader at the time (Helmut Köhl), agreed, but he did not ask the leader of the Bundesbank (at the time, Karl Otto Pöhl)[4]. Every country that joined the currency have to follow a set of rules that were in the treaty. The treaty also created the European Central Bank.
There have been treaties that have changed the Treaty of Maastricht. These were to add new countries to the European Union. The treaty was also changed in 2007 by the Treaty of Lisbon, to make it like a constitution.
- ↑ Parsons, Craig (2003). A Certain Idea of Europe. Cornell University Press. ISBN 978-0-8014-7296-1.
- ↑ TEU p. 15
- ↑ http://www.spiegel.de/politik/ausland/0,1518,719608,00.html
- ↑ Wirtgen, Klaus (1998-03-01). "Weg ohne Wiederkehr". Der Spiegel (in German). ISSN 2195-1349. Retrieved 2026-01-22.
