Visions for Europe [antikvár]

Editorial Notes Heinz Fischer, PES Vice-President and Speaker of ti^e Austrian Parliament The progress of European integration has extensive repercussions for the poKtical families in the member states of the European Union. In the first years and decades after the Second World War, co-ordination and the exchange of ideas between the social democratic parties of Europe took place above all in the Socialist International (SI). When the six-member European Community (EC) was enlarged first to nine and then to twelve members, there was a growing need for the establishment of a European platform within the EC or the SI to coordinate the work of social democratic, socialist and labour parties. The Confederation of Socialist Parties of the European Community was founded for this purpose. The Treaty of Maastricht (1992), which marked the next stage in the development towards political union by transforming the European Community into the European Union (EU), also resulted in a new round of integration of the family of Europe's social democratic parties: at a congress in The Hague in November 1992, the Confederation of Socialist Parties became the Party of European Socialists (PES), with the EU candidate countries Finland, Norway, Austria and Sweden, as they were then, being included as full members. The next major step in the enlargement of the EU is currently on the European agenda. It is being encouraged particularly by social democratic parties and governments, which in the past years have also made decisive