PYQ Vault · Paper 2 · Regionalisation of World Politics
Do you agree with the view that the EU has thus far proved to be the most successful experiment in the regional integration processes? Account for its successes and also some of the recent challenges that it is faced with.
How the answer moves
The flow snapshot — the routes in, the body, the counter-view and the routes out.
Flow snapshot — how the answer moves
Intro routes
R1 EU as the “gold standard” → travelled furthest, from economic pact to supranational order → that depth explains both success and strain / R2 judge the “experiment” by how far sovereignty was pooled → only the EU crossed from pact into supranational order → the same crossing is where the strain now falls
Body flow
ECSC 1951 / coal + steel / war “materially impossible” → Schuman + Monnet / community method over balance of power → Haas / spillover: gains in one sector push members into the next → common market 1957 → Maastricht 1992 / Union created / foreign policy, security, justice → single market + euro + Schengen + enlargement → sovereignty pooled, not surrendered → Nobel 2012 → strain falls where integration is deepest → Eurozone crisis 2008-09 / monetary union without matching economic integration → Stiglitz / imbalances pushed onto weaker economies / Greece → Brexit 2016 / limits of supranationalism / persistence of sovereignty → Euroscepticism / National Rally, AfD, Law and Justice → resurgent Russia / Crimea 2014, Ukraine 2022 / energy shock
Counter-view
intergovernmentalist reply → Moravesik / national preferences + interstate bargaining / member states still in charge → Thompson / “regionalism is out, sovereignty back in”
Conclusion routes
R1 Union deepened after a major power left → strategic autonomy as the answer to Russian and American pressure → still the benchmark / R2 agree, on the question's own qualifier “thus far” → deepest experiment, not a finished one → tested, but not displaced as the benchmark
Model answer
Handwritten, in the form it would be written in the examination hall.
