You Can’t Always Get What You Want, But Do You Sometimes Get What You Need? The German Presidency of the EU in 2007

The paper contributes to the ongoing debate as to whether large member states make better (or worse) presidents of the European Union and if this is indeed so, then why? It focuses on the German presidency of 2007, comparing and contrasting the German performance with sets of ideal-typical characteristics. The argument is developed in three main stages. Firstly, drawing on the academic literature on EU presidencies, we outline four key roles that are traditionally performed by the presidency. These are that of business manager; mediator; political leader and internal/external representative. Secondly, these roles are applied to the empirical record as criteria to devise a score-card of the presidency under consideration (in this case the German one). Empirically, the paper will look at the negotiations that underpinned attempts to revise the Constitutional Treaty, EU economic, energy and environmental policy, relations with Russia and finally neighbourhood policy. The paper argues that the German presidency performed rather well, particularly in terms of the traditional ‘communitarian’ criteria, as well as when measured against the presidency’s own pre-stated priorities and more long-term national aims.