Book Reviews Corbett Richard, Francis Jacobs and Michael Shackleton. The European Parliament (3rd ed.). London: Cartermill International, 1995. Pp. xxiii, 337. Index. £35; $75. Edwards, Geoffrey, and David Spence (eds.). The European Commission. London: Longman Group, 1994. Pp. xiii, 302. Index. £35; $75. Westlake, Martin. The Council of the European Union. London: Cartermill International, 1995. Pp. xxv, 404. Index. £36; $75 Everyone has something to say about democracy or its absence it), the European construct. Everyone has an opinion about the European Parliament. (Well, everyone who would be reading this review). But the factual base on which much grandiose assessment of the European Parliament is conducted is often laughably thin. This book is not a law book - when "ill there be a new edition of Jacqué, Bieber, Constantinesco and Nickel? It is, instead, the best up-to-date account in English of the anatomy and physiognomy of the Parliament. Almost the same can he said of the book on the Commission. It is a collection of essays and does not, thus, have quite the same structural coherence of Corbett and Co. But the editors imposed a rigid plan which has been followed. Each chapter has most useful annexes of primary sources quite an advantage. The most valuable parts are the first chapters dealing with the internal operation of the Commission and a short but efficient essay on the Commission and lobbying. That is another hallmark of the volume: Brevity, coupled with extensive pointers for further reading. The more traditional chapters, Commission Council; Commission-Parliament, Commission and the Union Foreign Policy apparatus are authoritative. Read this book coupled with the recent special edition of the Revue Francaise de Science Politique for an up-to-date description and conceptualization of the present day Commission. The third in this brace deserves similar accolades. Westlake's book on the Council is not elegant. There is no overall thesis and it is somewhat bitty in content and presentation. But Westlake and his coauthors provide a hugely informative and detailed account of the work of the Council - both in its generic sense and also sectorially - something never before done with such breadth and depth in English. Here too there are annexes galore with primary sources often difficult to access. The level of detail is impressive though this will of course make the book date somewhat more rapidly. All in all, these three books make an outstanding contribution and an altogether more detailed - insider - knowledge of the principal political institutions of the Union. Read them before you start theorizing. JHHW
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