The European Union and the multilateral system: Lessons from past experience and future challenges

EPRS invites leading experts and commentators to share their thinking and insights on important features of the European Union as a political and economic system. In this paper, David O'Sullivan, former Secretary General of the European Commission and EU Ambassador to the United States, reflects on the Union's contribution to and standing in the multilateral system which it has done so much to support and pioneer, as well as on some of the issues that confront Europe if it is to maximise its influence in international economic fora of various kinds.