This book is now six years old and obviously needs updating in the light of events during the last six years, not least BREXIT.

I don't want to go into all the arguments about this seemingly never-ending issue, save to say that I increasingly feel that there are two unions involved here, both with virtues yet both flawed, a European Union and a British Union (even the BBC quite happily refers to the 'four nations' of the UK now). The EU27 and the UK4 confront each other but also confront their own problems, trying to develop adequate structures to maintain themselves. The relationship between the UK and the EU in the 2020s may well be a story of two unions, not one, each of which has to struggle to survive in their current form.