To explain the evolution of the EU, a macropolitical approach using overall aggregate data is taken. Four dynamic views are tested: the neofunctional/ neofederal assumption of linear growth; the realist view of decline; the governance/pendulum view of cyclical up and down; and the fusion thesis view of structural growth and differentiation. The article uses five indicators: binding outputs; scope enlargement of public policies; transfer of competencies; institutional growth and procedural differentiation; and involvement of intermediary groups in channels of influence. The data point to trends of merging public resources at several state levels, leading to increasing complexities, a lack of transparency and difficulties in reversing the development. This ever closer fusion is explained as a dynamic product of rational strategies of European welfare states faced with growing interdependencies and spillovers, furthered by the institutional logics of EU bodies. Criticized for the lack of legitimacy and the entailing of national democratic constitutions, this new polity may be perceived as a new stage in the evolution of European states and -more open to critical debate -a novel form of representative government.

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Analysing the Treaty of Nice from a dynamic perspective we observe that the major decisions on institutions and procedures are part of an historical evolution of the EU's 'legal constitution'; in quantitative terms the Nice results extended fundamental trends of the European process over the last 50 years. By increasing the complexity of the procedures and the modes of governance, the masters of the Treaty have again taken decisions according to a pattern which I characterize as a three-step model of 'ratchet fusion'.

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