Establishment of European Political Co-operation (EPC)
The Hague Summit decided to examine the best ways of achieving progress in the establishment of a political union.
In October 1970 the Davignon Report (named after its author, the political director of the Belgian Foreign Ministry) was adopted by the foreign ministers of the Member States as a basic strategy in this area, and was then approved by the Copenhagen Summit on 23 July 1973.
It proposed the harmonization of foreign policy of the Member States outside the Community framework based upon regular exchanges of their respective views and, when possible, leading to a common position. It therefore recommended traditional inter-governmental cooperation in political matters without any supporting common structures. Some changes to EPC were tabled in a subsequent report, which was adopted by foreign ministers meeting in London on 13 October 1981.
The above-mentioned reports and the Solemn Declaration on European Union agreed at the Stuttgart Summit in 1983 constituted the foundation of EPC. It was incorporated in Title III of the SEA and can be viewed as the precursor to the more formalized co-operation in Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) matters under the Treaty of Maastricht, although the CFSP, even under the ToL, is still essentially inter-governmental, rather than supranational.
