"QUASI-STATES" IN EUROPE: INTEGRATION, STATE TERRITORIALITY AND THE CHANING NATURE OF STATEHOOD.

One of the most neglected topics in the general studies of the European Integration is how the statehood of the member states is implicated in the whole process of the integration. The existing approaches in the literature on the European Integration hardly provide analytical tools that would enable us to track continuities and changes in statehood in the context of the European Integration. In my discussion, I will bring spatial analysis with the debates on state sovereignty. I will argue that the spatial nature of statehood or state territoriality has two different components, external and internal, underlying two different types of statehood, juridical or legal and empirical or sociological. In Europe, the external component of state territoriality underlying the juridical dimension of statehood is eroding; the states are giving up their 'exclusive rights' to have ultimate authority within a given territorial jurisdiction in an increasing number of policy areas. However, the internal component of state territoriality underlying the empirical or sociological dimension of statehood is still strong; the states still hold remarkable administrative, extractive and coercive capacities. My thesis is that the spatial nature of the statehood in Europe is changing, and we have increasingly "quasi-states" in Europe, which are strong in internal territoriality and empirical statehood, but weak in external territoriality and juridical statehood. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]