Between June 1995 and February 1997 I conversed with 137 directors-general, deputy directors-general, directors, and senior advisors of the European Commission in semi-structured interviews lasting on average 79 minutes. I also asked them to mail back a structured questionnaire containing behavioral and attitudinal questions. By May 1997, I had received 106 mail questionnaires. These interviews and mail questionnaires provide the empirical basis for this book. I elaborate below five important elements in this research: the context, the organization, sampling, interviewing, and the people.

The context

The European Union is at a crossroads between 1995 and 1997. Its future is deeply contested and uncertain, and yet Europe's elites, if not its citizens, seem determined to integrate deeper and faster. Three major issues dominate the headlines and structure the daily dealings of top Commission officials: economic and monetary union (EMU) – at first, the plan's survival, and, later, the conditions of implementation; the ban from the European internal market of British beef infected by BSE (bovine spongiform encephalopathy – “mad cow disease”); and preparations for the 1996–7 intergovernmental conference, which would culminate in the 1999 Amsterdam Treaty. Two deeper concerns cloud EU politics during that period. Public opinion polls register a rapid rise in public dissatisfaction with European integration, and, on the economic front, most European countries suffer from persistently high unemployment whereas the US economy is booming. This is the political background against which I probe top Commission officials' basic preferences on EU governance.