The Enlargement of the European Union and NATO: Ordering from the
Menu in Central Europe. By Wade Jacoby. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2004. 287p. $70.00 cloth, $23.99 paper.
The enlargement of Europe has proven a lush garden for researchers to
cultivate new approaches and theories of international and comparative
politics and reengineer older approaches and theories. Many of these
studies fit under the larger rubric of the “Europeanization”
of the Central and Eastern European (CEE) countries and focus on the
external impact of the European Union on the political and economic
reforms of the new members of the EU and/or NATO. Good examples
include the works of Frank Schimmelfenning and Ulrich Sedelmeier (The
Europeanization of Central and Eastern Europe, 2005) and Milada Anna
Vachudova (Europe Undivided: Democracy, Leverage, and Integration
After Communism, 2004). Wade Jacoby's piece fits squarely into
this large and excellent body of growing literature—theoretically
sophisticated, methodologically sound, and well written.