The Treaty signed on 7 February 1992 in Maastricht lays the foundations for a new European structure. It establishes a ‘European Union' that brings together not only the three European Communities, but also two areas of political cooperation between Member States (CFSP and JHA). The aim is to allow these three elements to develop within a unified framework. This new structure is generally represented in the form of a Greek temple made of three pillars: the Community pillar, which has a supranational character, and the second and third pillars, which have an intergovernmental character.

On 17 November 1992, Jacques Santer, Luxembourg Prime Minister, delivers an address to the KPMG Fides Forum in Zurich on the future role of the European Union (EU) in which he focuses on the establishment of the Common Market, the common foreign policy of the European Union and Economic and Monetary Union (EMU).

In this interview, Jacques F. Poos, former Luxembourg Foreign Minister, recalls the objectives of the three-pillar structure of the Treaty of Maastricht on European Union and describes the limits set on Europe by the intergovernmental approach and the unanimity rule.

In 1991, the German cartoonist, Walter Hanel, speculates as to whether the European Union might well be constructing a fortress which is impenetrable for those European countries wishing to develop closer relations therewith.

In an article published in the Dutch journal Internationale Spectator in September 1992, following the Danish refusal to ratify the Treaty on European Union, Frits Bolkestein, leader of the parliamentary group Volkspartij voor Vrijheid en Democratie (VVD), sets out the main points of the Maastricht Treaty.

In October 1992, after the completion of the internal market and the ratification of the Treaty of Maastricht, the monthly journal Crocodile assesses the situation in the European Union and emphasises the major problems with which it is faced.

In 1993, writing in the magazine Política Exterior, the Spanish President, Felipe González Márquez, outlines the substance of the Maastricht Treaty and its importance for Spain.

On 1 November 1993, commenting on the entry into force of the Maastricht Treaty on European Union, the British left-wing daily newspaper The Guardian emphasises the United Kingdom's role in the forthcoming stages of European integration.

In this interview, Nicole Fontaine, Member of the European Parliament (EP) from 1984 to 2002, describes the progress achieved by the Treaty on European Union with regard to the powers of the EP.