History
Enhanced cooperation was introduced by the Treaty of Amsterdam for community, judicial cooperation and criminal matters. The Treaty of Nice simplified the mechanism and forbade opposition to the creation of enhanced cooperation. It also introduced cooperation for the Common Foreign and Security Policy, except for defence matters. The Treaty of Lisbon extended cooperation to include defence and additionally envisions the possibility for establishment of a permanent structured cooperation in defence.
The Schengen Agreement adoption is considered a historical inspiration for formalising the mechanism of Enhanced cooperation. It was created by European Communities member states only, but outside of its structures, in part owing to the lack of consensus amongst all members over whether it had the competence to abolish border controls, and in part because those ready to implement the idea did not wish to wait for others. As there was no Enhanced cooperation mechanism back then it was impossible to establish it inside the Community structures from the start, but afterwards the Schengen Agreement was subsumed into European Union law by the Treaty of Amsterdam as the rules of the Schengen Area. With its integration into general EU law it was transformed from a precursor Enhanced cooperation into an opt-out.
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