Founding of European Union

The European Union was formally established when the Maastricht Treaty, signed in the Dutch city in February 1992, came into force. The treaty built on the European Economic Community created by the Treaty of Rome in 1957, and before that on the European Coal and Steel Community of 1951, which had been designed to bind France and Germany together after the Second World War. It added common policies on foreign affairs and on justice and home affairs, introduced citizenship of the Union and set out the steps towards a single currency, the euro, which began in 1999 and appeared in cash in 2002. Later treaties, notably Lisbon in 2009, reformed its institutions. The Union has grown to twenty-seven members since the United Kingdom left in 2020.

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