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Our puzzles: traditional approaches and beyond Fifteen into one? takes up traditional approaches to political science. Since Aristotle it has been considered useful to compare constitutional and institutional dimensions of polities and not least to discuss 'optimal' models of policy-making. In view of the European Union's multi-level and multi-actor polity, we add to a vast literature 1 by highlighting the complex procedural and institutional setup of nation states preparing and implementing decisions made by the institutions of the European Community (EC). Unlike volumes on the general structure and culture of European political systems, this volume focuses on reactions and adaptations to a challenge which is common to all-i.e. the policy-cycle of the Union. We thus intend to explore structural commonalities and differences with a common point of reference. Fifteen traditional systems and their variations may be better explained when the comparison is based on the fact that they are reacting to the same challenge. In looking at the emerging and evolving realities of the European polity we are interested in how European institutions and Member States (re-)act and interact in a new institutional and procedural setup. Thus, our major puzzle is: how do governmental and non-governmental actors in different national settings-involving different national traditions-adapt to common challenges, constraints and opportunities for which they are mainly themselves responsible? Given the features and the dynamics of the evolution of the EU system, we expect to find generally observable trends in the ways that national systems meet the demands of the Union. How do actors perform when they become objects and subjects of the same interaction structure? Fifteen into one? aims to offer a mixture of conventional and specific analyses and insights for different groups of readers. For scholars of international relations, European integration and comparative politics, these

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