"Just good friends?" Britain and the European Union

This paper deals with the issue of Britain’s relationship with the EU and traces the origins of the decisionto withdraw the UK from EU membership back to the early years of the latter half of the twentieth century. The perceived role of Britain as a traditional balancer in European affairs is juxtaposed with the objective of “ever-closer union” which has been the goal of European integrationists and which to a large extent has become and continues to become reality.