One of the perennial frustrations for social policy specialists interested in Europe used to be sauntering through the maze of EU institutions, laws and policies only to miraculously arrive at the exit without ever passing anything that looked recognisably like social policy, and to be left wondering how they missed it. Much had been written about the possible Europeanisation of the welfare state, so why did it prove elusive to pin down in hard, let alone legal, copy? All this began to change with the treaty amendments of the 1990s, but even then the casual browser through the myriad Europa.eu.int websites would have found most documents with any legal validity (such as treaty titles or directives and recommendations) on education, health or social protection to be high sounding, yet flimsy on policy-prescriptive substance. The reason is that social policy in the context of European integration has had the meaning of labour policy more than broader social welfare policy. EU social policy developments have consequently focused in the past on the needs of workers – both female and male – and on employment-related problems.

There is a growing awareness that the labour focus of social policy has changed to become more inclusive. Indeed social protection is now a subtitle of the Commission's Employment and Social Affairs ‘major concerns’ list. But it is not easy to assess how far the EU has really shifted attention towards the social welfare of citizens in general. Does the fact that the Nice Presidency summit of heads of state in December 2000 adopted a social agenda that vows to prevent and eradicate poverty and modernise and improve social protection, mean citizens are going to see action that directly affects them? Did the endorsement of a Charter of Fundamental Rights represent a definitive coming of age of social policy in Europe? Is there now a strong legal base to matters traditionally associated with welfare states and falling within the purview of the discipline of social policy, as opposed to labour rights and the working environment? Or are those Charter chapters engagingly entitled ‘Equality’ and ‘Solidarity’ still only vague intentions with little chance of development? Is EU social policy moving from its ‘labourist’ origins to a more ‘welfarist’ character?