Magone begins by linking the construction of regional trading blocs and major changes in interest group intermediation to a transformation of the modern world system. He then turns to the evolution of European integration, focusing on the shift from rigid to flexible institutions; the problems caused by the incomplete development of regimes, knowledge, identity, and democracy; and the growing role of interest groups in European institution building and policymaking. Here, he devotes a chapter to Social Europe, which he characterizes as “a paradigm of development based on sustainable growth and socioeconomic cohesion” (p. 54). After presenting the basic contours of Social Europe, he examines the role of trade unions in an emerging “social dialogue” that is taking place across subnational, national, and supranational levels of negotiation. He focuses on two institutional innovations: 1) the Economic and Social Committee (ESC) and its national counterparts, and 2) the European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC).

While acknowledging the potential for these institutions to facilitate multilevel governance and the construction of Social Europe, Magone notes their continued lack of decisionmaking power and the persistence of “mismatching interfaces” among the different levels of governance. He attributes the latter problem partly to “the different traditions of social and employment policies across the European Union” (p. 64) and, more broadly, to the different systems of interest intermediation and regulation that persist in Europe. He concludes this section of the book with a detailed analysis of these systems, showing their different historical trajectories while suggesting that they are all moving toward greater flexibility and decentralization.

In the second part of the book, Magone turns to the cases of Portugal and Spain. In each case, he describes the system of interest intermediation that emerged after the transition to democracy in the 1970s and the changing strategies of the country's main trade unions. Regarding the system of interest intermediation, he devotes significant attention to the formation of national and subnational ESCs, suggesting that they are critical to the construction of a multilevel institutional setting. Regarding trade union strategies, he notes a shift from rigid, party-affiliated approaches aimed at national policies to more flexible, autonomous approaches aimed at multiple levels of governance. He finds that Spanish unions have been more successful in making this transition, partly as a result of stable funding based on state subsidies, but he is hopeful that Portuguese unions are on the same path.

Magone devotes the third part of the book to a closer look at the subnational and transnational policies of Portuguese and Spanish unions. He finds that trade unions in both countries are strongly supportive of integration and have begun to take advantage of opportunities to collaborate both below and above the nation-state. At the subnational level, he describes the emergence of Interregional Trade Unions Committees (ITUCs) to facilitate cross-border cooperation on such issues as migration, employment, and border development. At the transnational level, he discusses the participation of Iberian trade unions in the ETUC and the European ESC. Overall, he finds that both labor movements have been favorably influenced by the new structure of opportunities created by European integration, arguing that they have eased the change “from ideological, class-bound trade unionism to pragmatic, all-classes trade unionism” (p. 308). By the same token, he believes that the future of European integration, and particularly Social Europe, will be positively affected by the increasingly active and institutionalized participation of the trade unions.

As is evident, this book covers important and interesting ground. Its greatest contribution is empirical: It provides a wealth of information on multilevel governance structures in the EU, particularly Social Europe, and a valuable overview of the evolution of trade unionism in Portugal and Spain since democratization. Unfortunately, the book suffers from two serious flaws. The most regrettable one, which is largely the fault of the publisher, is very poor editing. The writing is often dense, confusing, and redundant, and the text has an inexcusable number of typographical and grammatical errors, particularly in the first part. As a result, the book can be a chore to read, which is a shame given its useful content.

The second flaw is less pervasive but more substantive. Magone does not make a sufficiently clear distinction between his theoretical and methodological claims and his empirical analysis. For example, he writes that “the move from a mere institutionalist to a constructionist-phenomenological theory of European integration —which integrates the whole thoughtfulness of the changing nature of reification processes—seems to be a more adequate approach to understand the present process” (pp. 32–34). He bases this claim on the finding that “the European integration process has become constructionist because it clearly is recreating a new socio-political reality through the device of new institutions” (p. 32, italics mine). Besides being confusing, these statements represent, at best, ad hoc theorizing based on empirical changes. He makes similarly confusing claims with regard to an “actorcentered approach to European integration” (p. 37), which he calls voluntarism. After citing the growing number of Euro-associations shaping policy formulation as evidence of voluntarism, he asserts that “voluntarism may lead to further integration of a myriad of actors at the subnational, national, and supranational level” (p. 38, italics mine). Once again, he appears to be confusing a methodological approach with an empirical claim. In general, he would have been better served by sticking to the book's strength of providing a detailed analysis of an important subject.