Students viewing an official map of the enlarged European Union may be struck by the emphasis on the regional boundaries inside the borders of each member state, including even the smaller countries. They are usually puzzled as well by the insets showing the overseas territories of France, Spain, and Portugal, which are nowhere near continental Europe. Both features reflect historical legacies of ethnic conflicts within the nation states of Europe and of imperial adventures overseas. Both features also reflect the economic policies of the EU, designed to resolve such ethnic conflicts permanently within Europe and to eliminate imperial rivalries among European powers overseas.

Inside the European Union, regional policy programs have been an increasing part of the budget expenditures over time and will continue to grow in importance with the addition of the central and east European countries and their ethnic rivalries. Outside the European Union, development strategies for former overseas colonies have confronted increasing challenges from the globalization of international trade and finance, which has undercut the value to the former colonies of “imperial preference” or “Community preference.” Both policies, one directed to reduce economic inequalities within the European Union, and the other directed to reduce economic backwardness in former colonies, received their basic impetus from the accession of the United Kingdom in 1973. Each subsequent enlargement of the membership of the EU has brought with it a reorientation of both regional and development policy, driven mostly by the political needs of the new members but shaped as well by an evaluation of the economic effects of previous policies.