JOHN LOUGHLIN is Professor of European Politics and formerly Jean Monnet Professor at Cardiff University, UK, and European Studies Visiting Fellow at St Antony's College, Oxford, UK. Previously he held positions at the Erasmus University Rotterdam and the University of Ulster. He has held Visiting Professorships and Fellowships at Merton College, Oxford, the Institutes of Political Science in Paris, Bordeaux and Aix-en-Provence, the European University Institute, Florence, the Royal Flemish Academy of Belgium for Arts and Sciences, the Free University of Brussels and the University of Umeå, Sweden. He is currently an Expert on Regional and Local Democracy of the Council of Europe and at UN-HABITAT.