ELECTRICITY MARKET LIBERALISATION AND INTEGRATION IN THE EUROPEAN UNION* TOORAJ JAMASB AND

Electricity sector liberalisation is part of thewider trend toward liberalisation and the with-drawal of the state from involvement in infrastruc-ture industries. The electricity liberalisation in the European Union (EU) is the world’s most extensive cross-jurisdiction reform program of the sector and involves liberalisation of electricity markets in mem-ber states and integration of the national markets. The member countries include some of the world’s pioneering countries (e.g. UK, Norway) as well as slow-reforming countries (e.g. France, Greece). In the absence of a centrally driven programme, the pace of reform in the EU would have been consider-ably slower.1 The electricity liberalisation trend in the EU is tak-ing place amid a world-wide slow down in the pace of reforms. The California electricity crises in 2000–01 and the 2003 blackouts in New York and parts of Europe have dampened political enthusiasm for reforms. In Latin America, political and public support for reforms is on the decline. Elsewhere, apart from some leading countries such as th