This Policy Brief investigates whether the Constitution’s coming into force would make a decisive difference compared to the status quo. In the first part the authors therefore take a closer look at concrete institutional aspects to illustrate how the EU is currently performing. At the same time they ask whether the Constitutional provisions would have changed the Union’s efficiency decisively for the better. In the second part, the issue is put into a broader context analysing especially the Constitution’s symbolic importance and its implications for the balance of power between the EU institutions.