Dealing with Ireland's No

The shock waves from Ireland's vote against the Lisbon treaty will reverberate around the European Union and beyond for many years. European leaders were preparing to focus on pressing external challenges such as climate change, energy security, Russia policy and E.U. enlargement; now they will have to turn inward once again to put time and energy into fixing the E.U.'s creaking institutions. The rest of the world may conclude that Europe's ambition to play a greater role on the world stage should not be taken too seriously: the treaty's biggest aim — to better coordinate the members' foreign policies — will...