Detailed notes of the book chapters and articles to be read for the course Politics and Government in the EU. Most chapters are from "The European Union: How does it work" (Fourth Ed.), with additional chapters/articles from the syllabus.
Summary Politics and Governance in the EU
Lecture notes & The European Union: How does it work?
Week 1: History of the Integration Process
Chapter 1 - “Introduction”, Kenealy, Peterson, Corbett
Studying the EU
2009-2015 have the most turbulent years for the Eurozone in the history of European
Integration (financial crises, issues of legitimacy and sovereignty, anti-EU parties in the 2014
EP election and national elections).
ECSC (‘52) → EEC (‘57) → EC as a pillar in the EU (‘92)
Three Pillars of the EU (created in Maastricht 1992, abolished in Lisbon 2007)
→ treaty reforms could make policy responsibilities shift from one pillar to another
Pillars Policy Responsibilities Decision-making style
(1) European Community Internal market (incl. Primarily supranational
→ first pillar of EU competition, external trade → Commission,
responsibilities with Related policies (consumer Council, Court and
more extension over protection; agriculture; etc.) Parliament act with a
time Economic and Monetary significant autonomy
Union (EMU) over national
Immigration asylum; visas governments
(2) Common Foreign and Common policy positions on Primarily intergovernmental
Security Policy foreign policy → between
Common action to governments, by
strengthen security of the unanimity and
EU without separate
Preserve peace legal framework (no
Promote international direct influence)
cooperation
(3) Justice and Home Cross-border crime Primarily intergovernmental
Affairs Criminal law → unanimity
+ after 1997 Police Police cooperation between members
Judicial Cooperation required for
in Criminal Matters decisions
→ intention: to
increase cooperation
in int. Security (fight
int. crime/drugs
trade)
,Why bother?
❏ Practical significance:
- Market → EU regulates world’s largest market (500 million consumers)
- Legislation → 6-35% of all domestic legislation originates from EU level
- Currency → euro since 2002 (in 2015 it contains 15 members)
- Wealth → GNI (Gross National Income) of EU is 30% of the world’s
- Trade → 20% of all world’s trade
- Aid → EU/members are largest donors of development aid (55%)
❏ Analytical importance:
- Effects of globalisation
- Future of nation-states
- Prospects of international cooperation
❏ Political puzzle:
- Big, peaceful, integrated, wealthy Union vs. Euroscepticism
- Complexities vs. unimportance of the EC, European Council and EP
Globalisation = increasingly interconnected and interdependent world with increasing flows
of trade, technology, ideas, people, and capital. Reduces autonomy of nation-states.
Governance = ‘established patterns of rule without an overall ruler’. The EU is a system of
governance without government/opposition.
Integration = sovereign states partially relinquish, or pool, national sovereignty to maximise
their collective power/interest
Intergovernmentalism = process/condition whereby decisions are reached by specifically
defined cooperation between/among governments, formally sovereignty is not relinquished
Multilevel governance = used to described the EU. A system wherein power is shared
between supranational, national and subnational levels. Significant interaction/coordination
of political actors across those levels.
Sovereignty = ultimate authority over people/territory, can be broken down into internal
(law-making authority over territory) and external (international recognition) sovereignty.
Supranationalism = above states or nations. Processes/institutions (largely) independent of
national governments make key decisions, subject national governments are obliged to
accept them. E.g. Court of Justice of the EU.
Understanding the EU: Theory and Conceptual Tools
Theories are used to simplify reality and see relationships that guide us.
International Relations (IR) approaches:
Basis for analysis is the nation-state: explaining why and how states choose to form
European institutions, and determine the speed of the integration process.
❏ Neofunctionalism (1958: Ernst Haas - The Uniting of Europe)
→ how a merger of economic activity in specific economic sectors across
borders (ECSC, ‘52) would ‘spill over’ and provoke wider integration in related
areas. Gradually leads to increasing loyalty to supranational levels.
, → explained successful early years of integration, but failed to give an
explanation for Empty Chair Crisis (De Gaulle, 60s) in the Council of
Ministers.
→ Hoffman (1966): the state is obstinate, not obsolete!
❏ Realism
→ little to say about European integration
→ emphasizes importance of structure of international system, on states as
unitary and rational actors possessing fixed/conflicting goals (little impact of
international institutions)
❏ Liberal intergovernmentalism (Moravcsik, 1993, 1998 - The Choice for Europe)
→ liberal because of its assumption that economic interest motivates and
drives European states (next to security interests)
→ national governments bargain at EU level to support its own agenda
Comparative Politics approach:
❏ New institutionalism (1980s onwards, Pollack 2004)
→ institutions matter in determining outcomes (arguably a leading theory
now)
→ EU’s institutions are leading actors in policy making process, with their own
agendas and priorities (e.g. Commission proposes everything)
→ path dependency determines that nation-states stick to their chosen path
that is increasingly more integrated
Sociological/Cultural approach:
❏ Constructivism
→ focus on the ‘social construction’ of collective rules and norms that guide
political behaviour
→ new arenas for socialisation, transfers of loyalty and actors that redefine
their interests as a result of interactions with the EU and its institutions
→ trouble proving that ideas matter more than interests, but can give an
insight into socialisation among EU Commission officials; learning behaviour
of actors; European identification among citizens
Public Policy approach:
❏ Policy Network Framework (Peterson 2009; Jordan/Schout 2006)
→ helps guide exploration of the bts negotiation/exchange that shapes EU
policy from day to day
→ a policy network is ‘a cluster of actors, each of which has an interest or
stake in a given EU policy sector and the capacity to help determine policy
success or failure’
→ but: networks lack hierarchy! They rely on resource exchange and
bargaining among actors determining shape of EU policies
Liberal Moravcsik (1998) Member states Too state-centric,
intergovern- control integration neglects day-to-day
mentalism policy-making
New Pollack (2009) Institutions matter, Over-emphasizes
institutionalism path dependencies power of the EU’s
and sunk costs institutions
make institutions
and policies ‘sticky’
Social Checkel (2004) Ideas matter, Methodological
Constructivism interests are weaknesses
constructed and not
pre-determined
Policy Networks Peterson (2009) Resource exchange Cannot explain big
within networks decisions
shape policy
Themes (to make sense of the EU)
Three distinctive features of the EU:
1. Experiment in motion → an ongoing process without a clear end-state
The EU has (neofunctionalist approach) developed from (1) free trade area to
(2) customs union to a (3) single market and to an (4) economic and monetary
union
Processes of progress as a result of experimentation:
- Changes in the European foreign policy
- Changes in the nature and intensity of change
2. System of shared power characterised by growing complexity and an
increasing number of players
Power is dispersed across a range of actors and levels of governance. (1)
member states, (2) EU institutions, (3) organised interests with ongoing
debate within the EU → Multilevel governance
3. Organisation with an expanding scope, but limited capacity
The EU has undergone:
- Widening → increasing number of members
- Deepening → states have decided to pool sovereignty in more policy
areas, also in national/sensitive topics (e.g. national budgets)
Tries to get rid of image of ‘economic giant, political dwarf and military worm’
by focussing more on issues like climate change.
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