Bart Vanhercke

Socializing the European Semester: EU social and economic policy co-ordination in crisis and beyond

ABSTRACT This contribution analyses how EU social objectives and policy co-ordination have been integrated into the Union’s post-crisis governance architecture. It argues that between 2011 and 2016, there was a partial but progressive ‘socialization’ of the ‘European Semester’ of policy co-ordination, in terms of increasing emphasis on social objectives in its priorities and key messages, including the Country-Specific Recommendations; intensified social monitoring and review of national reforms; and an enhanced decision-making role for EU social and employment actors. In explaining these developments, the contribution highlights the contribution of strategic agency, reflexive learning and creative adaptation by social and employment actors to the new institutional conditions of the Semester, building on recent theoretical work on ‘actor-centred constructivism’ and the ‘usages of Europe’.

Against the Odds - The Open Method of Coordination as a Selective Amplifier for Reforming Belgian Pension Policies

Tackling pensions problems means engaging with what Pierson (2001) has called immovable objects. Additionally, the EU competence for drafting specific legislation in this area remains unfulfilled potential, while EU legislation in other policy areas creates indirect pressures on national pension policies. Under such circumstances it seems that the room for an effective European intervention in the domain is limited, especially for soft modes of governance such as the Open Method of Coordination on Social Protection and Social Inclusion (SPSI). The pensions strand of the SPSI OMC is often referred to in academic writings as a bureaucratic nightmare which only involves experts and technocrats, even if some cognitive effects have been acknowledged. I take issue against the view of the OMC as mere window dressing. This chapter argues that OMC is effective in that it provides opportunities to create policy windows of opportunity which EU and national policymakers use in their efforts to discuss, manage and reform pension systems. Building on John Kingdons (1995) theoretical framework and applying it to both the EU level and the (most likely) case of Belgium, I conclude that the pension OMC influences, against the odds, three core streams of the policy formation process. First, OMC influences the acceptance of compelling problems so that decision makers pay serious attention to them; secondly, OMC brings about changes in the political stream; and thirdly OMC makes certain ideas take hold and grow, so that they matter (more) in the policy soup. The core mechanisms through which OMC operates are puzzling, through deliberate learning and de facto socialization, and powering, through usage of the OMC architecture and peer pressure as a result of comparisons with others.

About the Baby and the Bathwater: Assessing the European Platform Against Poverty

This Working Paper provides a qualitative assessment of one of Europe 2020s flagship initiatives: the European Platform against Poverty and Social Exclusion (EPAP). The paper argues that a transformed EPAP has the potential to provide strong added value for the EUs toolbox in the fight against poverty. Rather than throwing out the baby with the bathwater, the mid-term review of the Europe 2020 Strategy should be used as a window of opportunity to revamp this tool by addressing its weaknesses. The authors propose three complementary scenarios for boosting, step by step, the effectiveness of the Platform.