Joren Verschaeve

Europeanisation of aid budgets: nothing is as it seems

ABSTRACT In 2002 the European Union (EU) decided to gradually increase its official development assistance (ODA) towards the ‘0.7% norm’ by 2015. Both in terms of policy and in terms of procedures, this constituted a remarkable integrationist shift in EU development policy. However, it is unclear to what extent this integrationist shift (bottom-up) has effectively enhanced the EUs influence over its member states (top-down). More than 13 years after the EUs explicit goal to Europeanise the ODA issue, this article aims to assess to what extent it has been successful. More specifically, it analyses the impact of the EUs ‘0.7% norm’ on the national aid budgets. Through an inductive analysis involving 15 member states over a large time span, a comprehensive assessment of Europeanisation is provided. The conclusion reads that nothing is like it seems: ostensible compliance with EU targets appears mostly unrelated to the EU, while the EU might have contributed to non-compliance.

Ignoring the Elephant in the Room? Assessing the impact of the European Union on the Development Assistance Committee's role in international development

This article studies the impact of the European Union (EU) on the Development Assistance Committee (DAC) of the Organisation for Economic Co†operation and Development (OECD). While the literature thus far has focused on the external challenges for the DACs role in international development, this study argues that the EU should be taken into account as well. By focusing on the cases of policy coherence for development and the concessionality of official development assistance (ODA) loans, we show that the EU poses a structural challenge for the DACs role in international development given the strong overlap in membership between both institutions and the Unions changing nature as a development actor.

The Normative Distinctiveness of the European Union in International Development: Stepping Out of the Shadow of the World Bank?

Although the EU has shown a strong ambition to put a distinctive stamp on the international aid agenda over the past 15 years, it has also been pointed out that its policies suffer from a series of collective action problems. This article explores how both relate to one another. This article examines the EUs normative distinctiveness in contrast to the World Bank, focusing on policy norms in the field of governance, aid effectiveness and social development. We argue that collective action problems do not necessarily hamper EU distinctiveness: they are also a symptom of a strong EU desire to pressure European actors to come up with norms that pacify disagreements.

EU Donors and health system strengthening: the love-hate relationship with the Global Fund

ABSTRACT Since the 2000s, the proliferation of Global Health Initiatives such as the Global Fund have dramatically changed the field of global health. The European Union and several of its Member States have played an important role in the development of the Global Fund and have contributed considerable budgets to it. While the Fund has been successful in fighting priority diseases, it has also been criticized for impacting negatively on countries’ health systems, which provoked a debate on health system strengthening (HSS) within the organization. Drawing on a literature review, aid statistics, interviews at headquarter and field level, and document analysis, this article researches the relation between EU donors and the Global Fund, with an explicit focus on the HSS debate. The findings indicate a ‘love-hate relationship’. EU donors have loved the Global Fund’s innovative institutional set-up and its ‘saving lives’ approach involving quick results. However, over the years they have become more critical about its narrow focus, advocating a shift towards more HSS. Whereas this has been partly successful at headquarters level, most notably the incorporation of concrete HSS commitments in the Global Fund’s strategic documents, challenges at local level constrain their translation into funding and implementation measures.

United in diversity? Analysing behaviour expectations of the European Union as a non-state member of the OECD’s development assistance committee

ABSTRACT The European Union (EU) frequently accentuates its position as the largest provider of Official Development Assistance (ODA). Together with the EU institutions, EU Member States represent 21 of the 30 members of the OECD’s Development Assistance Committee (DAC) that sets out rules and standards for what can be reported as ODA. Following the EU Treaty’s requirement for the EU to work together in international organisations, research has detected a tentative yet positive trend to this end in different international organisations (IOs). This article’s empirical analysis shows no such trend can be detected in the EU’s engagement in the DAC. Explanatory factors include divergent development cooperation approaches inside the EU, discrepancies between the established image of and everyday practice in the DAC, and the EU’s full DAC membership. The findings add to the literature on international organisation governance by exploring different behaviour expectations of non-state membership vis-à-vis that of states.