Pauline Cullen

The Platform of European Social NGOs: ideology, division and coalition

This paper explores the role of ideological division in complicating collaboration between third sector organizations working to influence European Union (EU) policy processes. The Social Platform, the largest alliance of social justice groups working at EU level, is studied to illustrate how a coalition of ideologically disparate organizations cope with internal tensions that are often exacerbated by external shifts in the political opportunities available for mobilization. The alliance is successful at mediating the most significant sources of ideologically based division. However, the external political context for mobilization requires coalition members to compete for recognition and resources available at EU level. The reordering of EU equality legislation and initiatives has most recently exacerbated a series of competitive dynamics in play across the EU third sector and has stretched the ability of the coalition to maintain unity among member organizations.

Feminist NGOs and the European Union: Contracting Opportunities and Strategic Response

European womens organizations were among the first social movements to recognize the European Union (EU) as an important context for claim-making. From the mid-1990s, feminist groups had secured a representation to this transnational opportunity structure in the form of the European Womens Lobby (EWL), which receives EU funding, has access to policy setting, and is credited with a role in the construction and consolidation of EU gender equality policy. More recently, the EWL has experienced a contraction in the EU political opportunity context, a function of Eurocrisis dynamics that deem gender equality too costly at a time of austerity. EU progress on gender equality has stalled, with most policy advanced through non-binding or soft law mechanisms. This work assesses the implications of these shifts for the strategies and patterns of mobilization employed by the EWL as it works to exploit soft law opportunities and develop collaborative strategies with other EU non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and in other intergovernmental fora to promote a gendered analysis of the economic crises. Though this latter strategy is a relatively late and weak engagement on austerity, it marks a departure in strategic terms. The organization has also adopted strategies aimed at compensating for declining resources including seeking out new resource streams and cohering closely to topics where EU funding opportunities remain. Analysis of the EWLs response to this challenging political opportunity structure allows for an assessment of how feminist NGOs deal with austerity-based reductions in the political space and financial support for feminist mobilization and gender equality measures across Europe.

European Union Non-governmental Organizational Coalitions as Professional Social Movement Communities

Abstract Previous analysis has looked at the interface between organized civil society (OCS) and European Union (EU) institutions and has posed questions about their role as political communicators for the EU project, and consequently their independence, representativeness, and policy influence. While these accounts focus in part on the role of European OCS in helping the EU institutions in the process of identity building, this work differs in offering an account of the internal processes that build identification and community within EU OCS coalitions. These dynamics are examined using social movement theory on coalitions and communities applied to a diverse coalition of OCS working on a range of social change issues at EU level known as the Platform of European Social NGOs (the Platform). Aside from a broad ideological alignment based on support for a stronger social policy at EU level, the composition of the Platform remains diverse. While diverse organizations can cooperate effectively in loose episodic and strategic alliances, the continuity in and density of collaboration within this coalition are notable. In the process of coalition work Platform members are influenced by external frames that circulate at EU level; they are also involved in a process of community building that has emerged between organizations grappling together to develop a shared understanding of an issue and an agreement around its strategic communication. Through an analysis of coalition structures and outputs, this article contributes to debates on transnational OCS coalitions by exploring the conditions for continuity, survival, and the generative properties of coalitions which move transnational civil society actors beyond purely ad hoc and instrumental, coordinated action to more durable identity-based forms of collaboration.