Peter Nedergaard

POLICY LEARNING IN THE EUROPEAN UNION:: The case of the European Employment Strategy

Mutual learning among the Member states is the primary purpose of the employment policy of the European Union. The two most important research questions in this regard are how learning occurs and how much learning takes place. In this article it is argued that existing studies of the effects of learning in the European Employment Strategy (EES) have been either determined by the donors interests or have misunderstood how mutual learning between countries takes place. In contrast, this article develops a constructivist approach to learning and uses it to generate some concrete hypotheses about when learning in committees is most likely to take place. This constructivist approach is then used to analyse the institutional framework surrounding the EES in order to evaluate whether the potential for learning is optimal. Finally, the article concludes that even though some basic premises for learning have been fulfilled, the potential for mutual learning could and should be increased through the implementation of a range of concrete institutional reforms. Firstly, a range of professional and autonomous subcommittees that report to the Employment Committee (EMCO) should be established. Secondly, the EMCO should be given more time to discuss national action plans in meetings with more loosely defined agendas. Thirdly, cooperation should be concentrated around the areas where the differences in terms of policy performances among the Member states are greatest. Fourthly, the president of the EMCO should be given a more prominent role at the expense of the Commission. Finally, the members of the EMCO should in the main be recruited from directorates in the member states rather than ministers departments.

The Logic of Policy Development: Lessons Learned from Reform and Routine within the CAP 1980–2003

Abstract With the point of departure in the otherwise extensive knowledge on reform and routine within the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) of the European Union (EU), this paper argues that: (1) in order to fully appreciate the insights provided we need to look into the complementary nature of ideational and interest‐based approaches; and (2) lessons can be learned by comparing several (here, three of five) reform attempts and by pointing out the importance of periods in between reforms (here, covering a time horizon stretching from 1980 to 2003). Against this background, the paper offers a comprehensive logic of policy development that may be used for other areas of study, which both draws on the insights into bargaining processes as offered by rational choice institutional theory and the insight into arguing processes as offered by constructivist approaches.

The reform of the 2003 Common Agricultural Policy: an advocacy coalition explanation1

This article addresses the core research question – how can we understand the policy processes leading to the 2003 Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) reform? It utilizes the Advocacy Coalition Framework (ACF) perspective as an explanatory framework for these purposes in a European Union (EU) policy area which normally lies outside ACF applications. In the ACF, it is assumed that advocacy coalitions will resist information that challenges the policy core beliefs of decision actors. This characteristic is even stronger in semi-federalist systems such as the EU. Hence, a high degree of consensus is required to change the policy core, as was the case with the 2003 CAP reform. The article shows that the ACF can be expanded to explain the CAP reform. It also demonstrates that the preconditions identified by the ACF for a successful consensus process were fulfilled in the reform process. The onset of the BSE crisis and the emergent international trade negotiations meant that the status quo was no longer unacceptable. Most of the negotiations leading up to the CAP reform were held in private and took a great deal of time. Commissioner Fischler was willing to act as facilitator in the process and strove to make the reform process as non-normative as possible. However, in order to accommodate the criticism of the ACF for not taking collective action problems serious, it is also observed that new forms of non-trivial coordination occurred, namely discursive coordination, which became the most frequently used form of coordination during the 2003 CAP reform process and which is much less problematic as far as collective action problems are concerned.

‘As I Drifted on a River I Could Not Control’: The Unintended Ordoliberal Consequences of the Eurozone Crisis

Germany has a long history of institutionalized ordoliberalism. While these ideas may be implemented almost unreflexively within Germany, its status of ‘reluctant hegemon’ within the European Union has led to purposive uploading of many of these ideas to other Member States. In this article, we first define what these ordoliberal actions consist of, before tracing their evolution within Germany and the EU. Our intention is to detail how acting within ordoliberal tenets has led to some rather messy and unpredictable results for Germany and other EU Member States alike – a state particularly emphasized by the crisis. In so doing, we (re)invoke Robert Mertons treatment of unintended consequences. In particular, we are concerned with Germanys increased role in enforcing fiscal order in the EU, counter to our interviewees’ (drawn from the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs) express intentions to retain Germanys political distance.

From ‘Frankenstein’ to ‘toothless vampire’? Explaining the watering down of the Services Directive

The Services Directive is one of the most significant and controversial legislative proposals ever negotiated in the European Union (EU). This article fills a gap in our knowledge by addressing the key questions as to why and how this prestigious proposal was watered down during the negotiation process. By applying the framework of rational choice institutionalism, the analysis pinpoints the positions of the key players and estimates their relative importance in shaping the final outcome. Prima facie, the European Parliament seemed to be the decisive actor developing the text which was adopted in the end. However, a closer inspection reveals that the text was influenced by the newly elected conservative–socialist coalition government in Germany and reflected a relatively low common denominator which secured acceptance from not only the vast majority of Members of the European Parliament, but also avoided any explicit opposition in the adoption by the Council of Ministers.

European Union Administration: Legitimacy and Efficiency

The book analyses the administrative system in the European Union with a focus on the efficiency and legitimacy of the administrative practices. In the analysis three distinct theoretical perspectives are used (a structural, a procedural and a cultural), thus ensuring that a broad variety of factors are included.

The 2003 Reform of the Common Agricultural Policy: Against all Odds or Rational Explanations?

Abstract This article analyses the 2003 reform of the EU Common Agricultural Policy. On the basis of rational choice theory, it addresses to two basic questions: first, which processes led to the 2003 CAP reform? And second, how can the actual content of the reform — with, for example, increased bureaucratisation and more diffuse implementation — be accounted for? The article concludes that it is possible to rationally answer the two questions and that the external pressure resulting from the impending WTO negotiations represented a necessary, if insufficient, condition for reform. In order to arrive at an adequate explanation, an account of the policy entrepreneurship on the part of Commissioner Franz Fischler must also be given.

Blocking Minorities: Networks and Meaning in the Opposition against the Proposal for a Directive on Temporary Work in the Council of Ministers of the European Union

This article contains a case study of the behaviour of a blocking minority in the Council of Ministers. The article demonstrates that the behaviour of the Member States cannot be explained directly in this case by domestic circumstances and interests, as is often done, for example, in the liberal intergovernmentalist literature. Instead, the alternative explanations offered in this article are tight networks and their ability to create meaning in being part of the blocking minority through an attractive storyline. If generalized, this means that the influence of storylines created by discourse-coalitions must be upgraded as explanations of the behaviour in the Council of Ministers and that Member States providing the network with hegemony can critically strengthen an issue network. These factors have previously been overlooked in the literature on the Council of Ministers.

Policy Learning Processes in International Committees

Abstract In spite of their long history and extensive activities, the international committees of the Nordic Council of Ministers (NCM) have not hitherto been subject to scholarly examination. This article analyses for the first time policy learning among civil servants and experts in this international organization. Using the Advocacy Coalition Framework as the starting point, a number of exploratory hypotheses on policy learning in the NCM committees are tested. The aim is to investigate the processes of policy learning between countries in international committees, a subject which has hitherto only been dealt with in very few studies. In this analysis, a methodology for measuring policy learning is also proposed. Among other things, it is concluded that policy learning in these international committees increases when they avoid fragmentation into coalitions, are open to public opinion, when participants in committees are driven by a sense of purpose rather that material interest, when empirical data are made available to committees, when a neutral presidency is present in order to act as an authoritative persuader, and when neutral experts participate, although not experts from consultancy firms.

Learning in International Governmental Organizations The Case of Social Protection

There exists considerable research on how national policy makers learn from abroad. A significant amount examines the processes and actors at work at the international level. In that strand, relatively little attention has gone to international governmental organizations (IGOs), aside from the European Union (EU)’s Open Method of Coordination. In this article, we carry out a comparative study of learning in three IGOs: the EU, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, and the Nordic Council of Ministers. Our policy area is social protection. We investigate what is being learned, and the factors that promote or block learning. Our methodology involves an analysis of the formal design of those IGOs and face-to-face interviews with high-ranking bureaucrats from each organization. We observe, first, that the most important learning in IGOs concerns matters that are not part of formal agendas — governance and epistemic issues above all. Second, we see that very different factors promote or block learning in different organizations. We reflect on the implications of these findings for both theory and practice. Apprentissage dans les Organismes Gouvernementaux Internationaux: Le Cas de la Protection Sociale Il y a beaucoup de recherche aux responsables des politiques à l’échelon national s’inspirer de l’expérience d’autres pays. Beaucoup des études examinent les processus et les personnes qui travaillent au niveau international. Dans cette égard, relativement peu d’attention est accordée pour organismes gouvernementaux internationaux (OGI), sauf pour l’ ‘Open Method of Coordination’ de l’EU. Dans cette article, on fait une étdue comparative pour l’apprentissage dans trois OGIs: l’EU, l’OECD, et le Conseil de Ministres nordique. Notre domaine d’action est la protection sociale. On étudie les connaissances acquises, et les facteurs qui favorisent ou bloquent l’apprentissage. Notre méthodologie implique une analyse de la conception formelle de ces OGIs et entrevues face à face avec des hauts fonctionnaires de chaque organisation. Premièrement, on observe que l’apprentissage le plus important pour les OGIs concerne les sujets qui sont indépendant des ordres du jour formels — le gouvernement et issues de l’epistémologie partout. Deuxiémement, nous voyons que les éléments très différents favorisent ou bloquent l’apprentissage pour des organismes différents. Les implications de ces résultats pour la théorie et la pratique sont discutées. El Aprendizaje en las Organizaciones Gubernamentales Internacionales: El Caso de la Protección Social Existen muchas investigaciones sobre la manera en que los encargados de la política nacional aprenden del exterior. La mayoría de estas investigaciones se centran en los procesos y los protagonistas que trabajan a nivel internacional. En ese hilo, poca atención ha sido prestado a las organizaciones gubernamentales internacionales (las OGI), aparte del ‘método abierto de coordinación’ de la UE. En el presente documento, se realiza un estudio comparativo sobre el aprendizaje en tres OGI: la UE, la OCDE y el Consejo de Ministros Nórdico. Nuestra área de política es la protección social. Se examina lo que está siendo aprendido, y los factores que promueven o impiden el aprendizaje. Nuestra metodología supone un análisis del diseño formal de esas OGI e incluye entrevistas caraa-cara con burócratas de alta jerarquía en cada organización. Se observa, en primer lugar, que el aprendizaje más importante en las OGI concierne los asuntos que no forman parte de las agendas formales — la gobernabilidad y los asuntos epistémicos sobre todo. En segundo lugar se observa que son muy distintos los factores que promueven o impiden el aprendizaje en diferentes organizaciones. Se reflexiona sobre las consecuencias de estas conclusiones tanto para la teoría como para la práctica.