Europeanisation - the dynamic interaction between the European Union and its Member States

Short description:

Short description: Europeanisation has had a diverse but profound impact on politics, policies and polities in the member states of the European Union (EU). This five day seminar focuses on the dynamic interaction between the national and European level by examining different mechanisms of Europeanization.

More specifically contributions are invited from PhD students on how national positions are uploaded and processed at the European level and how the outcome is subsequently downloaded and processed at the national level. Participants are encouraged to focus on how to conceptualise and analyse this circular process which blurs the borders between the cause and effect.

The course takes place in Copenhagen from Monday November 26 to Friday November 30 and is divided into two parts. The first part takes place from November 26-27 where professor Markus Haverland will be focusing on how to study EU decision making. The second part takes places from November 28-30 where Ulrich Sedelmeier will focus on the process of Europeansiation. During the morning sessions the two guest professors will present the state of art on the topic whereas the after lunch sessions are reserved for student presentations where you can get feedback from the professor and the other participants on your work. In short, the course is an excellent opportunity to get updated on the state of the art on EU studies and receive feedback from two key expert in the field.

You are required to participate actively in the course in order to receive a diploma. However, there will be no exam in the end of the course.

Should you have any question please contact: Mads Dagnis Jensen on MCDJ@ifs.ku.dk

Lecturers: Post doc Mads Dagnis Jensen and Dr Ulrich Sedelmeier, Reader in International Relations, London School of Economics and Political Science, UK. Dr Markus Haverland, Professor of Political Science, Erasmus University Rotterdam, NL

Part I (November 26-27): Policy-making in the European Union

Lecturer: Dr Markus Haverland, Professor of Political Science, Erasmus University Rotterdam, NL

The European Union, the most far reaching form of international cooperation in the history of human mankind, faces turbulent times. In terms of citizen support, a series of referenda have indicated that EU policy-making cannot rely anymore on a permissive consensus. The financial crisis has called into question that the EU has achieved a constitutional settlement, concerning the distribution of competencies between the EU and its member states. Are political actors in the EU trapped between the functional need of more integration, touching upon core competencies of member states, and the lack of citizen support?
The first part of the course will take these developments as starting point and will focuses on two stages of policy-making in the European Union: agenda setting and decision-making. We will discuss literature that focuses on the factors that shape agenda setting and decision-making and we will seek to identify future venues of research informed by theoretical puzzles revolving around these recent developments.
The substantive topics will be prefaced by a discussion of research design issues tailored toward research into the European Union.

Lectures/seminars:

Monday:
1 Crafting research designs in EU studies
2. The EU as a political system: a constitutional settlement?
Tuesday:
3. From permissive consensus to restraining dissensus?
4. Agenda setting and decision making in a politicised EU

Key literature

Gschwend and Schimmelfennig (2007) Chapter 1 Introduction: Designing Research in Political Science -  Dialogue between Theory and Data In Gschwend and Schimmelfennig (Ed.), Research Design in Political Science, pp 1-14 (chapter in recent paperback version – 2012 - is fine as well)
Haverland, Markus (2007)  ‘Methodology’,  In Paolo Graziano & Maarten Vink (Eds.), Europeanization: New Research Agendas (pp. 59-70). Houndsmills, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 59-70

Haverland Markus, Minou de Ruijter, and Steven van de Walle (2012) ‘Constructing Citizen Support for EU Policy-Making, Unpublished Manuscript (provided by lecturer)

Hix, Simon (2006) 'The European Union as a Polity (1)', in: Jorgensen, Knud Erik, Mark A. Pollack, Ben Rosamond (eds) Handbook of European Union Politics, pp. 141-158

Hooghe, Liesbeth. & Marks, Gary 2008. ‘A Postfunctionalist Theory of European Integration: From Permissive Consensus to Constraining Dissensus.’ British Journal of Political Science, 39, 1–23

Leuffen, Dirk, Berthold Rittberger and Frank Schimmelfennig (2012) ‘Differentiated Integration. Explaining Variation in the European Union, Introduction and Conclusion. Palgrave Macmillan 2012 , “Introduction” and “Conclusion”

Part II (November 28-30): Europeanisation

Lecturer: Dr Ulrich Sedelmeier, Reader in International Relations, London School of Economics and Political Science, UK.

http://www2.lse.ac.uk/researchAndExpertise/Experts/u.sedelmeier@lse.ac.uk

In the context of its eastern enlargement policy, the European Union (EU) has had an unprecedented influence on the domestic politics of its neighbours. This part of the course analyses how the EU exercises its domestic impact and under what conditions its attempts at external governance are effective. It first reviews the study of ‘Europeanisation’ of EU member states and analyses of national compliance with EU law. It then analyses Europeanisation processes in candidate countries and the wider European neighbourhood and concludes with contemplating the EU’s impact after the enlargements of 2004/2007, both in the new member states and countries currently outside the EU.

The literature on ‘Europeanisation’ inside and outside the EU’s borders suggests that the debate between constructivist and rationalist institutionalism provides a fruitful analytical framework to explain the EU’s domestic impact. Both approaches suggest different – partly competing and partly complementary – mechanisms of Europeanisation and identify a range of explanatory factors, both with regard to the instruments and strategies used by the EU, and with regard to domestic conditions that are conducive and obstructive to the EU’s influence.

The themes of the course are relevant for students of the EU’s external relations, EU foreign policy, EU enlargement, and implementation of EU law across different policy areas, but also more broadly for students who analyse the domestic impact of International Organisations and national compliance with the rules of international institutions.

Lectures/seminars:

Wednesday: Europeanisation, policy implementation and compliance in EU member states

Thursday: Europeanisation of candidate countries

Friday: Europeanisation after the 2004/2007 enlargements: the limits of Europeanisation through conditionality?

Key literature

Börzel, T.A. and Risse, T. (2003) 'Conceptualising the Domestic Impact of Europe', in K. Featherstone and C. Radaelli (eds) The Politics of Europeanisation. (Oxford: Oxford University Press), 55-78.

Treib, O. (2008) 'Implementing and Complying with EU Governance', Living Reviews in European Governance, 3(5): http://www.livingreviews.org/lreg-2008-5

Börzel, T.A., Hofmann, T., Panke, D. and Sprungk, C. (2010) 'Obstinate and Inefficient: Why Member States Do Not Comply with European Law', Comparative Political Studies, 43(11): 1363-90.

Schimmelfennig, Frank and Ulrich Sedelmeier (2004) ‘Governance by Conditionality: EU Rule Transfer to the Candidate Countries of Central and Eastern Europe’, Journal of European Public Policy, 11(4): 661-79.

Sedelmeier, Ulrich (2011)‘Europeanisation in new member and candidate states’, Living Reviews in European Governance; 6(1), http://www.livingreviews.org/lreg-2011-1/

Epstein, Rachel and Ulrich Sedelmeier (2008) ‘Beyond Conditionality: International Institutions in Postcommunist Europe after Enlargement’, Journal of European Public Policy 15:6, pp. 795-805.

Further information:

Post doc Mads Dagnis Jensen – email: MCDJ@ifs.ku.dk