TY - JOUR A1 - Tosun, Jale A1 - Schulze, Kai T1 - Compliance with EU biofuel targets in South-Eastern and Eastern Europe: Do interest groups matter? JF - Environment & planning : international journal of urban and regional research ; C, Government & policy N2 - The European Union requires its member states to establish national targets for the biofuel content of all diesel and petrol supplies for transport placed on the market. This study explores the adoption of this European Union policy across South-Eastern and Eastern Europe between 2003 and 2012. In theoretical terms, we are specifically interested in examining the role of interest groups for policy adoption. We argue that the oil industry in general and the producers of biofuels in particular will support the establishment of national biofuel targets because they expect economic gains. By contrast, we expect environmental groups with international and regional ties to oppose such targets because biofuels have come under attack for their potential environmental impact including deforestation, a loss in biodiversity, and food insecurity. Empirically, we concentrate on policy adoptions in 21 South-Eastern and Eastern European states with varied relations to the European Union and the Energy Community. Our analysis supports our main arguments in suggesting that a stronger presence of environmental groups decreases the chances of adopting national biofuel targets across our country sample while producer interests tend to increase adoptions. This finding holds true also when controlling for a country's European Union membership and accession perspective, membership in the Energy Community, and additional domestic-level factors. These results add more generally to our understanding about compliance with European Union policies and environmental governance. KW - Biofuels KW - Eastern Europe KW - Energy Community KW - European Union KW - lobbying KW - South-Eastern Europe Y1 - 2015 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1177/0263774X15605923 SN - 0263-774X SN - 1472-3425 VL - 33 IS - 5 SP - 950 EP - 968 PB - Sage Publ. CY - London ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Sohst, Rhea Ravenna A1 - Acostamadiedo, Eduardo A1 - Tjaden, Jasper T1 - Reducing uncertainty in Delphi surveys BT - a case study on immigration to the EU JF - Demographic research N2 - Background: Following the rapid increase of asylum seekers arriving in the European Union in 2015/16, policymakers have invested heavily in improving their foresight and forecasting capabilities. A common method to elicit expert predictions are Delphi surveys. This approach has attracted concern in the literature, given the high uncertainty in experts’ predictions. However, there exists limited guidance on specific design choices for future-related Delphi surveys. Objective: We test whether or not small adjustments to the Delphi survey can increase certainty (i.e., reduce variation) in expert predictions on immigration to the EU in 2030. Methods: Based on a two-round Delphi survey with 178 migration experts, we compare variation and subjective confidence in expert predictions and assess whether additional context information (type of migration flow, sociopolitical context) promotes convergence among experts (i.e., less variation) and confidence in their own estimates. Results: We find that additional context information does not reduce variation and does not increase confidence in expert predictions on migration. Conclusions: The results reaffirm recent concerns regarding the limited scope for reducing uncertainty by manipulating the survey setup. Persistent uncertainty may be a result of the complexity of migration processes and limited agreement among migration experts regarding key drivers. Contribution: We caution policymakers and academics on the use of Delphi surveys for eliciting expert predictions on immigration, even when conducted based on a large pool of experts and using specific scenarios. The potential of alternative approaches such as prediction markets should be further explored. KW - European Union KW - immigration KW - international migration KW - migration flows Y1 - 2023 U6 - https://doi.org/10.4054/DemRes.2023.49.36 SN - 2363-7064 SN - 1435-9871 VL - 49 SP - 983 EP - 1020 PB - Max Planck Inst. for Demographic Research CY - Rostock ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Schmidt-Wellenburg, Christian T1 - Struggling over crisis T1 - Umkämpfte Krise BT - Discoursive Positionings and Academic Positions in the Field of German-Speaking Economists BT - Diskursive Positionierungen und akademische Positionen im Feld deutschsprachiger Volkswirt*innen JF - Historical Social Research N2 - If you put two economists in a room, you get two opinions, unless one of them is Lord Keynes, in which case you get three opinions.” Following the premise of this quotation attributed to Winston Churchill, varying perceptions of the European crisis by academic economists and their structural homology to economists’ positions in the field of economics are examined. The dataset analysed using specific multiple correspondence analysis (MCA) and hierarchical agglomerative clustering (HAC) comprises information on the careers of 480 German-speaking economists and on statements they made concerning crisis-related issues. It can be shown that the main structural differences in the composition and amount of scientific and academic capital held by economists as well as their age and degree of transnationalisation are linked to how they see the crisis: as a national sovereign debt crisis, as a European banking crisis, or as a crisis of European integration and institutions. KW - Economics KW - multiple correspondence analysis KW - Bourdieu KW - field KW - discourse KW - mixed methods KW - European Union KW - crisis Y1 - 2018 U6 - https://doi.org/10.12759/hsr.43.2018.3.147-188 SN - 0172-6404 VL - 43 IS - 3 SP - 147 EP - 188 PB - GESIS, Leibniz Institute for the Social Sciences CY - Cologne ER - TY - GEN A1 - Schmidt-Wellenburg, Christian T1 - Europeanisation, stateness, and professions BT - what role do economic expertise and economic experts play in European political integration? T2 - Postprints der Universität Potsdam : Wirtschafts- und Sozialwissenschaftliche Reihe N2 - The article explores Europeanisation as an effect of European political integration, a process driven by struggles over the legitimate political and social order that is to prevail in Europe. Firstly, an analytic framework is constructed, drawing on insights from Pierre Bourdieu’s work on similar struggles over nation-stateness. Secondly, the mechanisms identified are used to assess the role played by economic experts and expertise in the process of European political integration. It is argued that concepts arising from economic disciplines, agents educated in economics, and practising economic professionals influence European political integration and have benefited from Europeanisation initiated by this process. Special emphasis is placed on strategies of integrating Europe by law or by market, on governing Europe using economic expertise, on the role played by economic academia in researching and objectifying Europe, and on staffing European institutions with economists. T3 - Zweitveröffentlichungen der Universität Potsdam : Wirtschafts- und Sozialwissenschaftliche Reihe - 99 KW - field theory KW - economics KW - professions KW - European Union KW - neo-liberal governance KW - political integration Y1 - 2018 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus4-412590 SN - 1867-5808 IS - 99 ER - TY - CHAP A1 - Quitzow, Rainer A1 - Bersalli, Germán A1 - Lilliestam, Johan A1 - Prontera, Andrea ED - Rayner, Tim ED - Szulecki, Kacper ED - Jordan, Andrew J. ED - Oberthür, Sebastian T1 - Green recovery BT - catalyst for an enhanced EU role in climate and energy policy? T2 - Handbook on European Union Climate Change Policy and Politics N2 - This chapter reviews how the European Union has fared in enabling a green recovery in the aftermath of the Covid-19 crisis, drawing comparisons to developments after the financial crisis. The chapter focuses on the European Commission and its evolving role in promoting decarbonisation efforts in its Member States, paying particular attention to its role in financing investments in low-carbon assets. It considers both the direct effects of green stimulus policies on decarbonisation in the EU and how these actions have shaped the capacities of the Commission as an actor in the field of climate and energy policy. The analysis reveals a significant expansion of the Commission’s role compared to the period following the financial crisis. EU-level measures have provided incentives for Member States to direct large volumes of financing towards investments in climate-friendly assets. Nevertheless, the ultimate impact will largely be shaped by implementation at the national level. KW - European Union KW - green recovery KW - climate finance KW - European Green Deal KW - just transition Y1 - 2023 SN - 978-1-78990-698-1 SN - 978-1-78990-697-4 U6 - https://doi.org/10.4337/9781789906981.00039 SP - 351 EP - 366 PB - Edward Elgar Publishing ER - TY - GEN A1 - Pedersen, Karin Hilmer A1 - Johannsen, Lars T1 - The real challenge for change : public administration in new EU member states N2 - Executive responsibility for EU policies is by tradition delegated to the member states and their internal administrative bodies. It is therefore of outmost importance that the new Central and East European members have the capacity to administer the acquis communitaire once they are full members of the EU. Based on a survey among current and former top-level decision-makers (ministers), this article argues that although there are significant implementation problems, efficiency gains can be made through administrative reform and not the least education aimed at changing the worldview and knowledge of the individual civil servant. However, there seem to be significant differences in how these countries tackle implementation problems and administrative reform. KW - Europäische Union KW - öffentliche Verwaltung KW - European Union KW - public administration Y1 - 2004 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus-46718 ER - TY - THES A1 - Patz, Ronny T1 - Information flows in the context of EU policy-making : affiliation networks and the post-2012 reform of the EU's Common Fisheries Policy T1 - Informationsflüsse im Kontext von EU-Entscheidungsprozessen : Affiliations-Netzwerke und die Reform der Gemeinsamen Fischereipolitik der EU für die Zeit nach 2012 N2 - Information flows in EU policy-making are heavily dependent on personal networks, both within the Brussels sphere but also reaching outside the narrow limits of the Belgian capital. These networks develop for example in the course of formal and informal meetings or at the sidelines of such meetings. A plethora of committees at European, transnational and regional level provides the basis for the establishment of pan-European networks. By studying affiliation to those committees, basic network structures can be uncovered. These affiliation network structures can then be used to predict EU information flows, assuming that certain positions within the network are advantageous for tapping into streams of information while others are too remote and peripheral to provide access to information early enough. This study has tested those assumptions for the case of the reform of the Common Fisheries Policy for the time after 2012. Through the analysis of an affiliation network based on participation in 10 different fisheries policy committees over two years (2009 and 2010), network data for an EU-wide network of about 1300 fisheries interest group representatives and more than 200 events was collected. The structure of this network showed a number of interesting patterns, such as – not surprisingly – a rather central role of Brussels-based committees but also close relations of very specific interests to the Brussels-cluster and stronger relations between geographically closer maritime regions. The analysis of information flows then focused on access to draft EU Commission documents containing the upcoming proposal for a new basic regulation of the Common Fisheries Policy. It was first documented that it would have been impossible to officially obtain this document and that personal networks were thus the most likely sources for fisheries policy actors to obtain access to these “leaks” in early 2011. A survey of a sample of 65 actors from the initial network supported these findings: Only a very small group had accessed the draft directly from the Commission. Most respondents who obtained access to the draft had received it from other actors, highlighting the networked flow of informal information in EU politics. Furthermore, the testing of the hypotheses connecting network positions and the level of informedness indicated that presence in or connections to the Brussels sphere had both advantages for overall access to the draft document and with regard to timing. Methodologically, challenges of both the network analysis and the analysis of information flows but also their relevance for the study of EU politics have been documented. In summary, this study has laid the foundation for a different way to study EU policy-making by connecting topical and methodological elements – such as affiliation network analysis and EU committee governance – which so far have not been considered together, thereby contributing in various ways to political science and EU studies. N2 - Informationsflüsse im Kontext von EU-Entscheidungsprozessen sind ohne persönliche Netzwerke kaum denkbar, sowohl solche innerhalb der Brüsseler Sphäre aber auch solche, die über die engen Grenzen der belgischen Hauptstadt hinausreichen. Solche Netzwerke entwickeln sich zum Beispiel im Laufe von offiziellen und inoffiziellen Treffen, oft auch am Rande solcher Ereignisse. Die Vielzahl von Ausschüssen auf europäischer, transnationaler und regionaler Ebene bildet daher die Grundlage für die Schaffung europäischer Netzwerkstrukturen. Indem wir die Teilnahme an solchen Ausschüssen untersuchen, ist es uns möglich, grundlegende Strukturmerkmale solcher Netzwerke aufzudecken. Solche Affiliationsnetzwerk-Strukturen können dann die Grundlage zur Vorhersage von europäischen Informationsflüssen bilden: Die Annahme ist, dass bestimmte Positionen in solchen Netzwerken vorteilhaft für den Zugang zu Informationsflüssen sind, während andere Positionen (zu) weit entfernt und zu peripher sind, um rechtzeitigen Zugriff auf relevante Informationen zu erhalten. Die vorliegende Studie testet diese Annahmen anhand der Reform der Gemeinsamen Fischereipolitik der Europäischen Union für die Zeit nach 2012 . Basierend auf Teilnahmedaten von 10 Fischereipolitik-Ausschüssen über den Zeitraum von zwei Jahren (2009 und 2010) wurde ein Affilationsnetzwerk aus mehr als 1300 Interessenvertretern und –vertreterinnen sowie über 200 Ereignissen erhoben. Die Struktur dieses Netzwerks zeigt eine Reihe von interessanten Mustern auf, zum Beispiel die zentrale Rolle von Brüssel-basierten Ausschüssen aber auch die enge Verknüpfung bestimmter Interessen mit dem Brüsseler Kern des Netzwerk sowie die enge Vernetzung geographisch benachbarter Meeresregionen. Die Analyse von EU-Informationsflüssen wurde dann Anhand des Zugangs von Akteuren aus dem erhobenen Netzwerk zu (nichtöffentlichen) Entwurfsfassungen des Kommissionsvorschlags für eine neue Gemeinsame Fischereipolitik durchgeführt. Zunächst wurde dokumentiert, dass der Zugang zu diesen Dokumenten auf offiziellen Wegen unmöglich war und dass daher Zugang durch erweiterte persönliche Netzwerke die wahrscheinlichste Erklärung für den Erhalt von „Leaks“ durch Fischereipolitik-Interessengruppen in der ersten Hälfte von 2011 war. Eine Umfrage unter 65 Akteuren aus der Gesamtpopulation des Gesamtnetzwerk unterstützte diese Vermutung: Nur eine kleine Gruppe hatte Zugang zu den nicht-öffentlichen Entwurfsdokumenten durch ihre direkten Beziehungen mit der EU-Kommission. Die meisten Teilnehmer der Umfrage hatte Zugang zu diesen Dokumenten durch Dritte erhalten, ein Nachweis, dass EU-Informationen sich tatsächlich in weiteren Netzwerkstrukturen verbreiten. Die Studie konnte auch zeigen, dass enge Affiliations-Beziehungen zur Brüsseler Sphäre ein relevanter Indikator für den (zeitnahen) Zugang zu nicht-öffentlichen EU-Dokumenten ist. Die Herausforderungen in der methodischen Erhebungen von europäischen Affiliationsnetzwerkdaten und von EU-Informationsflüssen werden dabei in der Studie ausführlich dokumentiert. Die Relevanz dieser Methoden zur Analyse von EU-Politik wird ebenfalls im Detail dargelegt. Zusammenfassend legt diese Doktorarbeit die Grundlage für eine neue Art, europäische und transnationale politische Prozesse in Europa zu untersuchen. Sie verbinden thematische und methodische Ansätze – zum Beispiel Affiliationsnetzwerkanalyse und die Untersuchung des EU-Ausschusswesens – die bislang in dieser Form noch nicht zusammengeführt wurden, und trägt dadurch auf verschiedenste Weise zur Weiterentwicklung der Politikwissenschaft und der Europastudien bei. KW - Netzwerkanalyse KW - Europäische Union KW - Informationsflüsse KW - Ausschüsse KW - Affiliationsnetzwerke KW - network analysis KW - European Union KW - information flow KW - committee governance KW - affiliation networks Y1 - 2013 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus-70732 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Paasch, Jana T1 - Revisiting policy preferences and capacities in the EU BT - Multi-level policy implementation in the subnational authorities JF - Journal of common market studies : JCMS N2 - Research on multi-level implementation of EU legislation has almost exclusively focused on the national level, while little is known about the role of subnational authorities. Nevertheless, it is a prerequisite for the functioning of the European Union that all member states and their subnational authorities apply and enforce EU legislation in due time. I address this research gap and take a closer look at the legal transposition process in the German regional states. Using a novel data set comprising detailed information on about 700 subnational measures, I show that state-level variables, such as political preferences and ministerial resources, account for variation in the timing of legal transposition and repeatedly lead to subnational delay. To conclude, the paper addresses the role of subnational authorities in the EU multi-level system and points to their interest in shaping legal transposition in order to counterbalance their loss of competences to the national level. KW - European Union KW - transposition KW - EU directives KW - implementation measures KW - subnational authorities Y1 - 2022 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1111/jcms.13286 SN - 0021-9886 SN - 1468-5965 VL - 60 IS - 3 SP - 783 EP - 800 PB - Wiley-Blackwell CY - Oxford ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Ollier, Lana A1 - Metz, Florence A1 - Nuñez-Jimenez, Alejandro A1 - Späth, Leonhard A1 - Lilliestam, Johan T1 - The European 2030 climate and energy package BT - do domestic strategy adaptations precede EU policy change? JF - Policy sciences N2 - The European Union’s 2030 climate and energy package introduced fundamental changes compared to its 2020 predecessor. These changes included a stronger focus on the internal market and an increased emphasis on technology-neutral decarbonization while simultaneously de-emphasizing the renewables target. This article investigates whether changes in domestic policy strategies of leading member states in European climate policy preceded the observed changes in EU policy. Disaggregating strategic change into changes in different elements (goals, objectives, instrumental logic), allows us to go beyond analyzing the relative prioritization of different goals, and to analyze how policy requirements for reaching those goals were dynamically redefined over time. To this end, we introduce a new method, which based on insights from social network analysis, enables us to systematically trace those strategic chances. We find that shifts in national strategies of the investigated member states preceded the shift in EU policy. In particular, countries reframed their understanding of supply security, and pushed for the internal electricity market also as a security measure to balance fluctuating renewables. Hence, the increasing focus on markets and market integration in the European 2030 package echoed the increasingly central role of the internal market for electricity supply security in national strategies. These findings also highlight that countries dynamically redefined their goals relative to the different phases of the energy transition. KW - climate and energy policy KW - policy strategy KW - European Union KW - decarbonization KW - renewable energy Y1 - 2022 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1007/s11077-022-09447-5 SN - 0032-2687 SN - 1573-0891 VL - 55 IS - 1 SP - 161 EP - 184 PB - Springer Science+Business Media LLC CY - New York ER - TY - THES A1 - Meyer, Eike T1 - Democracy promotion by the European Union in Morocco within the framework of the European Neighbourhood Policy N2 - The intention of this master-thesis is a critical assessment of the European Union´s (EU) approach to external democracy promotion in Morocco. The study follows a comparative approach and compares the approach pursued by the EU within the framework of the European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP), incepted in 2004, with the approach that it had developed up until then under the framework of the Euro-Mediterranean Partnership (EMP). The comparison is done with the intention to analyse, to what degree it is justified to speak of a new impetus for democratisation through the ENP in partner countries. The analysis takes into consideration the range of possible instruments for external democracy promotion in the categories „diplomacy“, „conditionality“ and „positive instruments“. For the comparison of democracy promotion under the EMP and the ENP it is suggested to compare the implemented measures in respect to three distinct dimensions: As a first dimension, instruments of democracy promotion are analysed with respect to the focus on indirect vs. direct instruments, e.g. those which aim at establishing socio-economic preconditions favourable to successful democratisation, vs. those which immediately intervene in the processes of political reform. As a second dimension, it is asked whether there has been a shift in the democracy promotion approach on a continuum between consensual cooptation and coercive intervention. As a third dimension, finally, it is analysed whether the approach has undergone a general intensification of efforts, e.g. whether the approach to democracy promotion has become a more active one. The analysis in this master-thesis comes to the conclusion that since the inception of the ENP the EU is indeed pursuing a slightly more direct and certainly a more active approach to democracy promotion in Morocco, while no significant change can be observed in comparison to the strictly partnership-oriented and consensual approach of the EMP. It can be argued that, under the ENP, relations to Morocco have indeed become somewhat more “political”, although at the same time they are still not pro-actively oriented at a political liberalisation of the political regime. Reforms promoted by the EU in Morocco are modest and largely in line with the reform agenda of the Morrocan government itself – e.g. a still largely authoritarian monarchy. Concrete reform steps directed at an opening of the political space, which is largely reserved to the king and its administration, are neither demanded nor supported by democracy promotion instruments, also under the ENP. N2 - Die vorliegende Diplomarbeit untersucht den Ansatz der Europäischen Union (EU) zur Demokratieförderung in Marokko. Die Arbeit folgt einem vergleichenden Ansatz und vergleicht die Strategie der EU, die unter der 2004 ins Leben gerufenen „Europäischen Nachbarschaftspolitik“ (ENP) verfolgt wird, mit der, die sich bis dahin unter der „Euro-Mediterranen Partnerschaft“ (EMP) herauskristallisiert hatte. Der Vergleich wird mit dem Ziel durchgeführt herauszuarbeiten, inwiefern es berechtigt ist, neue Triebkraft und neue Anstöße für Demokratisierung durch die ENP zu erwarten. In der Arbeit werden alle Instrumente der Demokratieförderung berücksichtigt, die in die Kategorien Diplomatie, Konditionalität und positive Unterstützungsleistungen fallen. Die durchgeführten Maßnahmen werden auf drei Ebenen verglichen: Auf der ersten Ebene wird untersucht, ob sich der Schwerpunkt verschoben hat zwischen indirekten Maßnahmen, die insbesondere darauf zielen, die sozioökonomischen Voraussetzungen für erfolgreiche Demokratisierung zu schaffen, und direkten Maßnahmen, die unmittelbar in politische Reformprozesse eingreifen. Auf einer zweiten Ebene wird gefragt, ob sich der Ansatz der Demokratieförderung auf einem Kontinuum zwischen Konsens und Zwang verschoben hat. Auf einer dritten Ebene schließlich wird untersucht, ob sich das Engagement generell intensiviert hat und der Ansatz der Demokratieförderung aktiver geworden ist. Die Analyse in dieser Arbeit führt zu dem Ergebnis, dass seit der Initiierung der ENP tatsächlich ein leicht direkterer und aktiverer Ansatz verfolgt wird, während sich an dem streng partnerschaftlichen und auf Konsens ausgerichteten Ansatz der EMP nicht signifikant etwas verändert hat. Es wird jedoch auch deutlich, dass politische Reformen von Instrumenten der Demokratieförderung zwar häufiger anvisiert werden. Die Reformen, die von der EU gefördert werden, sind jedoch ausschließlich Teil des von der marokkanischen Regierung eingeleiteten und begrenzten Reformprozesses. Reformen die eine signifikante Öffnung des politischen Raumes bewirken könnten, der für die autoritäre Monarchie reserviert ist, werden auch im Rahmen der ENP von der EU weder gefördert noch gefordert. KW - Demokratieförderung KW - Europäische Union KW - Marokko KW - Europäische Außenpolitik KW - Europäische Nachbarschaftspolitik KW - Democracy Promotion KW - European Union KW - Morocco KW - European Foreign Policy KW - European Neighbourhood Policy Y1 - 2007 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus-19591 ER -