Institutional Adaptation to Europeanization in the State of Asymmetries: Participation of the Spanish Autonomous Communities in European Affairs_2011, Journal of US-China Public Administration (original) (raw)
Related papers
This article analyses the evolution of the institutional setting that the Spanish multilevel system provides for regional European Union (EU) adaptation, and the effects that recent developments of the EU (the Eastern enlargement, the Treaty reform process and the Euro-zone crisis) have had on the more or less pro-European positions and adaptive strategies of Spanish regions and on inter-governmental arrangements. It thus describes the increasing institutionalization of regional participation and EU policy coordination, both at the domestic and supra-national level, and the evolution of regional strategies, looking at its effects both on the degree of vertical and horizontal coordination, and the actual relative power and discretion of both levels of government. It argues that regional strategies have increasingly become more defensive and less pro-European and that increasing participation in European matters seemed to have favoured multi-lateralism and increased coordination without having produced further centralization until the recent crisis and associated budget consolidation targets induced new coordination requirements and a centralization of power towards the central government and EU authorities. This has, as a side-effect, reinforced some centrifugal tendencies of the system and therefore may affect the operation of IGR.
Federalism and Decentralization. Perceptions for Political and Institutional Reforms, 2016
The transformations experienced in the institutional balances of power in Europe in the last decades, primarily characterised by a growing co-operation at the supranational level, have been partly triggered by the increasingly strong globalisation tendencies experienced in recent years. The growing interdependence between states resulted in a strong “centrifugal” tendency in the distribution of power. The response at the state level to the loss of control of the economic and social spheres was the development of instruments of international co-operation, among which the European Union could be pointed out as the clearest example. The elaboration of a more accurate picture of the evolution of political events in Europe in recent years would require complementing the “centrifugal” tendencies with what we could call “centripetal” forces according to which people would be responding to globalisation and standardisation by reasserting local and regional identities. Although that identification with smaller territorial units of reference (generally) do not question the centrifugal tendencies affecting the economic sphere, for they do not (can not) propose viable and coherent alternatives to the growing interdependence of the global markets of goods, services, and particularly capitals, they do problematize the political scenario by bringing diversity to it. Partly in response to that demand for a bigger role for regional actors in the political sphere and in the policy-making arenas, and partly because of a search for more efficient ways of dealing with public issues, a process of decentralisation has been developed in most Western European countries. In Spain, these conflicting trends have to be understood in the context of the emergence of a multi-level governance structure built at the beginning of the 1980s with the objective of overcoming the profound legitimacy deficit of the authoritarian regime left by General Franco at his death, and within the process of transition towards a democratic regime. This whole process was conceived as a part of the pre-conditions to join the European integration process, and perceived to be the best anchor for the country as a project of liberty and prosperity. The design of a power-sharing structure between the European Union, the central government and the newly created regions proved complex, and left a large number of issue unresolved, but allowed for the consolidation of a democracy that faces now the challenge of updating its own structures to respond to the large range of problems and dysfunctionalities that have emerged over the last three decades in the running of that complex multi-level governance system.
Adaptation to Europeanization in the state of asymmetries_ US-China PA 2011
This article fits into the general debate about the effects of Europeanization on domestic institutions, the following institutional adaptation and its likely evolution towards multi-level governance. It focuses on the impact of the European Union on subnational level of government in Spain. Based on the presumption that access to European decision-making pre-judges the success of Europeanization of subnational actors, this study applies the "bottom-up" approach to Europeanization, understood as participation in the creation of European policies. Of interest here are the Spanish autonomous communities and their adaptation to institutional system of the EU based on regaining control and securing a growing role for themselves as "input-givers" in shaping and implementing EU policies affecting their competencies. On the basis of empirical analysis of subnational patterns of participation in European affairs applied in Spain, this article shows in what ways institutional and political capacity of subnational authorities to secure their interests in the EU is conditioned and limited by their formal-legal status within the Spanish constitutional system, the territorial distribution of competencies as well as the conflictuous nature of the Spanish institutional culture.
The European Union affects not only the competences of the Governments and Parliaments, but also of all public authorities, in particular the powers of sub-state entities of compound states, who saw how decisions that their governments could not adopt domestically nevertheless ended up being adopted in Europe. This affected the competences of these sub-state entities, which had no representation in Europe -or, to put it shortly, no voice and no vote. Or rather, in the expressive German phrase: the European Community had long practised Landesblindheit.
European Integration Reconsidered: Redistribution of Authority in European Union Member States
An arena in which the implications of increased subnational authority are particularly important is the European Union. In addition to the decentralization process experienced throughout Europe, the EU states also are undergoing the simultaneous process of supranational institution-building. We see increasing interest in regions and other subnational govemments and groups on the part of the EU, such as the long-standing importance placed on regional/structural policy and the recent creation of the Committee of the Regions in an advisory capacity. In turn, the emergence of subnational entities with increased political and economic power has potentially important consequences for European integration. The current paper first critiques the disparate literature that studies the transfer of governmental authority to a lower level within the nation-state. It then argues that an altemative conceptualization, "redistribution of authority", based on the institutional capacities, fu...
Institutional and geopolitical changes of the EU from the perspective of Spanish national interests
Contemporary European Studies 4, No. 2., 2009
This text deals with the period of Spain's entry and presence in the European integration project, analyzing the most relevant changes in the first and third pillar from the perspective of the Spanish national interests. The article is focused primarily on changes in the institutional position of Spain based on an analysis of the position of Madrid in negotiating particular treaties (Maastricht, Amsterdam, Nice) and priorities related to the economic integration and socioeconomic cohesion in the EU. The secondary objective is to compare PSOE and PP governments in terms of their defence of national interests.
The Impact of Soft-Europeanization on Multi-Level Governance and Domestic Balances of Power
EUSA 9th Biennial International Conference, Austin, …, 2005
Some authors argue that the process of European Integration and its effect on Member States empowered domestic sub-national levels of government. Others posit that Europeanization strengthens the national governments because they are the key players in the process of integration. These types of studies focus on the effect of legally bindingness agreements on domestic settings. Nowadays, the European Union increasingly creates a set of non-bindingness regulations, or what is referred as soft law, with the end of guiding component states and achieving a set of goals. Given that these schools of thought do not address the issue of 'bindingness, I ask-what is the effect of soft law on domestic territorial configurations? Does soft Europeanization affect domestic balances power in MSs? If so, how and why? This paper seeks to answer the former questions by studying the case of the European Employment Strategy. I suggest that non-binding instruments built on collaborative mechanisms do informally affect the balance of power between national and sub-national levels. Nevertheless, we should not expect to observe the same type of outcome (e.g., weakening or strengthening of national governments) across member States because the effect of soft law on domestic balances of power is mediated by the configuration of domestic institutions. Mainly, this paper seeks to expand the debate on the multilevel governance by directly addressing whether 'lack of bindingness' furthers or reverses the increasingly important role of sub-national entities in decision-making and policy-making in multi-tiered systems. These propositions are explored empirically using data gathered at the national level in Spain, Belgium, and Sweden. To develop the argument about sub-national involvement, I include data gathered in Madrid and the Flemish Community in Brussels. I rely primarily on more than seventy interviews conducted in these countries and on official and unofficial documents. The Impact of 'Soft-Europeanization' on Multi-Level Governance and Domestic Balances of Power "It is a matter of 'soft' policy, because what we can do is to go and instruct the national government to take into consideration the local actors" (Interview, European Union, December 2003). "The study of cross-national similarities and differences should not treat states (or nations) as unitary units. In this sense, we must include and acknowledge institutional complexities in studies of political phenomena, and stay away from a 'single level approach' " (Rose, 1973).
European Integration Studies, 2018
Subnational mobilization literature has flourished since the mid. 1990s. Regional and local authorities have tried, not always successfully, to utilize alternative channels of representation in the European Union (EU) in different policy areas and with different scope and depth. The policy areas and the degree of subnational mobilization is greatly varied contingent on exogenous -at the EU level- and endogenous -within local and regional organisational capacity- factors. Most commonly, subnational authorities (SNAs) find themselves involved in cohesion policy issues, environmental affairs, and social policy measures, mostly involved in the implementation phase. However, as the EU continuously emphasizes the importance of regional and local authorities in facilitating the European integration process, it has fuelled SNAs’ institutional ambitions and expanded their aspirations for participation in new policy areas, even in fields traditionally considered to be exercised –and monopolized–by national authorities, such as foreign policy issues. This article focuses on the role of subnational institutions in the European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP), a relatively new policy area compared to other established EU policies. (...) ... it is argued that sub-state entities have managed to expand their institutional role in new policy areas that have been traditionally monopolized by central state authorities.
THE SUBNATIONAL DIMENSION OF EUROPEANIZATION
Review of European and Comparative Law, 2020
Despite the increasing influence of European legislation on the subnational level of government and local public policy, until recently, the subnational level has played only a marginal role in exploring Europeanization processes. With the creation of the single market in the early 1990s, the process of European integration began to have a significant impact on local governments across Europe. Subsequently , the development of European regional and cohesion policy resulted in the adaptation of the political and administrative structures of the local units of the Member States. However, the impact of European integration is not one-sided. The European Union's multilevel governance system and the spread of the impact of Europeanization on interstate levels pose new challenges for European cities and local actors and enable them to actively participate and influence political decision-making processes at the European level. The main aim of the paper is to identify, explain and classify aspects of Europeanization of local self-government. Therefore, research questions include identifying the dimensions, mechanisms and adjustments that local units make under the influence of European institutions. The paper first conceptualizes the phenomenon of Europeanization and then identifies and addresses its dimensions and mechanisms in the field of local self-government. Emphasis is placed on the implementation of European