Suchergebnisse

1. Introduction : EU presidencies between politics and administration -- 2. The early preparations phase : creating the foundation for the EU presidencies -- 3. The intensive preparations phase : putting the EU presidencies on track -- 4. The execution phase : managing the presidencies -- 5. The evaluation phase : transfer to the next membe state and lessons learned from the presidencies -- 6. Conclusions.

AbstractHow does the European Central Bank (ECB) legitimise its decisions and monetary policy programmes in the period from 2009 to 2021 in terms of input, throughput and output legitimacy? This article contains an answer to this important question based on a content analysis of speeches made by the presidents of the ECB. Ideally, the institution is founded on its independence and therefore cannot maintain legitimacy through public influence. This article proves that there are clearly most references on output legitimacy in the ECB's legitimation strategy, showing that it highlights its results as an independent institution to compensate for its lack of democratic channels in terms of legitimacy. Generally, in times of crises, there is an increase in frequency of references to legitimacy. During these periods, ECB actors also more frequently refer to throughput legitimacy in speeches, showing that the institution is in fact sensitive to public criticism.

AbstractOrganised policy learning among the Nordic countries—Finland, Norway, Sweden, Denmark and Iceland—has been around for more than 50 years, but it is an under‐researched subject. This article analyses the process as well as the output of policy learning among Nordic countries on adult education in networks under the auspices of the Nordic Council of Ministers. The data material consists of 10 in‐depth interviews with actors herein over a period of 2 years, as well as the few documents available. The most important results are that the policy learning process is characterised by so‐called epistemic and reflexive learning modes dominated by cooperation, inputs from science and dialogue. The output from the Nordic policy learning networks mainly consists of combining elements from other Nordic countries that are frontrunners in the relevant policy area. The output of Nordic policy learning is certainly much more than just being inspired by practices in Nordic countries. The results from the analysed networks can easily be generalised to other Nordic networks, but to a lesser extent to international policy learning networks where 'value consensus' is not as pronounced as among the Nordic countries.

AbstractThe trio Presidency function entails that Member States in groups of three are responsible for drawing up a common programme for the Council for a period of 18 months and for assisting each other. This article contributes new knowledge by focusing on the variation between four different trio Presidencies that have ended their terms since the function was launched in 2007. A typology is developed to classify past and future trio Presidencies. It is shown that there are considerable variation between past trio formations with regard to whether they follow the same objectives (scope) and how much they co‐ordinate to achieve these (depth). The observed variation is linked to the environment in which the trio Presidency operates, the individual trio members' attitude toward European integration, their territorial structuring of the state, their size, the ideology of the government and personality of the involved actors.