Suchergebnisse

This article analyzes the literature on procedural models of European Union politics. We present an overview of the main models of the legislative procedures, with a focus on their relevance to European Union politics and the literature today. We discuss early controversies in the literature and examine the empirical research that tested the models. Furthermore, we consider models of other aspects of policy-making in the European Union. Finally, we discuss the literature's main contributions and principal shortcomings and formulate suggestions for improvement. We argue that the models contribute greatly to our understanding of European Union politics, offer clear predictions regarding policies, institutions' powers, and the extent of gridlock and have sparked extensive empirical research. The models of consultation and codecision can serve as standard models of unicameral legislatures with an agenda setter and bicameral legislatures with bargaining between the two chambers, respectively. Moreover, they contribute to the study of the implications of institutional reform.

Forecasting plays an increasingly important role in the scientific study of European Union politics and in political science in general. This is because forecasts are not only indispensable for (political) actors who need to form expectations about future events, but can also be used to judge the validity of (competing) theoretical models. While the debate about whether political science should engage in forecasting is largely over, many questions about how this should be done in everyday research are still open. One of these is how forecasts of political time series can be derived from theoretical models. Using a practical example from European Union research, we start to address this question. We first show how forecasts of political time series can be derived from both theoretical and atheoretical models. Subsequently, we use an atheoretical time series (ARMA) imputation approach to demonstrate how they can be fruitfully integrated in order to overcome some of the limitations to making forecasts of political time series which are based on theoretical models.

The implementation of European Union directives into national law frequently triggers extensive parliamentary activities, especially if they are complex, salient, and conflictive. These activities can cause delayed transposition. The literature suggests that early parliamentary involvement may speed up the subsequent transposition process. In this article, it is argued theoretically and empirically shown that this hope is only fulfilled where parliaments are sufficiently strong. On the empirical side, the article looks at the effect of ex-ante scrutiny on the duration of the transposition of more than 650 directives in four weak parliaments as well as in four strong parliaments. It is found that an early involvement of strong parliaments may speed up transposition. By contrast, weak parliaments' early engagement with EU directives may even cause a further delay of the transposition process.

According to the 'opposition deficit thesis' European Union politics is characterized by a conspicuous absence of opposition to the policies promoted by the EU. However, once we start looking for systematic evidence supporting the claim of an opposition deficit in EU politics, we come up surprisingly empty handed. This article seeks to rectify the lacuna in previous research by examining how much and what type of opposition actually exist in EU politics. The study formulates four hypotheses on the state of political opposition in EU politics, and breaks new ground by testing their validity by use of unique data collected from the Swedish European Affairs Committee for the period 1995–2016. The results show there is in fact considerably more opposition present in EU politics than has previously been assumed. The opposition deficit thesis thus seems to be more myth than reality.

How provinces effectively negotiated their European interests before Austria's admission to the European Union; with comparisons to regional government in Germany and other nations.

AbstractAccording to the 'opposition deficit thesis' European Union politics is characterized by a conspicuous absence of opposition to the policies promoted by the EU. However, once we start looking for systematic evidence supporting the claim of an opposition deficit in EU politics, we come up surprisingly empty handed. This article seeks to rectify the lacuna in previous research by examining how much and what type of opposition actually exist in EU politics. The study formulates four hypotheses on the state of political opposition in EU politics, and breaks new ground by testing their validity by use of unique data collected from the Swedish European Affairs Committee for the period 1995–2016. The results show there is in fact considerably more opposition present in EU politics than has previously been assumed. The opposition deficit thesis thus seems to be more myth than reality.

WHEREAS OTHER SUB-NATIONAL GOVERNMENTS HAVE HAD TO CONSTRUCT RESPONSES TO THE CHALLENGES OF EUREOPAN INTEGRATION IN REACTION TO ONGOING DEVELOPMENTS IN THE INTEGRATION PROCESS, THE AUSTRIAN LANDER NEGOTIATED CHANNELS OF EUROPEAN POLICY INPUT BEFORE AUSTRIAN ACCESSION TO THE UNION. THIS ARTICLE SETS OUT WHAT THEY ACHIEVED. THEY HAVE SECURED EXTENSIVE RIGHTS OF INPUT, ALONG WITH A STRONG BASE IN BRUSSELS, BOTH LARGELY MODELED ON THE EXAMPLE SET BY THE GERMAN LANDER. IT IS CLEAR THAT THE AUSTRIAN LANDER HAVE SETTLED ON A SELECTIVELY FOCUSED MOBILIZATION OF THEIR RIGHTS.

When EU member states signed the Treaty of Lisbon in 2007, they did not anticipate the manifold crises in store for them over the following years. Instead of the intended consolidation of a Union which had just gone through its most profound modernisation and biggest round of enlargements, the EU has since then had to weather a wide range of political, economic, social, legal, health and even military crises with major repercussions within and beyond its own territory. Indeed, this time of polycrisis has induced change on many levels: Across the continent and its many fora of European supra-, trans- and international collaboration, established institutions, rule systems and normative frameworks have been put into question and power balances have been shifting. Against this background, actors from social, political, economic and cultural life have sought new ways to overcome the manifold pressing problems of their time, be it through intensified collaboration or attempts to increasingly resolve issues at the national level. This volume offers a compilation of case studies on EU crisis responses, covering the most impactful of the various crises the EU has had to face in recent years. It provides theoretical and conceptual guidelines for the study of political actors' responses to crisis at all levels of the EU multilevel governance system and beyond