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The article explores the question of how the EC and several European governments almost simultaneously launched research and technological development (RTD) programmes during the 1980s. It is suggested that RTD policy processes within the EC and individual states were linked to each other in a European policy process, and that the convergence of such policies was a function of policy diffusion. An analytical approach of policy diffusion is outlined in order to study the linkages between national and EU policy processes. A policy diffusion perspective, which entails how policies are formed in a communication between various national political-administrative systems, can be seen as an important contribution to the study of the dynamics behind the European integration process. It is suggested that the OECD, with its informal and non-hierarchical cooperation structure, is an important condition for policy diffusion, and that this type of cooperation can also be found within the EU. The EU, which can be characterized as a type of multilevel governance, enhances communication between national political-administrative systems and thus the processes of policy diffusion.

There has been rapid proliferation of public-private partnerships in areas of human rights, environmental protection and development in global governance. This book demonstrates how different forms of partnership legitimacy and accountability interact, and pinpoints trade-offs between democratic values in partnership operations

There has been a rapid proliferation of public₆private partnerships in the areas of human rights, environmental protection and global governance. Consequently, private actors such as non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and transnational companies have gained increasing authority in both public policy and regulation. Research into the democratic legitimacy of how these arrangements span the public-private divide is still in its infancy. However, this book furthers our understanding of how different forms of legitimacy and accountability interact, and highlights trade-offs between democratic values in partnership operations. It places the partnership trend in the context of broader theoretical discussion and explores a variety of tensions between, for instance, hierarchies and markets, the common good and private profit, and government and governance. In addition, the book presents research into global and national partnerships, particularly with regard to their democratic credentials.

Allowing private companies to de facto exercise legal authority is becoming increasingly common in several countries. Externalizing legal authority is sustained by a discourse replacing a conventional institutional approach to law enforcement with a functional approach where the agent is less important than efficiency and expected outcomes. Drawing on two brief case studies in Sweden—automobile inspections and reviews of international financial transactions—we argue that legal authority is transferred to for-profit actors with only a minimum of safeguards and accountability. For-profit actors are legal authority insiders but outsiders in the democratic chain of accountability.