Slowing down Social Europe? The role of coalitions and decision-making arenas
Report 5 - summary report
Research paper by Mikkel Mailand and Jens Arnholtz
The analysis of the eight cases of EU-level decision-making from the second half of the 2000s within three work and employment related areas shows that the expected impact in the form of a weakening or a ‘slowing down of Social Europe’ is seen in only three of eight cases analysed, and some of these only to a limited extent. None of the two cases in the employee involvement area – the revision of the European Works Council directive and the European Private Company initiative - marked a general weakening of Social Europe, although the pro-regulation actors did far from obtain all their goals in any of the cases. In the employment area the employment policy parts of the Lisbon revision and the Europe 2020 shows signs of a weakening of Social Europe, but only to a limited extent and less so than expected. The third case, the common European flexicurity guidelines, included so many concessions to the pro-regulation actors that it could not be seen as weakening Social Europe. In the posting area, the Laval quartet itself has seriously weakened Social Europe, and the response (the case analysed here) has not yet come. The two other cases, the temporary work directive and the Service directive, do not represent weakening of Social Europe.
The weakening of Social Europe is less widespread than expected and this can be explained by especially two factors. The first is actor/action oriented: Successful resistance and ad hoc coalition-building from pro-regulation actors. The second factor is institutional and has to do with the institutional set-up. A certain form of organisational inertia linked to the actors’ search for legitimacy, especially the Commission’s need for a stronger social profile in order to be reappointed. Regarding the role of the coalitions, these seem only to have been playing a role in some of the cases. In general, coalitions seem less stable and solid than described in the previous research. Two possible explanations can be suggested. One explanation could be that the weakening of the pro-regulation actors has weakened their capacity to maintaining a coalition too - and this to such an extent that it is not able to mobilize for new initiatives for Social Europe or organize more than partial and ad hoc resistance on attempts to weaken Social Europe. Contributing to this development might be that a number of the new member states are not easily placed within the two coalitions, although these member states governments on average tend to take more regulation sceptical positions than the old member states. What has replaced the clear cut coalitions are actors that to a larger extent than before defend their own national model and national interests on an ad hoc basis.
It is important to add, that the cases do not include the most recent developments at EU-level.
Read also the four other research papers as well as an article published as part of the same project:
Report 1: Theory, literature review and methods
Report 2: The area of employee involvement
Report 3: The employment policy area
Report 4: The posting of workers issue
Article in Industrial Relations Journal: Slowing down Social Europe? The struggle over work and employment regulation