Tectonic Shifts of European Integration

Identifying Deliberation and Change in the Everyday Practice of Decision Making in EU's Justice and Home Affairs

Santino Lo Bianco

• Publisher: Eleven International Publishing
• Year: 2015
• eBook ISBN: 9789462743601
• Edition: 0
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Comparative Politics
• Index: Politics & International Relations

This study seeks to understand how European integration works. It examines the gradual unobtrusive changes that happen in the daily flurry of decision-making activity in the European Union (EU). Specifically, the book identifies and explains occurrences of change in the EU's police and justice cooperation. The study thereby captures the EU as an evolving polity where - in view of its institutionally dense environment - interests of a multitude of parties interacting on routine basis are more likely to intermesh, rather than compete. On the basis of three case studies, involving discourse analysis of policy documents and interviews with people from the professional field, the book captures instances where actors under given circumstances engage in deliberative discourse which induces them to shift or change their interests towards a common understanding that provides the basis for a policy outcome. The basic finding is that when arguments carry the day, negotiating parties are less inclined to take recourse to interstate or 'intergovernmental' tactics that would enable them to maximize their own national interests. One of the implications of the findings is that we need to re-evaluate the generalization that the EU is being molded and made only through interstate bargaining politics, even in policy areas where the paradigms of national statehood and sovereignty are well-established (such as justice and home affairs). It also means that the scope for Member State action to shape EU policy on an individual basis is quite limited, and that it is contingent on a wide variety of conditions operating at the day-to-day level of EU decision making. *** Librarians: ebook available [Subject: European Studies, Public Administration, Politics, Justice Studies]

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title page
• Contents
• List of Tables and Figures
• List of Abbreviations
• Preface and Acknowledgements
• 1. Introduction: origins of change in EU policies
• 2. Theories on change in European integration
• 3. Research design and methods
• 4. Negotiating the European Evidence Warrant
• 5. Negotiating access to the Visa Information Systemfor law enforcement authorities
• 6. Negotiating criminal law measures for environmentalprotection
• 7. Conclusion
• Bibliography
• Appendix 1: Overview of data sources
• Appendix 2: Coding agenda for interview transcripts
• Appendix 3: Short chronology on the EEW decision-making process
• Appendix 4: Short chronology of the VIS-Access decision-makingprocess
• Appendix 5: Short chronology of the ECD decision-making process
• Index
• Summary
• Nederlandse samenvatting