Europe´s political, social, and economic (dis-)integration: Revisiting the Elephant in times of crises. IHS Political Science Series Working Paper No. 143, October 2016

Since the outbreak of the European debt crisis, the EU has faced some of its greatest challenges to date. Discussions about the downsizing of the Eurozone, the UK exit referendum or the increasing success of EU-sceptic parties contradict the vision of an “evercloser union.” As disintegration becomes increasingly conceivable, so does our need for a conceptual understanding of the compound processes of European integration. In the present paper, European integration is understood as a bidirectional and multidimensional process. It is assumed that processes of integration and disintegration can occur simultaneously, and that their results can be measured with the help of the same indicators. Moreover, European integration is not limited to political integration: processes of integration and disintegration also proceed in the economic and social dimension. We exemplarily point out the complex relations between dynamics of integration and disintegration in its political, economic and social dimensions, and we specially focus on the causal relations between indicators of social and political integration

Europe's political, social, and economic (dis-)integration: revisiting the Elephant in times of crises

Since the outbreak of the European debt crisis, the EU has faced some of its greatest challenges to date. Discussions about the downsizing of the Eurozone, the UK exit referendum or the increasing success of EU-sceptic parties contradict the vision of an “ever-closer union.” As disintegration becomes increasingly conceivable, so does our need for a conceptual understanding of the compound processes of European integration. In the present paper, European integration is understood as a bidirectional and multidimensional process. It is assumed that processes of integration and disintegration can occur simultaneously, and that their results can be measured with the help of the same indicators. Moreover, European integration is not limited to political integration: processes of integration and disintegration also proceed in the economic and social dimension. We exemplarily point out the complex relations between dynamics of integration and disintegration in its political, economic and social dimensions, and we specially focus on the causal relations between indicators of social and political integration

More cooperation than conflict despite no ‘Third Level’? Understanding the dynamics of paradiplomacy towards the EU in Bavaria and Baden-Württemberg

This article advances new understandings of paradiplomacy in action, by reconsidering the mobilisation towards the EU of two German Länder, Bavaria and Baden-Württemberg, over a 30-year period (1992–2022). Refining its traditional usage as a catch-all concept, we deploy a novel typology of layers of paradiplomatic activity, in order to unpack the inherent dynamics of substate engagement with the EU and explore the implications of paradiplomacy on intergovernmental relations in Germany. We find little difference between Bavaria and Baden-Württemberg in the dominant mode of interaction with the federal government resulting from paradiplomacy, the cooperative mode, though modes of interaction differ across the layers of paradiplomatic activity, ranging from more active cooperation in the policy space through to benign neglect on cross-border cooperation and on regional identity promotion

The impact of European integration on constitutional policy in the German federal system

Die Studie untersucht die Auswirkungen der Einbettung des föderalen Systems in das europäische Mehrebenensystem auf die Verfassungspolitik anhand der Verhandlungen und des Ergebnisses der "Föderalismusreform I", insbesondere in den Bereichen Umweltpolitik und europapolitische Zusammenarbeit von Bund und Ländern.The paper analyzes the impact of European integration on the federal system in Germany. It focusses on the negotiations and outcomes of the "federalism reform I" (environmental policy, coordination of EU policies)

Is there a 'German school' of comparative politics? An institutional perspective

Looking at scientific research in terms of 'schools' marks an established way of evaluating larger research areas. In this paper, we deliberately use a soft concept of 'school', designed to capture possible peculiarities of the discipline of Comparative Politics in Germany, and its impact at the international level of political research. The focus of our inquiry is on three major sub-areas of comparative political studies - comparative executive politics, comparative legislative research, and comparative federalism research - which can be meaningfully subsumed under the label of institution-centred comparative political research. Moreover, we focus basically on the developments of the past decade. We find that the size of the German, or German-language, community of comparative politics has long worked to keep the pressure for German or Germany-based scholars to publish their research in English low, though the language of publication alone cannot be considered a valid indicator of either scientific excellence or parochialism. Data collected for the past decade, measuring the share of contributions by German or Germany-based scholars in the internationally leading specialist journals of the sub-areas examined, suggest that the discipline has 'opened up' and 'reached out' more recently. That said, for the time being, the German comparative politics community in the three sub-areas studied continues to be considerably stronger at the receiving end, in terms of paying reasonable attention to the theoretical and empirical developments at the international level, than at actively shaping the international debate. As in other areas, exceptions prove the rule.(VLID)460431