Governance, Coordination and Evaluation: the case for an epistemological focus and a return to C.E. Lindblom

While much political science research focuses on conceptualizing and analyzing various forms of governance, there remains a need to develop frameworks and criteria for governance evaluation (Torfing et al 2012). The post-positivist turn, influential in recent governance theory, emphasizes the complexity, uncertainty and the contested normative dimensions of policy analysis. Yet a central evaluative question still arises concerning the capacity of governance networks to facilitate ‘coordination’. The classic contributions of Charles Lindblom, although pre-dating the contemporary governance literature, can enable further elaboration of and engagement with this question. Lindblom’s conceptualisation of coordination challenges in the face of complexity shares with post-positivism a recognition of the inevitably contested nature of policy goals. Yet Lindblom suggests a closer focus on the complex, dynamically evolving, broadly ‘economic’ choices and trade-offs involved in defining and delivery policy for enabling these goals to be achieved and the significant epistemological challenges that they raise for policy-makers. This focus can complement and enrich both post-positivist scholarship and the process and incentives-orientated approaches which predominate in contemporary political science research on coordination in governance. This is briefly illustrated through a short case study evaluating governance for steering markets towards delivering low and zero carbon homes in England

Legitimacy through Subsidiarity? The Parliamentary Control of EU Policy-Making

This article explains the relationship between subsidiarity and legitimacy of policies designed at EU level. Through means of theoretically informed analysis this paper claims that if the principle of subsidiarity is respected and implemented throughout the policy process, EU policy-making can aspire to satisfy the condition of both input and output legitimacy. The empirical part of the paper shows how, through a subsidiarity control mechanism known as the Early Warning System, national parliaments can collectively fulfill representative and deliberative functions in EU policy-making. Conclusions about the changing dynamics in parliamentary modus operandi in the field of EU affairs lead to forming a set of recommendations for further research

Classical Liberalism, Non-interventionism and the Origins of European Integration: Luigi Einaudi, Friedrich A. von Hayek, Wilhelm Röpke

What did classical liberal thinkers contribute to the theoretical underpinnings of the European unification project? This paper examines works by Luigi Einaudi, Friedrich A. von Hayek and Wilhelm Röpke, attempting to understand to what extent the nineteenth-century pacifist tradition of classical liberalism came back to life in works of these authors. Their views on the international order show a certain degree of homogeneity—but up to a point. While Einaudi and Hayek were distinctively more favourable to the European project, Röpke had a less favourable view of European unificaton, fearing it may result in increasing centralisation. They, nonetheless, shared some common elements in understanding international order that we trace back to nineteenth-century liberalism.2reservedmixedMasala, Antonio; Mingardi, AlbertoMasala, Antonio; Mingardi, Albert