European Policy Analysis最新文献

{"title":"Networks and perception in European policymaking","authors":"Nils C. Bandelow,&nbsp;Johanna Hornung,&nbsp;Fritz Sager,&nbsp;Ilana Schröder","doi":"10.1002/epa2.1218","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1002/epa2.1218","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Summer is the time for conferences and the release of new journal rankings. For the editorial teams of journals specializing in policy process research, including European Policy Analysis (EPA), both are interconnected. Ideally, they both help to increase the chances of attracting more high-quality submissions and special issues, while also promoting the journal among readers and reviewers.</p><p>The citation scores for 2023 remained very high for EPA. Both in the Web of Science and Scopus, the journal is ranked in Q1 of the political science category. Our new Impact Factor (IF) is 2.7, which positions us at 56/317 in Political Science and 23/91 in Public Administration. In Scopus, we have an outstanding CiteScore of 9.7, placing us at 9/706 in Political Science and International Relations, and 11/232 in Public Administration. These figures are, of course, situational and will fluctuate frequently; they likely say little about the actual quality of the journal. However, we hope they contribute to attracting more interest in the journal, thereby helping us to firmly establish EPA as a leading journal for European perspectives in policy process research.</p><p>Relevant conferences in both political science and public policy are also very helpful in this regard. We engage in regular exchanges with the editorial teams of other journals to discuss new challenges. These include formal developments such as open access, the rapid advancements in artificial intelligence, and possible reactions from commercial publishers and professional associations, all of which we must address. Simultaneously, there are exciting substantive developments in our field. These include new approaches and methods for understanding networks in policymaking, which are particularly intriguing in the diverse European countries and the European Union (EU) multi-level system. Are there European perspectives and knowledge from which the international policy process community can benefit? The freely submitted contributions in this issue make important contributions in this regard and will hopefully generate significant interest.</p><p>Capano et al. (<span>2024</span>) investigate a question of fundamental importance to current policy process research: What constitutes political networks? What are the motives for cooperation between policy actors, and what role do coalitions between actors play in policy-making? Policy process research has developed and tested a variety of perspectives on specific cases of collaboration (Guo, <span>2022</span>; Ingold et al., <span>2021</span>; Möck, <span>2021</span>). This paper draws on three perspectives and examines their explanatory power through the example of two networks of administrative reform in Italy. What do we find in these networks? Are they more akin to policy communities, which are stable coalitions of heterogeneous actors with a common interest to frame the policy discourse (Jordan, <span>1990</span>; Miller &amp; Demir, <span>20","PeriodicalId":52190,"journal":{"name":"European Policy Analysis","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":2.7,"publicationDate":"2024-08-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1002/epa2.1218","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141980169","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Assessing policy capacity and policy effectiveness: A comparative study using sustainable governance indicators","authors":"Rameen Khan, Fiaz Hussain","doi":"10.1002/epa2.1217","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1002/epa2.1217","url":null,"abstract":"Policy capacity is vital for a nation's prosperity and sustainability, enabling governments to fulfill diverse responsibilities, such as security, economic growth, and accountable governance. This study evaluates policy capacity across countries from 2014 to 2020 using Sustainable Governance Indicators by the Bertelsmann Foundation. Focusing on executive capacity, which encompasses policy capacity's analytical, managerial, and political aspects, we gauge governments' ability to implement sustainable policies. Executive capacity is further classified into steering capability, policy implementation, and institutional learning. Findings show that policy capacity significantly influences policy effectiveness in all countries, with high‐capacity countries demonstrating more impact. Enhancing policy capacity through efficient steering, implementation, and learning can improve policy effectiveness and foster responsive governance for sustainable development. This research provides valuable insights for policymakers seeking to bolster governance capacities and achieve positive policy outcomes.","PeriodicalId":52190,"journal":{"name":"European Policy Analysis","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":2.7,"publicationDate":"2024-07-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141799788","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Is who they are, what they prefer? Understanding bureaucratic elites' policy preferences for European integration of government accounting","authors":"Pascal Horni","doi":"10.1002/epa2.1215","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1002/epa2.1215","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Bureaucratic elites and national public administrations' experts play a key role in the preparation of supranational policies and in shaping global governance instruments. However, we know surprisingly little about what factors drive their preferences and support for supranational solutions. Drawing on the results of a vignette and conjoint experiment and the case of the European Commission's policy initiative to develop European Public Sector Accounting Standards, this study analyzes the effect of the communicative framing of a policy's objective and how experts' attitudes influence their preferences for policy outcomes. The study shows that the communicative framing of a policy's objective based on functional needs rather than on normative grounds increases support among national administrations' experts. Moreover, the study finds evidence that experts who internalized a public service motivation and those with a supranationalist collective identity are more willing to give up national sovereignty in favor of supranational policy solutions.</p>","PeriodicalId":52190,"journal":{"name":"European Policy Analysis","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":2.7,"publicationDate":"2024-06-17","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1002/epa2.1215","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141980343","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Explaining differences in policy learning in the EU \"Fit for 55” climate policy package","authors":"Fredrik von Malmborg","doi":"10.1002/epa2.1210","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1002/epa2.1210","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Through learning, policy actors can maintain, reinforce, or revise their beliefs and positions about the design and outcomes of policies. This paper critically analyzes factors influencing policy learning by comparing policy processes of two EU laws of the recent “Fit for 55” climate package: (i) revised provisions on increasing energy efficiency in companies included in the recast Energy Efficiency Directive and (ii) the new FuelEU Maritime regulation provided for decarbonizing maritime shipping. Learning across coalitions with competing beliefs was encountered in the first case but not in the other despite similar institutional settings. The difference is attributed to a more politicized debate on decarbonizing shipping, leading to consensus through bargaining instead of deliberation, and a circumscribed leader of one coalition, with a less flexible negotiation mandate. The paper adds to the theory on policy learning, suggesting that levels of politicization and polarization, as well as the mandates of the coalition leaders, influence cross-coalition learning.</p>","PeriodicalId":52190,"journal":{"name":"European Policy Analysis","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":2.7,"publicationDate":"2024-05-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1002/epa2.1210","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141980460","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Discourses and bottom-up policymaking in Europe and the EU","authors":"Nils C. Bandelow,&nbsp;Johanna Hornung,&nbsp;Fritz Sager,&nbsp;Ilana Schröder","doi":"10.1002/epa2.1209","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1002/epa2.1209","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Artificial intelligence (AI), climate change, COVID-19, financial budgets, religion and state in Israel—the challenges that the EU and countries in Europe face today seem to increase rather than decrease. This EPA issue includes contributions that show the extent of diversity with which European policy research deals with these topics. The articles draw from different theoretical and/or methodological approaches to analyze the capacity of European governments and the EU in governing these challenges, the ideas and discourses that emerge around them, and the role that bureaucrats and citizens play in bottom-up processes.</p><p>AI is the newest among the mentioned challenges and is subject to increased attention in public policy research. Several articles tackle AI by analyzing the national or global governance of AI technologies (Büthe et al., <span>2022</span>; Erman &amp; Furendal, <span>2022</span>; Radu, <span>2021</span>; Robles &amp; Mallinson, <span>2023b</span>; Taeihagh, <span>2021</span>; Ulnicane &amp; Erkkilä, <span>2023</span>), including the setting of standards (von Ingersleben-Seip, <span>2023</span>), the perceptions by citizens and relevance of public trust (Ingrams et al., <span>2021</span>; Robles &amp; Mallinson, <span>2023a</span>; Schiff et al., <span>2023</span>) or the impact of AI “on the ground” (Brunn et al., <span>2020</span>; Selten et al., <span>2023</span>). Following this recent rise in interest in AI, Lemke et al. (<span>2024</span>) tie in with a contribution that methodologically relies on discourse analysis (Newman &amp; Mintrom, <span>2023</span>) and opens this issue by a comprehensive depiction of the German discourse on AI. Their systematic analysis includes 6421 statements from various relevant stakeholders with a focus on how AI is defined and framed as a policy problem. Thereby, the analysis underpins that AI is (still) perceived as an issue primarily related to technology and, hence, placed in the policy sector of technology and innovation. It is thus not an issue where questions around civil rights, labor, or education dominate, although the multitude of stakeholders framing and defining the problem increases uncertainty in problem definition. Furthermore, the discourse highlights the need for international cooperation.</p><p>With Germany being a large European country with a central role in the European Union (EU), such emphasis of international cooperation also refers to joint endeavors at a European level. However, to be able to address problems that concern Europe, the EU must have the necessary leverage, and members states must also comply with adopted laws—which is often not the case (Brendler &amp; Thomann, <span>2023</span>; Heidbreder, <span>2017</span>; Kriegmair et al., <span>2022</span>; Thomann &amp; Sager, <span>2017</span>). Clinton and Arregui (<span>2024</span>) look into these infringements of EU law at local and regional levels of EU members states to identify explanations for why","PeriodicalId":52190,"journal":{"name":"European Policy Analysis","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":5.0,"publicationDate":"2024-05-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1002/epa2.1209","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141084972","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Enabling free movement but restricting domestic policy space? The price of mutual recognition","authors":"Jasmin Zöllmer,&nbsp;Harald Grethe","doi":"10.1002/epa2.1208","DOIUrl":"10.1002/epa2.1208","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Free movement of goods within the EU is guaranteed via mutual recognition: any product lawfully produced in one member state must also be accepted in all other member states. While unleashing economic benefits from trade without regulatory barriers, mutual recognition potentially limits member states' ability to address societal concerns with regard to production conditions. This hypothesis is addressed via the case of farm animal welfare in Germany, combining a thorough policy analysis with 20 elite interviews. The results demonstrate how the discourse of inner-European competition has discouraged policymakers to adopt stricter legislation over the past three decades, exemplifying the impeding effect of mutual recognition on member states' policies. Understanding these mechanisms is vital for handling regulatory diversity within integrated markets and offers insights into similar policy areas. This research contributes to the broader issue of national sustainability standards in a globalized world, where collective preferences increasingly collide with economic goals.</p>","PeriodicalId":52190,"journal":{"name":"European Policy Analysis","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":2.7,"publicationDate":"2024-04-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1002/epa2.1208","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140672293","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Who is to blame? Stories of European Union migration governance in Italian, Maltese, and Spanish newspapers","authors":"Martina Abisso,&nbsp;Andrea Terlizzi,&nbsp;Eugenio Cusumano","doi":"10.1002/epa2.1207","DOIUrl":"10.1002/epa2.1207","url":null,"abstract":"<p>While scholars have investigated how media frame human mobility and securitize irregular border crossings, little research has been dedicated to how European Union (EU) actors are portrayed in media coverage of migration across the Mediterranean. By integrating framing into narrative analysis through the Narrative Policy Framework, our article fills this gap. Specifically, we provide a content analysis of Italian, Maltese, and Spanish newspapers and identify the key narratives underlying the portrayal of specific EU actors. We show that, overall, lack of EU solidarity is the prevalent issue in Italian, Maltese, and Spanish newspapers alike, followed by the alleged inefficiency of EU actors. Accordingly, the EU and its key actors are regularly narrated as either villains, responsible for the crisis and deserting member states in need of solidarity, or as weaklings unable to take effective action. These narratives appear remarkably consistent across countries, over time, and newspapers with different ideological orientation.</p>","PeriodicalId":52190,"journal":{"name":"European Policy Analysis","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":2.7,"publicationDate":"2024-03-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1002/epa2.1207","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140378821","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Identifying causal mechanisms of unexpected policy change: Accumulated punctuation in the field of lobbying transparency in Germany","authors":"Maximilian Schiffers,&nbsp;Sandra Plümer","doi":"10.1002/epa2.1205","DOIUrl":"10.1002/epa2.1205","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Recent trends toward mechanistic approaches offer a new perspective in understanding policy change and stability. This paper analyzes causal mechanisms leading to unexpected policy change by using punctuated equilibrium theory. As empirical illustration, the paper presents a case study on the introduction of the German mandatory lobbying register in 2021 after a 16-year-long debate. Methodologically, the paper employs process tracing and qualitative content analysis to examine policy documents. We identify a combination of three mechanisms: end of a de-thematization of the policy issue, growing dominance of the issue network favoring stricter transparency regulations, and issue validation through the accumulation of scandals. Thus, policy change results from the descend of policy actors defending the status quo while those advocating for change ascend to an influential position, and actively exploit focusing events as fertile ground for reform. The paper contributes to a refined theoretical understanding of the causal mechanisms of policy change.</p>","PeriodicalId":52190,"journal":{"name":"European Policy Analysis","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":2.7,"publicationDate":"2024-02-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1002/epa2.1205","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140418479","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Assessing the types of policy networks in policymaking: Empirical evidence from administrative reform in Italy","authors":"Giliberto Capano,&nbsp;Eleonora Erittu,&nbsp;Giulio Francisci,&nbsp;Alessandro Natalini","doi":"10.1002/epa2.1204","DOIUrl":"10.1002/epa2.1204","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Policy networks can propose solutions (policy communities, and epistemic communities), defend specific instruments (instrument constituencies), and programmatically prioritize change or stability (programmatic groups). This paper focuses on two specific networks that have been present in 30 years of administrative reform in Italy, and it empirically assesses what type of network they are according to their origins, developments over time, membership and motivations to stay together, and role in the policymaking. This comparison, while improving the current understanding of the networking taking place in the Italian administrative reform, shows that if policy networks are very relevant in the policy process, it is analytically more fruitful and empirically more reliable to assess their characteristics empirically, rather than to assume their existence in advance (and make hypotheses on this basis) or to use the concept in a purely metaphorical manner.</p>","PeriodicalId":52190,"journal":{"name":"European Policy Analysis","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":2.7,"publicationDate":"2024-02-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140417917","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Mind the gap! The role of health policy capacity and vaccination acceptance in European Covid-19 mortality differences","authors":"Beáta Farkas,&nbsp;Tamás Attila Rácz","doi":"10.1002/epa2.1206","DOIUrl":"10.1002/epa2.1206","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Two years of the Covid-19 pandemic caused significantly different death tolls in European countries. Nine of the 30 countries with the highest accumulated fatalities belong to Central and Eastern Europe, although the solidarity of the European Union (EU) provided vaccines for all member states. Using correlation and cluster analysis, this paper identifies the demographic, social, and political factors which can explain the differences. As generally accepted in the literature, the death toll is measured by the number of excess deaths. The examination separates the prevaccination and vaccination periods. While the impact of other factors is also present, vaccination coverage has a salient explanatory role in the excess deaths of the second period. The experiences of the Covid-19 pandemic simultaneously highlight the importance and sociopolitical constraints of health policy at the European level. The analysis confirms that complementary competences between the European and national levels are adequate for the EU health policy.</p>","PeriodicalId":52190,"journal":{"name":"European Policy Analysis","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":5.0,"publicationDate":"2024-02-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140432745","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}