Education policy and the European Semester: challenging soft power in hard times

Education policy is a national competence within European Union rules, and therefore the responsibility of national governments. However, encouraging education policy co-ordination across Member States, and developing a European education ‘policy space’ has always been a feature of EU activity. In this chapter we demonstrate how the EU’s economic governance structures, known as the European Semester, introduced after the 2008 financial crisis have developed to include a significant role for developing European education policy. We identify the need to ‘open up’ the European Semester to more democratic influences and show how education unions across Europe are working to ensure the Semester promotes socially just and democratically accountable public education.