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Commission Entrepreneurship and the Debasing of Social Europe Before and After the Eurocrisis

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  • Amandine Crespy
  • Georg Menz

Abstract

The bulk of the literature on ‘social Europe’ has suggested that social policy at the level of the EU remains to be characterized by the interplay of courts and markets. While we do not disagree with this argument, our objective is to shed light on the European Commission's entrepreneurship, an element which appears to be somewhat bereft of scholarly attention. We show how, by displaying social acuity, defining problems and building teams, the Commission has actively promoted a policy agenda focused on liberal market building at the expense of socially minded regulation. This was however only made possible by a new constellation among the Member States after 2004. We substantiate this claim by documenting the activity of the Commission in two crucial policy domains of the post-Lisbon era: the liberalization of service provision, and the impact of the new macro-economic governance on social policy after the financial and debt crisis.

Suggested Citation

  • Amandine Crespy & Georg Menz, 2015. "Commission Entrepreneurship and the Debasing of Social Europe Before and After the Eurocrisis," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 53(4), pages 753-768, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:jcmkts:v:53:y:2015:i:4:p:753-768
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    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1111/jcms.12241
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Mikkel Mailand, 2013. "Slowing down Social Europe? The struggle over work and employment regulation," Industrial Relations Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 44(3), pages 240-257, May.
    2. repec:bla:jcmkts:v:48:y:2010:i::p:1307-1327 is not listed on IDEAS
    3. repec:bla:jcmkts:v:46:y:2008:i::p:293-313 is not listed on IDEAS
    4. Caporaso, James A. & Tarrow, Sidney, 2009. "Polanyi in Brussels: Supranational Institutions and the Transnational Embedding of Markets," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 63(4), pages 593-620, October.
    5. Nicole Lindstrom, 2010. "Service Liberalization in the Enlarged EU: A Race to the Bottom or the Emergence of Transnational Political Conflict?," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 48(5), pages 1307-1327, November.
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    Cited by:

    1. Beatrice Carella & Paolo Graziano, 2022. "Back to the Future in EU Social Policy? Endogenous Critical Junctures and the Case of the European Pillar of Social Rights," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 60(2), pages 374-390, March.
    2. Volintiru Mihai, 2018. "The internalization context of private health service providers in Europe: Romanian market case study," Proceedings of the International Conference on Business Excellence, Sciendo, vol. 12(1), pages 1038-1047, May.
    3. Paul Copeland, 2023. "Poverty and social exclusion in the EU: third-order priorities, hybrid governance and the future potential of the field," Transfer: European Review of Labour and Research, , vol. 29(2), pages 219-233, May.
    4. Sandrino Smeets & Alenka Jaschke & Derek Beach, 2019. "The Role of the EU Institutions in Establishing the European Stability Mechanism: Institutional Leadership under a Veil of Intergovernmentalism," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 57(4), pages 675-691, July.
    5. Guglielmo Meardi, 2018. "Economic Integration and State Responses: Change in European Industrial Relations since Maastricht," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 56(3), pages 631-655, September.
    6. John Peterson, 2017. "Juncker's political European Commission and an EU in crisis," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 55(2), pages 349-367, March.
    7. Alberto Arenal & Claudio Feijoo & Ana Moreno & Sergio Ramos & Cristina Armuña, 2021. "Entrepreneurship Policy Agenda in the European Union: A Text Mining Perspective," Review of Policy Research, Policy Studies Organization, vol. 38(2), pages 243-271, March.
    8. Bernhard Zeilinger, 2021. "The European Commission as a Policy Entrepreneur under the European Semester," Politics and Governance, Cogitatio Press, vol. 9(3), pages 63-73.
    9. Ana Paula Brandão & Isabel Camisão, 2022. "Playing the Market Card: The Commission's Strategy to Shape EU Cybersecurity Policy," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 60(5), pages 1335-1355, September.
    10. Javier Bilbao-Ubillos, 2023. "The Social Dimension of the European Union: A Means to lock out Social Competition?," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 165(1), pages 267-281, January.
    11. Paul Copeland, 2022. "The Juncker Commission as a Politicising Bricoleur and the Renewed Momentum in Social Europe," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 60(6), pages 1629-1644, November.
    12. Mikkel Mailand, 2021. "Commission entrepreneurship and EU employment policy – The fate of a former darling," European Journal of Industrial Relations, , vol. 27(3), pages 249-267, September.
    13. Anna Elomäki & Johanna Kantola, 2020. "European Social Partners as Gender Equality Actors in EU Social and Economic Governance," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 58(4), pages 999-1015, July.

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