IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/zbw/mpifgd/p0081.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

From negative to positive integration? European state aid control through soft and hard law

Author

Listed:
  • Blauberger, Michael

Abstract

European state aid control, a part of competition policy, typically follows the logic of negative integration. It significantly constrains the potential for Member States to distort competition by reducing their ability to subsidize industry. In addition, this paper argues, ambiguous Treaty rules and heterogeneous Member States' preferences have enabled the European Commission to act as a supranational entrepreneur, not only enforcing the prohibition of distortive state aid, but also developing its own vision of good state aid policy. In order to prevent or to settle political conflict about individual decisions, the Commission has sought to establish more general criteria for the state aid which it still deems admissible. These criteria have been codified into a complex system of soft law and, more recently, hard state aid law. The Commission has thus created positive integration from above and increasingly influences the objectives of national state aid policies.

Suggested Citation

  • Blauberger, Michael, 2008. "From negative to positive integration? European state aid control through soft and hard law," MPIfG Discussion Paper 08/4, Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies.
  • Handle: RePEc:zbw:mpifgd:p0081
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/36531/1/572160887.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Lehmkuhl, Dirk, 2008. "On Government, Governance and Judicial Review: The Case of European Competition Policy," Journal of Public Policy, Cambridge University Press, vol. 28(1), pages 139-159, April.
    2. Scharpf, Fritz W., 1999. "Regieren in Europa: Effektiv und demokratisch?," Schriften aus dem Max-Planck-Institut für Gesellschaftsforschung Köln, Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies, volume 0, number sbd-1999.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Hussein Kassim & Bruce Lyons, 2013. "The New Political Economy of EU State Aid Policy," Journal of Industry, Competition and Trade, Springer, vol. 13(1), pages 1-21, March.
    2. Roman Stöllinger & Mario Holzner, 2017. "State Aid and Export Competitiveness in the EU," Journal of Industry, Competition and Trade, Springer, vol. 17(2), pages 203-236, June.
    3. Nicolae Băcilă, 2011. "The Impact Of The Economic And Financial Crisis On State Aid: Between Liberalization And Interventionism," Theoretical and Applied Economics, Asociatia Generala a Economistilor din Romania / Editura Economica, vol. 5(5(558)(su), pages 579-585, July.
    4. Neil Foster-McGregor & Mario Holzner & Michael Landesmann & Johannes Pöschl & Robert Stehrer & Roman Stöllinger, 2013. "A ‘Manufacturing Imperative’ in the EU – Europe's Position in Global Manufacturing and the Role of Industrial Policy," wiiw Research Reports 391, The Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies, wiiw.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Carina I. Hausladen & Regula Hänggli Fricker & Dirk Helbing & Renato Kunz & Junling Wang & Evangelos Pournaras, 2024. "How voting rules impact legitimacy," Palgrave Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 11(1), pages 1-10, December.
    2. Weidner, Helmut, 2005. "Global equity versus public interest? The case of climate change policy in Germany," Discussion Papers, Research Unit: Civil Society and Transnational Networks SP IV 2005-102, WZB Berlin Social Science Center.
    3. Arnaud Lechevalier & Jan Wielgohs, 2015. "Social Europe: A Dead End," Post-Print halshs-03781863, HAL.
    4. Libman, Alexander, 2005. "Взаимодействие Государственных И Частных Структур В Интеграционных Группировах: Теоретические Подходы И Опыт Снг [Interaction of Public and Private Actors in Regional Integration Groups - Theoretic," MPRA Paper 17044, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    5. Mayntz, Renate & Scharpf, Fritz W., 2005. "Politische Steuerung - Heute?," MPIfG Working Paper 05/1, Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies.
    6. Martin Binder & Monika Heupel, 2020. "Rising Powers, UN Security Council Reform, and the Failure of Rhetorical Coercion," Global Policy, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 11(S3), pages 93-103, October.
    7. Weidner, Helmut, 2002. "Gemeinwohl und Nachhaltigkeit: Ein prekäres Verhältnis," Discussion Papers, Research Unit: Standard-setting and Environment FS II 02-303, WZB Berlin Social Science Center.
    8. Henrik Scheller & Annegret Eppler, 2014. "European Disintegration – non-existing Phenomenon or a Blind Spot of European Integration Research? Preliminary Thoughts for a Research Agenda," Working Papers of the Vienna Institute for European integration research (EIF) 2, Institute for European integration research (EIF).
    9. Höpner, Martin & Haas, Christine, 2021. "Dürfen europäische Gesetze Grundfreiheiten einschränken?," MPIfG Discussion Paper 21/2, Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies.
    10. Budzinski, Oliver & Eckert, Sandra, 2015. "Wettbewerb und Regulierung," Ilmenau Economics Discussion Papers 93, Ilmenau University of Technology, Institute of Economics.
    11. Nonhoff, Martin, 2007. "Die ökonomische Bedrohung politischer Selbstbestimmung: zum Verhältnis von Demokratie und Wohlfahrtsstaat," Working papers of the ZeS 10/2007, University of Bremen, Centre for Social Policy Research (ZeS).
    12. Höpner, Martin, 2008. "Usurpation statt Delegation: Wie der EuGH die Binnenmarktintegration radikalisiert und warum er politischer Kontrolle bedarf," MPIfG Discussion Paper 08/12, Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies.
    13. Mayer, Sebastian, 2010. "Kollidieren die Güter? Juridische und politische Reaktionen auf Zielkonflikte internationalisierter Sicherheitspolitk," TranState Working Papers 130, University of Bremen, Collaborative Research Center 597: Transformations of the State.
    14. Deters, Henning, 2010. "Legislating on car emissions: What drives standards in EU environmental policy?," TranState Working Papers 142, University of Bremen, Collaborative Research Center 597: Transformations of the State.
    15. Jürgen Rüland, 2012. "The rise of “diminished multilateralism”: East Asian and European forum shopping in global governance," Asia Europe Journal, Springer, vol. 9(2), pages 255-270, March.
    16. Höpner, Martin, 2017. "The Social Progress Protocol of the ETUC: A suggestion for its future development," WSI Working Papers 208, The Institute of Economic and Social Research (WSI), Hans Böckler Foundation.
    17. Scharpf, Fritz W., 1999. "Föderale Politikverflechtung: Was muß man ertragen, was kann man ändern?," MPIfG Working Paper 99/3, Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies.
    18. Seikel, Daniel, 2016. "Ein soziales und demokratisches Europa? Hindernisse und Handlungsperspektiven," WSI-Mitteilungen, Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft mbH & Co. KG, vol. 69(1), pages 5-13.
    19. Obinger, Herbert & Leibfried, Stephan & Castles, Francis G., 2005. "Prospects for a European welfare state: Lessons from welfare state development in six OECD-Federations," TranState Working Papers 16, University of Bremen, Collaborative Research Center 597: Transformations of the State.
    20. repec:sae:envval:v:16:y:2007:i:1:p:43-60 is not listed on IDEAS
    21. Ansgar Belke & Frank Baumgärtner & Friedrich Schneider & Ralph Setzer, 2005. "The Different Extent of Privatisation Proceeds in EU Countries: A Preliminary Explanation Using a Public Choice Approach," CESifo Working Paper Series 1600, CESifo.

    More about this item

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:zbw:mpifgd:p0081. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/mpigfde.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.