Review article
Europeanisation of National Policies: the Concept and the Research Approach
Mario Sošić
; Independent researcher, Croatia
Abstract
The relationship between the European Union and the national state, in a theoretical explanation of the integration process, can be viewed from a bottom-up and a top-down perspective. The fi rst perspective explains the process and direction of the institutional development, that is, the integration itself, while the second perspective looks at the changes in national states caused by the infl uence of European institutions, political processes and specifi c policies, i.e., the issue of Europeanisation. In the study of various cases of changes at the level of national states under the infl uence of Europeanisation, the neoinstitutionalist approach proves to be very adequate, especially in its derivative as historical institutionalism. It most adequately captures the whole complexity of the relationships between structures, actors and the historical context in the integration process, and enables an assessment and explanation of their individual contribution to eff ectuated (non)changes. Theoretical conceptualisation of adaptation pressure, as an explanatory mechanism for the direction and scope of changes at the national level, points to two logics of behaviour of actors and institutions: the rationalist logic of pursuing a goal in the process of redistribution of resources, and the sociological logic of consent through a process of learning and socialisation.
Keywords
Europeanisation; top-down perspective; adaptation pressure; neoinstitutionalist approach; historical institutionalism
Hrčak ID:
38271
URI
Publication date:
15.5.2007.
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