Contemporary Social Policy in the E.U.
Professor John Wilton
Lecture 6
The ‘Europeanisation’ of social policy

Additional sources:
Tavora, I. ‘The southern European social model: familialism and the high rates of female employment
in Portugal’, in Journal of European Social Policy, Vol. 22, No. 1, February 2012, pp. 63-76.
Palier, B. (ed.) ‘A Long Goodbye to Bismarck? The Politics of Welfare Reform in Continental
Europe’, (Book Review Symposium) in Journal of European Social Policy, Vol. 22, No. 1, February
2012, pp.90- 101.

Additional sources:
Tugdar, E.E. (2013) ‘Europeanization of Minority Protection Policies in Latvia: E.U. Conditionality
and the Impact of Domestic Factors on the Rights of Ethnic Russians’, in CEU Political Science
Journal, Vol. 8, Issue 1, February, p31-53
(including Bibliography for good sources on ‘Europeanisation’)
Jurado, E. Brochmann, G. and Dolvik, J.E. ‘Immigration, Work and Welfare. Towards an integrated
approach’, www.policy- network.net, Feb.2013)

Contemporary Social Policy in the E.U.
 ‘Europeanisation’ of social policy
- E.U. ‘single social policy areas’?
- E.U. policies affect:
- policy style (formulation and implementation);
- general problem solving approach;
- policy instruments employed;
- policy standards set (based on E.U values and principles)

Contemporary Social Policy in the E.U.
-Europeanisation of :
- pressure groups
- interest groups
- epistemic communities and policy networks
-

Contemporary Social Policy in the E.U.
4 processes of ‘Europeanisation’ of policy:
a)‘bottom-up’ (national state – E.U.)
b)‘top-down’ (E.U. – national state)
c)‘horizontal’ (State – State)
d)‘round-about’ (national state – E.U. – national state)

Contemporary Social Policy in the E.U.
‘Europeanisation’ based on underlying E.U.   principles and ‘core values’:
- social progress;
- the aim of high levels of employment;
- social protection;
- the aim of raising living standards and quality of life;
- promotion of social cohesion and social justice

Contemporary Social Policy in the E.U.
‘Europeanisation’
= overarching E.U. core values and principles, within which individual policies are shaped and
formulated, and diversity and ‘mutual recognition’ acknowledged, particularly in implementation to
meet policy aims

Contemporary Social Policy in the E.U.
•Europeanisation consists of 3 processes of:
–   a) construction
•        b) diffusion
•        c) institutionalisation
–        of formal and informal rules, procedures,     policy paradigms, styles, ‘ways of doing
things’ and shared beliefs and norms which are first defined and consolidated in the EU policy
process and then incorporated in the logic of domestic (national and subnational) discourse,
political structures and public policies.
•