Environment and Planning A 2014, volume 46, pages 2703 – 2717
doi:10.1068/a130037p
Europeanizing territoriality—towards soft spaces?
Phil Allmendinger
University of Cambridge, Clare College, Trinity Lane, Cambridge CB2 1TL, England;
e-mail: pma32@cam.ac.uk
Tobias Chilla, Franziska Sielker¶
Institute for Geography, Friedrich-Alexander Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg,
Wetterkreuz 15, D-91058 Erlangen, Germany; e-mail: tobias.chilla@fau.de, franziska.
sielker@fau.de
Received 10 June 2013; in revised form 25 February 2014
Abstract. This paper explores the coexistence of relational and territorial spaces—soft
spaces—through the experiences of EU integration and territorialization. First, we seek
a better understanding of EU integration through an engagement with the literature and
research on soft spaces. We propose that EU integration is best understood as involving
an interplay between territorial and relational understandings and approaches that
vary through time, a variation that can be categorized as involving pooled territoriality,
supraterritoriality, and nonterritoriality. Second, we seek to add to the current research
and literature on soft spaces by focusing upon the changing character of soft spaces and
their temporalities. We approach these two dimensions through an exploration  of
two ex  post case studies, the development of which typically shows different stages
of softening, hardening, and of differing degrees of Europeanization. With the focus on
Europeanization, the paper concludes with three findings: the new spaces of European
territoriality are characterized by, first, temporal dynamics, second, their parallel existence
with ‘hard’ spaces, and, finally, they can be employed as a political tool.
Keywords: soft spaces, territoriality, Europeanization, Habitats Directive, macroregions
1	 Introduction
Recent debates on the nature of space and scale have explored their social, porous, and
networked nature (eg, Amin, 2004; Massey, 2005; Thrift, 2004) and argued for a relational
view, highlighting
““first, that space is constituted through an infinite set of multilayered interactions; second,
that space is understood to contain the potential for multiplicity as an expression of social
plurality; and third, that space is recognized as being constantly under construction”
(Goodwin, 2012, page 2).
Such perspectives challenge ‘territorial’ and ‘bounded’ understandings of space and scale,
disputing the idea that space can be understood as a ‘container’and scales as nested hierarchies
of bounded and partitioned spaces (Gualini, 2006).
This ‘relational turn’ has itself been challenged from a variety of perspectives that seek
to highlight the binary and unhelpful nature in which relational and territorial spaces are
portrayed. Such a reaction has sought to bring territory ‘back in’ by rejecting what Jones
(2009) refers to as the ‘crude caricatures’ of relational thinkers that present nonrelational
thinking as ‘static’. There are also an emerging number of studies that seek to explore
the nature of spatial governance empirically, drawing upon evolving new forms of spatial
governance across different policy sectors.
¶ Corresponding author.
2704	 P Allmendinger, T Chilla, F Sielker
In seeking to overcome the territory–relational dualism, Allen and Cochrane (2010) have
explored the nature of spatial and scalar restructuring, coming to the conclusion that regional
politics draw upon and employ a range of relational networks that stretch beyond regions but
are also simultaneously lodged within them. As Cochrane has put it, “politics in practice still
seems to retain a strong territorial focus, or at least territory seems still to provide a significant
focus around which a range of political projects are organised” (2012, page 95). It remains the
case, as Goodwin argues, that a lot of practical politics continues to be conducted in, through,
and against a set of institutions whose jurisdiction is territorially defined (2012, page 3). The
upshot of such theoretical and empirical challenges to the relational turn is a rebalancing
and tempering of the view of space as a collection of networks and flows and scale as a
political construction with no preordained hierarchy. According to Painter (2010), territory
remains the quintessential state space. More recently there have been attempts to overcome
the territorial–relational standoff through the notion of assemblage that broadly concerns
how spaces and places are put together whilst retaining their heterogeneity (Anderson and
McFarlane, 2011). Drawing upon Latour among others, assemblage thinking argues that
places are complex and unique configurations of global and local factors that blur the binary
nature of structure and agency, near and far, social and material. The emphasis in assemblage
thinking is upon emergence, multiplicity, and determinacy leading to the need for ‘thick
descriptions’ of how places, for example, manifest, assemble, and reassemble neoliberalism
[though for an alternative view see Brenner et al (2011, page 225)].
Despite this revisionism and welcome engagement with the actual practices of territorial
and spatial governance, such territorial–relational debates have largely been abstract and/
or normative and have made few inroads into policy spaces and disciplines such as spatial
development. Within the EU recent studies have highlighted how spatial governance has
begun to address the tensions within state-bounded territorial and relational networked
governance through the emergence of new spaces such as the Baltic Sea Region (Stead,
2011). These new spaces provide a ‘spatial fix’ that straddles the need to provide legally
enabled and democratically accountable territorially linked plans and strategies in ways that
also reflect the complex relational world of multiple, networked spaces. Within the EU there
is also another driver of new spaces. Spatial planning across Europe is itself reflective of the
tensions between nation-state territoriality and EU territorial cohesion objectives. A range
of different territorial strategies of the EU have emerged, each influencing the nature of
territorial/spatial governance. It is also clear that EU integration differs between sectors as
well as through time, leading to a complex and evolving set of tensions and new spaces
(Dühr, 2009; Faludi, 2003; 2010a). Spatial planning as an activity facilitates such spatial
reconfiguration, simultaneously embracing relational understandings and approaches while
acting within territorially defined and legally sanctioned spaces. This duality requires
planning to think and act in different realms of space, engaging with the global, national,
regional, and bespoke, functional spaces yet working through other, often more stable and
accountable, spaces.
Such theoretical reflections and tensions on the changing nature of EU space and the role
of spatial planning have lacked empirical analyses of how, for example, tensions are resolved
in contemporary practices of spatial governance. Recent experiences of emerging or new
spaces around spatial or development planning might provide a way forward. A number of
studies across Europe have highlighted and explored the emergence of so-called soft spaces as
attempts to create hybrids of territorial and relational spaces (see, for example, Allmendinger
and Haughton, 2007; 2009; 2010; Counsell et al, 2012; Haughton et al, 2012; Heley, 2013;
Luukkonen, 2014; Metzger and Schmitt, 2012; Olesen, 2011, pages 145–162; Stead, 2011;
Waterhout, 2010). Soft spaces constitute new spaces for development planning that can
Europeanizing territoriality	 2705
be relatively enduring or ephemeral, formal or informal, centrally sanctioned or locally
driven. Soft spaces, sometimes accompanied by fuzzy boundaries, provide an opportunity to
address mismatches between administrative and functional areas by creating bespoke spaces
for dealing with specific issues such as regeneration, integrating different sectors such as
transport, infrastructure, education, etc in such processes operating at variable scales.
Studies of soft spaces have focused upon spatial planning where future strategies and
plans for an area have been territorially sanctioned and tethered though relationally connected
to issues and influences far beyond. Yet development planning is not the only field or sector
where such tensions and possible hybrid solutions arise. This paper explores the coexistence
of relational and territorial spaces—soft spaces—through the experiences of EU integration
and territorialization. First, we seek a better understanding of EU integration through an
engagement with the literature and research on soft spaces. We propose that EU integration
is best understood as involving an interplay between territorial and relational understandings
and approaches that vary through time, a variation that can be categorized as involving
pooled territoriality, supraterritoriality, and nonterritoriality. Second, we seek to add to the
current research and literature on soft spaces by focusing upon the changing character of
soft spaces and their temporalities. Some soft spaces might be very limited in time; others
‘harden’ towards strongly institutionalized forms; and others remain ‘soft’ over a long time.
We approach these two objectives through an exploration of several EU policy case studies,
the development of which typically shows different stages of softening, ‘hardening’, and of
differing degrees of Europeanization. This reflection leads, finally, to a proposed research
agenda that more thoroughly links territoriality, institutional change, and power plays.
2	 Spatial planning, territory, and soft spaces
Recent debates on the nature of space and scale and the need to understand geography in
relational terms have made some limited though important inroads into planning imaginations
and practices (see, for example, Davoudi and Strange, 2009; Graham and Healey, 1999;
Healey, 2006). However, such interpretations and arguments for more relational forms of
spatial planning(1)
or the ‘strategic turn’ have tended to overlook or gloss over disjunctures
between the broad-brushed and largely abstract discussions of relational thinking and the
nature and practices of territorially embedded spatial planning (see as well Luukkonen,
2014). Planning practice has always accepted the need to think beyond territorial units. Yet
the entreaty to plan more relationally has tended to ‘wish away’ or overlook the enduring
and significant hierarchical ontology of scalar politics and government. Financial powers,
infrastructure coordination and investment, ecological and environmental concerns, to
name a few issues, all remain situated within hierarchical structures of government and
governance. Yet, we can also see that tiered, hierarchical structures of politics and power are
also influenced by relational networks and are themselves porous and malleable.
Part of the solution lies, we feel, in rejecting the ‘either/or’ dichotomy of the relational/
territorial approach. Relational and territorial perspectives are not only far less opposed
than is often presented but from the standpoint of spatial planning also relate to different
functions of spatial governance. Spatial planning exists at the intersection of relational
understandings and the need for territorial governance. In other words, plan and strategy
making needs to think and act relationally and territorially. This distinction is not always a
clear one from relational analyses of planning. Another way to think about this need to act
and think relationally and territorially is to consider the need for planning to both ‘open up’
strategy and plan making to acknowledge and take account of multiple influences, networks,
(1)
 We use the term spatial planning in a general sense to capture the variously labelled systems and
practices of land-use or development planning across Europe.
2706	 P Allmendinger, T Chilla, F Sielker
and flows and then necessarily ‘close down’such diversity in the form of a territorially based
strategy or plan based upon the allocation of legal rights and responsibilities. Thinking and
acting relationally come up against the need for accountability and transparency, the political
dimension, as well as a suite of legal sanctions to ensure that decisions and strategies are
implemented and enforced. Thus relational perspectives are necessarily anchored to territorial
functions in spatial planning.
Recent research on the practices of spatial planning across Europe has highlighted and
explored how this dual function of thinking and acting relationally and territorially has been
managed through the practice of soft spaces and fuzzy boundaries, particularly when the
relational spaces of planning are multiple and fragmented. At one level soft spaces have
emerged as attempts to represent and reflect space beyond and within territorial boundaries:
““So whilst planning still needs its clear legal ‘fix’ around set boundaries for formal plans,
if it is to reflect the more complex relational world of associational relationships which
stretch across a range of geographies, planning also needs to operate through other
spaces, and it is these we think of as ‘soft spaces’ ” (Allmendinger and Haughton, 2009,
page 619).
However, it would be misleading to ascribe a single justification to the growing use of soft
spaces, as evidence suggests that there are a variety of uses and backgrounds (Allmendinger
and Haughton, 2010). At one level soft spaces emerge to provide opportunities for functional
planning to address mismatches between territorial boundaries and coherent areas such as
housing markets, travel-to-work, or river catchment areas bringing in new actors and interests
from beyond existing territorial concerns: in other words, drawing in relational conceptions of
networked space into territorial forms of governance. At another level soft spaces can emerge
to address specific and complex issues around growth management or urban regeneration
within territories in relational ways. In this form soft spaces reflect the desire to create forms
of networked governance to reflect the complexity of societal issues and institutions. A third
driver of soft spaces concerns the question of competences: governing in a multilevel setting
always involves struggles about mandates: which actors of what level have a say in which
policy fields? Here, soft spaces emerge to challenge or obscure where power actually resides.
This point is of particular importance in the context of European integration, as we will detail
later. Fourth, there is an important experimental and political dimension to soft spaces that
allows them to be used politically, testing strategies and approaches to an issue without ceding
ultimate authority. If successful, then such spaces can ‘harden’ (Metzger and Schmitt, 2012)
or disappear if their function has been achieved. If not successful then they can be disavowed
and dropped (Haughton et al, 2012). Similarly, soft spaces are often accompanied by ‘fuzzy
boundaries’ that attempt to insert new agendas, challenge existing identities and territorial
representations but with a degree of uncertainty over the issues and actions to be addressed
(Haughton et al, 2010; Heley, 2013). According to Luukkonen (2014, page 14) European
spatial planning thus “forms an informal networked space of Europeanization” and therefore
“enables its articulation in terms of common ‘European space’ or the ‘EU territory’.”
What we are concerned about more in this paper is how such soft spaces can emerge
and be deployed to address, challenge, and ‘open up’ difficult and politically sensitive issues
around identity and territory and spatial imaginaries, particularly with regards to European
integration and how spatial planning and governance is being used as a means through which
reterritorialization at the macroregional scale is being managed.
3	 European integration and territoriality
Soft spaces emerged as a response to tensions around territorial and relational space in spatial
planning. However, such tensions are not unique to planning contexts; they are found in other
sectors and areas of governance, and are most notably a component of European integration.
Europeanizing territoriality	 2707
Questions of territorial and relational space in the context of European integration are
highly complex and sensitive for two main reasons. First, the polity of European integration
is characterized by a tension between nation-state territoriality and some supranational
mandates on the EU level. Second, we see a high heterogeneity on the policy level. In some
policy fields—like the environmental policy or the European Single Market—we can identify
clearly supranational features; in others—in particular, in the field of spatial planning—there
are no transposed mandates. In both contexts, soft spaces have emerged to handle certain
complex, cross-territorial and asymmetric situations or they are used as a tool in strategic
ambitions about competence ‘gaining and keeping’.
To start with the polity dimension: despite the strength of some EU supranational
competences, the EU’s territoriality cannot simply be understood as a parallel to the
Westphalian state territoriality or as a superstate. Instead, we see a hybrid setting of a few
hard elements (in particular, with regard to external border control) and predominating soft
elements. Many authors understand this as a predominating intergovernmental organization
of a ‘pooled territory’ (Bialasiewicz et al, 2005; Mammadouh, 2001; Pullano, 2009). The
European citizenship is a good example as it relies exclusively on the national affiliation of
individuals: one has to belong to a nation-state before one can be considered as an EU citizen.
Others stress the ‘soft’ territorial character of EU integration as “aspirational in terms of
a space of values and an area of solidarity” that should not be captured in a clear territorial
way (Scott and van Houtum, 2009, pages 271, 273).
Secondly, from the policy perspective, no explicit EU mandate has been established yet
with regard to spatial planning. Some see the objective of ‘Territorial Cohesion’ anchored as
shared competence in the Lisbon Treaty as a new and formal basis for the development of
such a mandate (eg, Faludi, 2010a). In the meantime, the EU Commission has published a
Green Book that has posed questions to stakeholders and member states on how to concretize
the objective of territorial cohesion. The public consultation process has brought much
inspiration, but little clarity (cf COM, 2009). In other policy fields we see explicit European
mandates that are highly relevant from a territorial perspective, but which are not coordinated
in a territorial, European way—the Common Agriculture Policy or the Transeuropean
Networks are just two examples in this respect (see Dammers and Evers, 2008). This setting
has to be understood from a multilevel perspective: for example, EU financial support can
prioritize certain objectives whilst, on the polity level, the autonomy of national, regional,
and local authorities can be limited by European regulation. However, initiatives of national,
regional and local bodies can also draw upon European funding and regulation to help deliver
the ‘by-passing’ domestic opponents (see Böhme and Waterhout, 2008; Clark and Jones,
2009; Radaelli, 2003).
Against this background, Deas and Lord (2006) identified a growing number of ‘unusual’
or nonstandard regions around cooperative arrangements established by INTERREG and
other programmes highlighting the tensions between national and regional territory and
the European motor of spatial integration and policy (Faludi, 2009). Luukkonen sees
territorialization of the EU as an interplay of rescaling between different levels occurring
through “everyday practices of policymakers such as European spatial planners … at the
‘lower levels’ as well as through ‘high politics’ ” (2014, page 15). Scrutinizing European
spatial planning as a field of interaction, he further concludes that the “idea of ‘Europe’
as a spatial entity … contributes significantly to the production of the territory of the EU”
(page 14). Soft spaces and soft forms of territorial/spatial governance have been and continue
to be one way in which this tension is managed and played out. Macroregional strategies such
as the Baltic Sea and Danube regions provide early examples of such strategic soft spaces
(Knieling, 2011; Metzger and Schmitt, 2012; Stead, 2011).
2708	 P Allmendinger, T Chilla, F Sielker
One way to capture the emergence, use, and fissiparous nature of soft spaces of EU
integration is to propose an analytical framework against which to compare and contrast
the reality of practices. In order to understand political processes and dynamics, including
hidden agendas, actor coalitions, etc, we have to consider a differentiated system of territorial
categories. This is particularly the case given the logic of integration underpinning the
European Union as a construction ‘sui generis’, without archetype and without predictable
outcomes.
In the following parts of the paper we discuss the Europeanization of territoriality and
what role soft spaces play in our understanding of this process. Our analytical framework is
based upon three territoriality categories that provide a heuristic against which to compare
the concrete case studies of the Europeanization of territory that follow.
The first category we label as ‘nonterritoriality’. Nonterritoriality is relevant if there
is no formal mandate for a political task with regard to spatial development. In practice
this means that a mandate for a certain policy field at the EU level does not exist, is not
addressed, or is neglected. Thus, as long as no formal EU mandate exists, EU territoriality
cannot take effect. Fiscal policy is a typical example as the nation-states apply their own
rules within their territory. Of course, differences in fiscal regulations are highly relevant for
spatial development (eg, commuting in border regions), but this form of spatiality does not
question the political principle of national territoriality.
As soon as political mandates are transposed to the intergovernmental European level,
we enter the second category of pooled territoriality. Sovereignty remains with the nationstates
as ‘building blocks’: this is as true in the institutional as in the territorial sense. This
intergovernmental logic reflects the metatheory of intergovernmentalism based upon the notion
that European integration should not or cannot overcome national sovereignty. This can be
applied for spatial planning at the current state, but also for other policy fields. Good examples
of this kind of policy are the Schengen Regulations. These regulations are based exclusively
on national competences and they are managed by nation-state authorities. The role of the
Commission is to focus on data management. (This is not to confuse it with the supranational
character of the above-mentioned Frontex mandate that addresses the external borders.)
The third category we label as supraterritoriality, capturing those cases where the
political mandate and power is located on the EU level, overriding (inter)national mandates.
The supranational organization of mandates initiates a supranational territoriality and can
limit national sovereignty. The European Single Market serves as an example: thousands
of technical regulations have to be considered which are linked with juridical sanctions
which can be enforced by the European Court of Justice (eg, interdiction of certain customs,
mandatory public procurement procedures). This refers to the second metatheory of European
integration, (neo)functionalism that assumes that in the long run European integration
necessarily leads to ever-more integration and in the end to the supranational state.
This threefold classification provides a framework for the different territorial dimensions
of EU integration, though there is a further dimension that needs to be included. Analyses
within spatial development highlight the dynamic nature of soft spaces as they evolve to
take on new dimensions and characteristics (Allmendinger and Haughton, 2009; Chilla
et al, 12012; Haughton and Allmendinger, 2010). Such evolution reflects the flexible and
ephemeral nature of such hybrid spaces as a result of changes in their policy scope (eg,
the inclusion or exclusion of transport and environmental issues) or territorial domain. In
other words, there is a temporal dimension over which territoriality evolves, including future
trajectories and possibilities. A policy’s reorganization can mean the shift from one kind of
territoriality to another. The ‘upward’ dynamic is fuelled by the transposition of political
mandates. The downwards dynamic can be triggered by the retrieval of political mandates.
Europeanizing territoriality	 2709
This latter development must be regarded as exceptional, but discussions around the future
of the Euro illustrate this: the Euro states could agree to withdraw from the common
currency—either to nonterritoriality with the renationalization of the currencies or to a pooled
territoriality based on currency peg. Both directions, either upwards or downwards, are forms
of reterritorialization.
4	 From the analytical to the empirical
The following two case studies are explorative empirical arguments that aim to illustrate
and test the framework developed above. The engagement between the analytical and
experiences is based on the involvement of the authors in a series of research projects related
more or less directly to the questions addressed here. We draw upon two experiences of the
Europeanization of territory—the Habitats Directive (HD) and Macro Regional Strategies
(MRS). We have chosen these case studies in order to cover the wide range of current
constellations in Europeanized territoriality. They involve territorial questions of formally
institutionalized policies (HD) and more informal ones (MRS); they cover political processes
of quite a long period (HD since the 1980s) and very recent ones (MRS for less than a
decade); they involve the EU/EC without originally having explicit mandates (HD) and the
EU as coordinator explicitly invited by national authorities (MRS). The two case studies at
hand enable us to explore the temporalities of territoriality in two very different cases. Both
cases are examples of new, provocative soft spaces that challenge and reterritorialize areas
and perimeters.
4.1  Habitats Directive
The HD is the main basis of EU nature conservation policy and is the legal basis for the
protection of fauna, flora, and habitats in all EU member states. The HD was enacted in 1992,
after considerable political bargaining. Today, more than 10% of the European territory is
protected by the HD regime that unfolds relatively strong consequences in spatial planning
and territorial development (Alphandéry and Fortier, 2001; Chilla, 2005; Gibbs et al, 2007).
The starting point of this policy tool lies in the late 1980s when dissatisfaction with
political power constellations was felt in two groups—within the European Commission and
from protagonists of environmental policy. Firstly, within the European Commission there
was a strong ambition for more supranational competences in the field of nature conservation,
where EU competence was absent, with the exception of the Birds Directive from 1979 that
had shown hardly any effect until the 1990s. Environmental, policy-specific motivations
certainly played their role but, given the rotation logic of the personnel within the Commission,
the policy-specific ambitions were completed by general political power questions and polity
concerns.
Secondly, on the national and regional level throughout Europe many policy experts
on the fields of the environment felt a certain frustration about environmental policy in
general. Despite a considerable degree of institutionalization of environmental and nature
conservation policy, the effectiveness in concrete planning conflicts was seen to be rather
weak. In the course of the political bargaining on the HD, both these groups got together
within a structural coalition, by-passing the resisting powers mainly on the national level.
This coalition turned out to be effective. The first phase of policy formulation was
characterized by a deterritorialization strategy. Within the official discourse, spatial differentiation
was largely absent. Discursive references to the pan-European heritage remained
diffuse from a territorial point of view. In background negotiations, it was not easy to
convince sceptical member states to adapt the competence transfer—and here ‘territorial
othering’ came into play: For example, Germany was persuaded to support the HD with
the argument that there would be few consequences for the country well known for its high
2710	 P Allmendinger, T Chilla, F Sielker
environmental ambitions. It was argued that the intention was to upgrade nature conservation
policies of the—at that time—new southern European member states [the so-called ‘Club
Med’considered to have limited ambitions in environmental policy; (see Chilla, 2005)]. From
a juridical point of view, this argument was meaningless, but it was politically effective.
In parallel, the institutional setting was institutionalized through the HD, in parts somehow
hidden in its annexes that comprise long lists of species to be protected throughout Europe,
regardless of territorial belonging (HD Annex I–V). Moreover, biogeographical regions were
installed (HD Article 1 c iii). However, the procedural regulations remained unclear at that
time and member states were unaware of the juridical meaning of the long appendices of
the HD. In this sense, the policy formulation can be seen as a discursive deterritorialization.
This phase can be interpreted as ‘deterritorialized biology’: biological arguments of nature
conservation were put forward, detached from their (bio)geographical meaning.
After the adoption of the HD in 1992, the implementation process started only slowly,
as the national adaptation came along with delays in most countries. In the years after, more
and more conflicts came up: in particular, between environmental/biological arguments on
the Commission side, supported by environmental nongovernmental organizations (ENGOs)
from all levels, and the nonenvironmental arguments from subnational levels like regional
planning authorities or national economic lobbying. This is where the second phase started
that we consider as the reterritorialization phase. The prescriptions of the HD were taken
very seriously, and the hitherto soft elements unfold surprisingly efficient consequences:
this is particularly true for site selection processes where the protection of the annexes’
species turned out to be juridically coercive: the Commission and the European Court of
Justice took this issue surprisingly seriously, considering the hitherto ‘relaxed’ monitoring
of environmental implementation processes. Figure 1 illustrates this hardening process.
The negotiations of the site selection processes were not directly negotiated between
member states and the Commission. Instead, following the perimeters of the respective
biogeographical regions, representatives of the concerned states and the Commission
negotiated in different parallel committees. This spatial and institutional reorganization gives
Figure 1. Territorialities and temporalities of the Habitats Directive.
Supraterritoriality
Startofpolicy
form
ulation
Pooled territoriality
Nonterritoriality
1980s 1992
Directive
enacted
Europeanization of
territoriality
2000s
Implementation
conflicts
(site selection, etc)
Today
Jurisidictional logic ‘Soft spaces’
Europeanizing territoriality	 2711
the Commission a powerful role in coordinating and directing the policy development. For the
Commission this procedure is efficient as there are fewer biogeographic regions than member
states. The states face a considerable complexity: France, for example, is part of four of
these regions (the Atlantic, Continental, Mediterranean, and Alpine biogeographic regions).
Despite the legislative anchorage of the biogeographic regions they are soft spaces as they
constitute technically driven, functional planning spaces that cross territorial boundaries.
Latterly, the political importance of these regions has diminished. They remain the technical
reference, but political negotiations ended with the completion of the site selection process.
As a result, the key actors’ aims of the early phase were achieved: both the supranational
institutions and the environmental policy concerns saw an important shift in competences and
power. Reterritorialization processes, based on temporarily soft spaces, were a key concept
of this strategy.
4.2  The case of the macroregions
Macroregions have emerged as a new form of European territorial cooperation within the
budget period 2006–13 in regions with so-called ‘common geographical characteristics’
(Dubois et al, 2009; Samecki, 2009). MRS were developed as intergovernmental initiatives
aimed at reinforcing international cooperation. Within the Baltic Sea Region the idea for
the development of a joint MRS arose in 2005. In the course of a changing geopolitical
configuration after the EU Eastern enlargement and an increasing eutrophication of the Baltic
Sea an interregional working group of the European Parliament took up the idea of a strategic
cooperation (Antola, 2009; Schymik, 2011). In 2007 an ‘experimental’ phase of macroregions
started, when the European Commission was mandated to develop the first MRS in
order to set new impulses to the already-existing institutional setting (see figure 2).
The institutionalization process in the Baltic area was surprisingly quick: due to the
priorities of several EU presidencies the European Parliament adopted the strategy in 2009.
Several stakeholder groups strongly supported the development of macroregions for different
reasons. Two inducements played an important role for the stakeholders: many stakeholders
Figure 2. Territorialities and temporalities of the Macroregional Strategies.
Supraterritoriality
Startofpolicy
form
ulation
Pooled territoriality
Nonterritoriality
Europeanization of
territoriality
2009
adoption BSR
Today2005
initiation of
Baltic Sea
Region (BSR)
2011 adoption
Danube Region
Jurisdictional logic
‘macro-regional hype’
‘experimental
impulse’
‘Soft spaces’
2712	 P Allmendinger, T Chilla, F Sielker
were not satisfied with the setting of cross-border and transnational cooperation (eg, water
purification control). There was a search “for a spatial or territorial framework for these
policies to fit into” (Faludi, 2010b, page 6). Policy makers on the national and EU levels
expressed their dissatisfaction with the existing instruments and complained about missing
instruments for joint actions within their geographical focus. The European Commission,
more explicitly the Directorate General for Regional Policy, had shown signs of frustration
considering the output of regional policies and had difficulties in successfully competing
for competences in internal power plays. National representatives were unsatisfied with
the international cooperation perimeters available and at the subnational level private
stakeholders and project partners in particular missed recognition and political support for
long-term actions (Sielker, 2012).
At this stage the pooled territoriality principle is applied as national and regional
representatives developed the strategies within their respective mandates. Supranational
elements can be seen in the Commission’s role preparing the consultation process and
parliamentarian adoption. Summarizing the first phase, macroregions can be termed ‘soft
spaces’ that were developed between different layers of decision making. The official
literature stresses the bottom-up element in the establishment process (COM, 2013). It is true
that the initiative started at the member state level, but the strong role in coordinating the
establishment process must not be underestimated. During the phase of implementation
the national representatives, however, gained importance.
Following the idea of the first MRS, tremendous political interest in this new tool arose
on the national level—in most cases for the reason of policy influence (eg, shipping, harbour
infrastructure) and on the EU level in particular for the reason of integration challenges with
regard to new member states. The Baltic Sea Region Strategy triggered a macroregional
‘hype’ as many regions debated their own potential in this respective (Bialiasewicz et al,
2013; Dühr, 2011). In the early phase the so-called three ‘nos’—postulating the absence of
(1) financial, (2) institutional, and (3) legislative changes—underline the political sensitivity
of macroregions (Schneidewind, 2011).
Macroregions are implemented through multilateral committees that sit alongside formal
institutions and operate within existing frameworks (Sielker, 2012). The key governance
elements are so-called Priority Areas addressing different policy fields. Voting members are
national representatives that give an observing status to the Commission, and private and
semipublic stakeholders. The implementation mode, thus, builds on an intergovernmental
model and does not lead to supraterritoriality. The Priority Areas are soft in the sense that
they are constantly open to diverse stakeholders and operate in flexible and sometimes
overlapping spatial foci (Sielker, 2012). Within the different actions in each Priority Area, a
multitude of actor constellations and different geographical boundaries can be relevant (Stead,
2011, page 165). The macroregions also include ‘hard’ elements, as the goals agreed upon in
Steering Groups have to be decided and implemented by, for example, national ministries or
other committees of funding schemes. During the preparation and implementation process
a “growing readiness for ‘soft’ reforms is evident” (Schymik, 2011, page 6). The macroregional
concept has shown first signs of ‘hardening’ ” (Metzger and Schmitt, 2012) as, for
example, the newly developed committees developed different steps of institutionalization
depending on working modes and engagement of nation-state representatives in the Steering
Groups. One reaction towards the macroregional development is the development of a
Danube Region INTERREG programme area. However, the principle of pooling domestic
territory is not put into question by a new INTERREG programme organization.
The dissatisfaction discussed above has led to the different stakeholder groups being in
a constant search for arenas to enforce their objectives. In both the Baltic Sea Region and
Europeanizing territoriality	 2713
the Danube Region we see a ‘success’ of certain policy priorities on the general political
agenda through the changing interplay of stakeholders at the macroregional level. In the case
of the Danube Region the focus on the river, for example, led to an increased agreement and
prominence of objectives to increase the shipping on the Danube. In the case of the Baltic Sea
Region the macroregional development provoked an increasing attention of the wider public
towards the problems of eutrophication, leading to the increasing popularity of existing policy
actions and initiation of new policy actions, making the missing instruments and perimeters
more visible.
In parallel, the Directorate General obtained the possibility to take credit for new
cooperation initiatives in which they appear in a new managing role without tying up
substantially more resources. At the same time, the responsibility for the success and the
implementation lies in the hands of the nation-states. Interestingly, the diversity of objectives
pursued by different stakeholder groups is not fully obvious. The European Commission
aims at more European competences; the national representatives pursue intergovernmental
cooperation agendas; and the stakeholders of certain sectors (eg, International Commission
for the Protection of the Danube River within the Danube Region) aim at an increasing policy
influence in informal networks. All three stakeholder groups, however, seem to be able to
address their needs through a gradual reterritorialization process.
We expect the ‘macroregional era’ to continue, though the development paths of
macroregions in Europe are not exactly foreseeable—and might vary between the regions
(eg, speed of development, degree of institutionalization, or topics addressed). One
development path could be a ‘supranationalization’ where MRS are first steps of a rescaling
process towards a supranational level to which competences will be allocated (Faludi,
2010c; Metzger and Schmitt, 2012; Stead, 2011; Welz and Engel, 1993). A second, very
likely, scenario is the continuation of macroregions to ‘intergovernmental superregions’
coming along with a further allocation of resources. In the coming years the scope for
assigning further competences to the macroregional framework would not imply leaving
the intergovernmental logic. A third development path would imply the continuation of the
‘status quo’where macroregions are established as a permanent cooperation and constitute an
umbrella for other EU initiatives with the soft characteristics as the dominant ones.
5	 Conclusions
If we compare both cases presented (HD and MRS), we see parallels and differences. The
starting point in both cases was political dissatisfaction and different actors’ ambitions to
increase the political influence on a certain level and for certain policy priorities. In both
cases soft spaces played an important strategic role. In the case of the HD, the phase of
deterritorialization, of spatial ‘tabooing’, was of key importance particularly in the first
phase. Biogeographical regions were very soft in the beginning and are detailed in the
implementation phase only after the formal competences shifted. This can be contrasted with
the development of macroregional processes where territorial arguments played a prominent
role throughout the process that institutionally establishes regions with so-called common
geographical challenges. The soft character was of importance when building a governance
structure and deciding upon the Priority Areas and goals. In both cases, though having a
different emphasis on territorialization processes, reterritorialization turns out to be very
efficient throughout the policy process, based on ‘soft spaces’. The biogeographical regions
and in particular the ‘functionally coercive’ annexes of the HD turn out to influence spatial
development in Europe in a very efficient way. The macroregional development within in
Europe has already changed the perception of some regions and influences: for example, the
allocation of the INTERREG budgets’ organization after 2013.
2714	 P Allmendinger, T Chilla, F Sielker
As soon as the strategy is efficient, new perimeters, new agendas, and new actor
constellations occur. In parallel, soft spaces can ‘harden’ (MRS as INTERREG perimeter)
and/or they lose their political relevance (biogeographical spaces today as only technical
reference). In the case of nature conservation policy, the strategy has turned out to be efficient;
in the case of the MRS, the ‘success’is not yet finally to be seen, but there are clear signs that
MRSs are unlikely to vanish from the political agenda again.
The two explorative case studies here indicate that soft spaces can be very efficient
instruments with regard to power plays and ambitions for competence transfer in the context
of European integration. In that sense, our examples highlight the complex, evolving, and
contested nature of reterritorialization of European space and how such new spaces can
unsettle, challenge, and disrupt existing, national territorial spaces.
Summarizing the two case studies presented we can identify three perspectives that are
crucial for the understanding of soft spaces in the context of European integration: the new
spaces of European territoriality are characterized by, first, temporal dynamics; second,
the parallel existence with ‘hard’ spaces; and, finally, they can be employed as a political
tool. Firstly, soft spaces are very much characterized by temporalities due to the dynamic
political development. As we saw in the example of the macroregions, at a certain point of
the political process the softness of the early years can harden, but this hardening can turn
into softening again. It is important to note that there is no automatic logic of hardening and
no one-way dynamic: soft spaces are object to political negotiations with an open end—they
are part of contemporary reterritorialization processes.
Secondly, we see a persisting parallelism of ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ spaces also in the context
of European integration. The example of the macroregions demonstrates that an intense
debate on soft spaces does not necessarily modify or weaken the hard spaces of domestic
planning. The territorial and relational features of such new spaces can coexist and develop
dynamically. This is particularly true for phases of ‘opening up’ when the relational features
get more prominent. As we see in the case of the biogeographical regions, there is a process
of ‘closing down’ when soft spaces undergo a process of hardening.
Finally, soft spaces are not only an outcome of political processes, but they can also be
employed as a political tool, be it intentionally or not. They can be an efficient element in
political bargaining of political competences and power.
This paper has presented a heuristic on the basis of ex-post case-study analyses.
Obviously, further empirical testing has to be the next step, taking an in-vivo perspective
in contemporary processes of reterritorialization. We feel that a focus upon the significance
and import of existing and emerging new spaces of planning would be fruitful, highlighting
how European reterritorialization is impacting upon the outcomes, or not, of national and
subnational competences and spatial planning. Such processes may help explain some of the
role of new spaces in national political displacement and disruption.
References
Allen J, Cochrane A, 2010, “Assemblages of state power: topological shifts in the organization of
government and politics” Antipode 42 1071–1089
Allmendinger P, Haughton G, 2007, “The fluid scales and scope of UK spatial planning”
Environment and Planning A 39 1478–1496
Allmendinger P, Haughton G, 2009, “Soft spaces, fuzzy boundaries and metagovernance: the new
spatial planning in the Thames Gateway” Environment and Planning A 41 617–633
Allmendinger P, Haughton G, 2010, “Spatial planning, devolution, and new planning spaces”
Environment and Planning C: Government and Policy 28 803–818
Alphandéry P, Fortier A, 2001, “Can a territorial policy be based on science alone? The system for
creating the Natura 2000 network in France” Sociologia Ruralis 41 311–328
Amin A, 2004, “Regions unbound: towards a new politics of place” Geografiska Annaler B 86 33–44
Europeanizing territoriality	 2715
Anderson B, McFarlane C, 2011, “Assemblage and geography” Area 43 124–127
Antola E, 2009, “EU Baltic Sea Strategy”, report for the Konrad-Adenauer-Foundation London
Office”
Bialasiewicz L, Elden S, Painter J, 2005, “The constitution of EU territory” Comparative European
Politics 3 333–363
Bialasiewicz L, Giaccaria P, Jones A, Minca C, 2013, “Re-scaling ‘EU’rope: EU macro-regional
fantasies in the Mediterranean” European Urban and Regional Studies 20 59–76
Böhme K, Waterhout B, 2008, “The Europeanisation of planning”, in European Spatial Research
and Planning Ed. A Faludi (Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, Cambridge, MA) pp 225–248
Brenner N, Madden D, Wachsmuth D, 2011, “Assemblage urbanism and the challenges of critical
urban theory” City 15 225–240
Chilla T, 2005, “The implementation of the EU Habitats Directive in the German Laender—the
challenge to enforce ecological aims and the risk of top-down-procedures”, in Sustainable
Regions: Making Regions Work. Conference Proceedings of the Regional Studies Association
Annual Conference Eds S Hardy, L B Larsen, F Freeland (Regional Studies Association,
Seaford, East Sussex) pp 104–105
Chilla T, Evrard E, Schulz C, 2012, “On the territoriality of cross-border cooperation: ‘institutional
mapping’ in a multi-level context” European Planning Studies 20 961–980
Clark J R A, Jones A R, 2009, “Europeanisation and its discontents” Space and Polity 13 193–212
Cochrane A, 2012, “Making up a region: the rise and fall of the ‘South East of England’ as a political
territory” Environment and Planning C: Government and Policy 30 95–108
COM, 2009, “Sixth progress report on economic and social cohesion”, Commission of the European
Communities, Brussels,
http://ec.europa.eu/regional_policy/sources/docoffic/official/reports/interim6/com_2009_295_en.pdf
COM, 2013, “Commission Staff Working Document: Accompanying the document Report from
the Commission to the European Parliament, the Council, the European Economic and Social
Committee and the Committee of the Regions concerning the added value of macro-regional
strategies”, Commmission of the European Communities, Brussels,
http://ec.europa.eu/regional_policy/sources/docoffic/official/communic/baltic/swd_added_value_
macro_region_strategy_en.pdf
Counsell D, Haughton G, Allmendinger P, 2012, “Growth management in Cork through boom,
bubble and bust” European Planning Studies doi:10.1080/09654313.2012.722975 1–18
Dammers E, Evers D, 2008, “Beyond heuristics: applying scenarios to European territorial
development” Tijdschrift voor Economische en Sociale Geografie 99 629–635
Davoudi S, Strange I, 2009, “Space and place in twentieth century planning: an analytical framework
and historical review”, in Conceptions of Space and Place in Strategic Spatial Planning
Eds S Davoudi, I Strange (Routledge, London) pp 7–42
Deas, I, Lord A, 2006, “From a new regionalism to an unusual regionalism? The emergence of nonstandard
regional spaces and lessons for the territorial reorganisation of the state” Urban Studies
43 1847–1877
Dubois A, Hedin S, Schmitt S, Sterlin J, 2009, “EU macro-regions and macro-regional strategies—a
scoping study”, WP 4, Nordregio, Stockholm
Dühr S, 2009, “Visualising spatial policy in Europe”, in Planning Cultures in Europe. Decoding
Cultural Phenomena in Urban and Regional Planning Eds J Knieling, F Othengrafen (Ashgate,
Aldershot, Hants) pp 113–136
Faludi A, 2003, “Intersectoral relations and European spatial planning: the case of the European
Spatial Development Perspective”, in European Regional Planning: Sustainable Spatial
Development: Strengthening Intersectoral Relations (Council of Europe Publishing, Strasbourg)
69 53–57
Faludi A, 2009, “A turning point in the development of European spatial planning? The ‘Territorial
Agenda of the European Union’ and the ‘First Action Programme’” Progress in Planning 71 1–42
Faludi A, 2010a, “Beyond Lisbon: soft European spatial planning” disP: The Planning Review
46(182) 14–24
2716	 P Allmendinger, T Chilla, F Sielker
Faludi A, 2010b, “Territorial cohesion post-2013: to whomsoever it may concern”, in Space is
Luxury: Selected Proceedings 24th AESOP Annual Conference 2010 Eds P Ache, M Illmonen,
pp 172-187, http://lib.tkk.fi/Reports/2010/isbn9789526031309.pdf
Faludi A, 2010c, Cohesion, Coherence, Cooperation: European Spatial Planning Coming of Age?
(Routledge, London)
Gibbs D, While A, Jonas A E G, 2007, “Governing nature conservation: the European Union
Habitats Directive and conflict around estuary management” Environment and Planning A 39
339–358
Goodwin M A, 2012, “Regions, territories and relationality: exploring the regional dimensions of
political practice” Regional Studies 47 1181–1190
Graham S, Healey P, 1999, “Relational concepts of space and place: issues for planning theory and
practice” European Planning Studies 7 623–646
Gualini E, 2006, “The rescaling of governance in Europe: new spatial and institutional rationales”
European Planning Studies 14 881–904
Haughton G, Allmendinger P, 2010, “Spatial planning, devolution and new planning spaces”
Environment and Planning C: Government and Policy 28 803–818
Haughton G, Allmendinger P, Counsell D, Vigar G 2010 The New Spatial Planning (Routledge,
London)
Haughton G, Allmendinger P, Oosterlynck S, 2012, “Spaces of neoliberal experimentation: soft
spaces, postpolitics and neoliberal governmentality” Environment and Planning A (forthcoming)
Healey P, 2006 Urban Complexity and Spatial Strategies: Towards a Relational Planning for Our
Times (Routledge, London)
Heley J, 2013, “Soft spaces, fuzzy boundaries and spatial governance in post-devolution Wales”
International Journal of Urban and Regional Research 37 1325–1348
Jones M, 2009, “Phase space: geography, relational thinking, and beyond” Progress in Human
Geography 33 487–506
Knieling J, 2011, “Metropolitan networking in the Western Baltic Sea Region: Metropolitan Region
Hamburg between multilevel governance and soft spatial development”, in The Role of Regions?
Networks, Scale, Territory Eds T Herrschel, P Tallberg (Kristianstads Boktryckeri, Stockholm)
pp 195–214
Luukkonen, J, 2014, “Planning in Europe for ‘EU’rope: spatial planning as a political technology of
territory” Planning Theory doi:10.1177/1473095213519355
Mammadouh V, 2001, “The territoriality of European integration and the territorial features of the
European Union: the first fifty years” TESG 92 420–436
Massey D, 2005 For Space (Sage, London)
Metzger J, Schmitt P, 2012, “When soft spaces harden: the EU strategy for the Baltic Sea Region”
Environment and Planning A 44 263–280
Olesen K, 2011, Strategic Spatial Planning in Transition—A Case Study of Denmark unpublished
PhD thesis, Department of Development and Planning, Aalborg University
Painter J, 2010,”Rethinking territory” Antipode 42 1090–1118
Pullano T, 2009, “The evolving category of territory: from the modern state to the European Union”,
GARNET WP 63/09, Economic and Social Research Council, Swindon
Radaelli C, 2003, “The Europeanization of public policy”, in The Politics of Europeanization
Eds K Featherstone, C Radaeli (Oxford University Press, Oxford) pp 27–56
Samecki P, 2009, “Macro-regional strategies in the European Union. A discussion paper”, paper
presented at a conference, Stockholm, 18 September,
http://ec.europa.eu/regional_policy/cooperate/baltic/pdf/macroregional_strategies_2009.pdf
Schneidewind P, 2011, “Makroregionale Strategien: EU Kraftakt mit Phantasie” RAUMÖsterreichische
Zeitschrift für Raumplanung und Regionalpolitik 82 46–49
Schymik C, 2011, “Blueprint for a macro region. EU strategies for the Baltic sea and Danube
regions”, research paper, Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik, http://www.swp-berlin.org/
Scott J W, van Houtum H, 2009, “Reflections on EU territoriality and the‚ ‘bordering’ of Europe”
Political Geography 28 271–273
Europeanizing territoriality	 2717
Sielker F, 2012 Makroregionale Strategien der EU und Soft Spaces—Perspektiven an der Donau
Fakultät Raumplanung, TU Dortmund, http://hdl.handle.net/2003/29755
Stead D, 2011, “European macro-regional strategies: indications of spatial rescaling?” Planning
Theory and Practice 12 163–167
Thrift N, 2004, “Transurbanism” Urban Geography 25 724–734
Waterhout B, 2010, “Soft spaces and governance: the transformation of planning”, paper presented at
24th AESOP Annual Conference, Helsinki, 7–10 July,
http://repository.tudelft.nl/view/ir/uuid%3A247daffa-2240-492f-a091-f979fab1dd9c/
Welz C, Engel C, 1993, “Traditionsbestände politikwissenschaftlicher Integrationstheorien:
Die Europäische Gemeinschaft im Spannungsfeld von Integration und Kooperation”, in Die
Europäische Option. Eine Interdisziplinäre Analyse über Herkunft, Stand und Perspektiven der
europäischen Integration Ed. A von Bogdandy (Nomos, Baden-Baden) pp 129–169