Investigating the partnership approach in the EU Urban Agenda from the perspective of soft planning

Figures & data

Table 1. Expert interviews: Details on data sets, interviewees and themes discussed.

Data set	Overview	Interviewees	Themes discussed	Reference in text
A	Austria (n = 17) Language: German Year: 2017	public officials employed at national, federal, regional and local level	Planning systems and relation of different planning scales EU strategy documents, e.g. ESDP, Urban Agenda 3 different types of EU policy interventions, their influences and implementation	Interviewee 1–2
B	Finland (n = 18) Language: English, Finnish Year: 2017/2018			Interviewee 3–5
C	Belgium & The Netherlands (n = 5) Language: English Year: 2017	actors involved in the development of the UA or the housing partnership	Development and meaning of the Urban Agenda Relation of Urban Agenda to other policies and strategies Partnerships: formation, expectations, implementation	Interviewee A-E

Table 2. Statements from actors in the housing partnership (Data set C).

The partners and their expertise
D	[The European Commission] created this mechanism in order to seek this expertise that they don't have. Because if you are in the EU bubble, you are in the EU bubble, so you really have often less understanding of the dynamics or the issues of provision of affordable housing on the ground […]. They quite rightfully created this mechanism to learn about that.
C	In principle it is important to not always go through others, but to bring in practitioners who work on the ground and have actual experience that they can refer to. And we succeeded in doing that with the partnerships. […] The practitioners that are involved really want to change something. And they know exactly, from their daily work, what the weak points of EU legislation are.
B	There is a lot of enthusiasm, mainly from cities. They want to participate in this, they tell us: ‘this is the first time I am sitting at a table with the Commission, with member states and other stakeholders as equals’. When you speak about urban matters in the EU context, formally it is only member states, the Commission and the Parliament who talk about policy. Now in this framework of the Urban Agenda, they get a voice. It's not a formal forum, but still for them it is important to have these direct discussions with the Commission and, if I would think about concrete results in a couple of years, I think the main result maybe are these informal contacts.
Cooperation and group dynamics within the partnership
A	I think this is the backbone, the big idea behind it, that the partnership takes place on an equal footing.
D	Well in group dynamics you have always types of personalities and attitudes. Some are much more active and dynamic, interested and committed and resourceful.
E	The involvement of the cities is very good, the involvement of the member states is very good, the involvement of EU is, in my view, rather cool. […] They [the European Commission] like to work top-down in the way they do. They have a subject, they write a White Paper or a Green Paper or a whatever paper, they collect the comments from all the member states – never a city, always a state – they do what they do with those comments, they make a new paper, and then there is a new regulation which goes up to the board of ministers, and that's it folks. That's their lifestyle. And this housing partnership, and the other partnerships, are not their lifestyle. They are not used to communicate with the kind of people they have to communicate with in the partnership. And you see their uneasiness with this kind of working.
Expectations for the outcome of the partnership
B	The formal process in the EU is so complicated, and it takes a long time to influence new rules. I think they [the partnerships] can have an impact, but it will be more the informal discussions, that will contribute to changes in EU regulations or EU funding. I think that's the main thing or the main result these partnerships will produce.
C	Well, all these exchanges of best practices – let me say it bluntly – this ‘blah blah’ … no, we make legislation! […] I understand the partnership as an opportunity to pool our interests and direct them exactly to where they can have an impact.
E	If your action is to change the EU regulation on housing, forget it! It won't work! But perhaps you have one or two good ideas, e.g. on the definition of state aid. […] But first and foremost important is the exchange of knowledge, knowing each other, each other's systems.
D	In the end the partnerships produce a certain type, a certain quality of evidence which either supports the current policy or does not. And if there is some strong indication that the current EU policy in certain domains or aspects does not work, the partnership is supposed to prove that.
Limitations of the partnership approach
C	We do this on top of everything else. We don't get paid for it, there is not even compensation for travel expenses. […] We cannot even pay researchers to help us. […] There is a little bit of money for a secretary that the Commission has put in place, but what they actually do is write protocols. And we already complained, ‘Come on, this money could be better spent on research and experts’.
D	It is important to know that for all the meetings, the cost of attending is always on the participants. […] And we have meetings all over Europe. […] So apart from the fact that you always have different individuals and different type of dynamics, then you have also the question of resources, whether people can access these meetings, because for some of the member cities it is a concern.
B	There is always a discussion about the money. […] And there are always the cities and the member states complaining that the Commission should put in more money but there is no more budget available.
Links between the Urban Agenda and other policies
B	Well, formally in the Pact of Amsterdam it says that we have to connect with the Territorial Agenda but if I look at the partnerships … some of them are naturally related to the Territorial Agenda […] but other partnerships don't have this territorial perspective too much, and I don't think that they will engage this perspective in their work. So I think that is something that could be strengthened, this connection between urban and territorial.
A	Well, it depends a lot on what is written there [in the action plan]. The Commission will absorb everything, and we hope that there are actions directed at the Commission, but also some directed at the member states or the Council, or even at the cities themselves.
C	The issue is, […] even if we deliver the best results, how will they be implemented? That's something that has to be worked on. But let's see how this will play out. […] A challenge is for example that the Commission doesn't have to move regarding certain areas of law, such as state aid. […] This is going to be the most difficult task. Nonetheless, I believe in people's ability to learn, so if we show that state aid regulations hinder investments on the ground, at home, then maybe at some point the penny drops. I am cautiously optimistic that this will work out.
A: interviewee from European Commission B: interviewee from Dutch ministry of the Interior and Kingdom Relations C: interviewee from International Union of Tenants D: interviewee from Eurocities E: interviewee from Dutch ministry of the Interior and Kingdom Relations