Explaining change in EU education policy

ABSTRACT

The article explores the evolution, expansion and dynamics of EU education policy. Applying standard public policy analysis, it examines EU education policy with regard to context and process. The paper claims that EU education policy has, in recent years, been subject to a significant turn in functional terms. An assessment of EU documentation from 1970 to 2006 reveals a shift from politico-economic to economic-functional goals. A strong indicator of the shift is a change in the method of policy-making, which has drifted back from a semi-Community to an inter- or transgovernmental mode of policy-making. In short, there is a paradigmatic shift in policy aims, away from pro-integrationist towards pro-market orientation. The purpose of this macro-policy study is to reveal a new direction in EU education policy, which reflects the increased political and economic salience of education. Following transgovernmentalist logic, the article demonstrates that education policy in the EU frames a new form of policy regime which is characterized by flexibility but also by fragility.

Keywords:

• Education policy
• European Union
• functionalization
• policy change
• salience
• transgovernmentalism

Acknowledgements

I am indebted to Nicolas Allen, Anne Corbett, Avril Keating, Thomas Plümper and three anonymous reviewers for critical and helpful comments on earlier drafts of this article. A special thanks to Adje Schröder, Oldenburg, for sharing his vision of European education with me.

Notes

1. The Bologna declaration was signed in 1999. Initially 29, now 46, European countries participated to promote a common European space for higher education until 2010 (Confederation of EU Rectors' Conferences, undated).

2. The European Council adopted the strategy in 2000. It aims to make the EU the most competitive economy in the world by 2010. The main targets are full employment, economic reform and social cohesion. Education and training systems have been assigned a key role in achieving the move to a ‘knowledge economy’ (European Council 2000).

3. Database: EUR-Lex (accessed 11 June 2007); time frame: 1960–2006; text search ‘education’ revealed 11,845 documents, broken down by years.

4. Database: EUR-Lex (accessed 11 June 2007); time frame: 1960–2006; title search ‘education’ revealed 1,365 documents; filter ‘Council of Ministers’ and ‘secondary legislation’; 225 documents found with direct relevance to EU education policy: regulations (15), directives (43), decisions (63), recommendations (6), conclusions (21), mixed conclusions (8), resolutions (19), mixed resolutions (26), guidelines (24).

5. Database: EUR-Lex (accessed 11 June 2007); time frame: 1960–2006; 1,365 EU documents on education; filter ‘European Commission’; 229 documents found with direct relevance to EU education policy: regulations (1), directives (5), decisions (2), recommendations (3), reports (63), communications (28), miscellaneous (guidelines, Green Papers, White Papers, joint declarations: 127).

6. Database: EUR-Lex (accessed 11 June 2007); time frame: 1960–2006; 1,365 EU documents on education; filter ‘European Court of Justice’; 76 judgments and preliminary rulings found with direct relevance to EU education policy.

7. Database: EUR-Lex (accessed 11 June 2007); time frame: 1960–2006; 74 EU documents on education; filter ‘open method of co-ordination’; 28 for Council of Ministers, 46 for Commission.