The Macroeconomic Imbalance Procedure as European integration: a legalization perspective

ABSTRACT

The Macroeconomic Imbalance Procedure seeks to prevent and correct destabilizing economic imbalances in the European Union (EU). Scholars are divided as to whether this instrument of economic policy co-ordination relies on familiar intergovernmental modes of decision-making or reflects supranational institutions more significant role in economic policy following the euro crisis. Such diametrically opposed interpretations are symptomatic of longstanding concerns over the lack of a clear-cut definition of European integration. To address these definitional difficulties, this article turns to the concept of legalization. Taking account of the design and early implementation of the Macroeconomic Imbalance Procedure and using the Broad Economic Policy Guidelines as a point of comparison, it shows that the former can be understood as a modest but clear-cut increase in legalization compared to the latter. On this basis, it considers whether legalization, in spite of its own conceptual limitations, can contribute to a more rigorous definition of European integration.

KEYWORDS:

• Definition
• euro crisis
• European integration
• legalization
• Macroeconomic Imbalance Procedure

Acknowledgements

Thanks to Servaas Deroose, Emmanuelle Schon-Quinlivan, Marco Scipioni, Amy Verdun, Jonathan Zeitlin and three anonymous referees for helpful comments. The usual disclaimer applies.

Notes on contributor

Dermot Hodson is Reader in Political Economy in the Departmental of Politics at Birkbeck College, University of London.

Notes

1 Article 2, Regulation (EU) No 1176/2011.

2 For Odell (2001: 163), the ‘disciplined interpretive case study interprets or explains an event by applying a known theory to a new terrain’. Such a case should be judged not necessarily by its ability to test a theory but by how systematically and explicitly the theory is applied.

3 Recital 17, Regulation (EU) No 1176/2011.

4 Article 103, Treaty of Maastricht.

5 Article 121(3), Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU).

6 Article 8, Regulation (EU) No 1176/2011.

7 Article 13, Regulation (EU) No 1176/2011.

8 This concept of precision is close to Kelemen’s (2011) idea of prescriptive rules, a key feature of Eurolegalism. See also Armstrong and Kilpatrick (2006: 675), who suggest that reducing detail in the interests of precision might undermine policy learning and so weaken rather than strengthen EU co-operation.

9 Article 2, Regulation (EU) No 1176/2011.

10 Article 3, Regulation (EU) No 1176/2011.

11 Article 4, Regulation (EU) No 1174/2011.

12 Article 4, Regulation (EU) No 1176/2011.

13 Article 4, Regulation (EU) No 1176/2011.

14 Article 4, Regulation (EU) No 1176/2011.

15 Protocol (No. 12) on the Excessive Deficit Procedure, Treaty on European Union .

16 Article 2, Regulation (EU) No 1176/2011.

17 Article 4, Regulation (EU) No 1176/2011.

18 IMF Articles of Agreement, Sections 1 and 3.

19 The Lisbon Treaty altered the terms of this qualified majority vote by stating that the votes of the member state concerned would not be taken into account (Article 121[4]).

20 Article 5, Regulation (EU) No 1174/2011.

21 Article 2, Regulation (EU) No 1174/2011.

22 Article 6, Regulation (EU) No 1174/2011.

23 Article 5, Regulation (EU) No 1176/2011.

24 COM/2014/0905 final.

25 COM/2015/691 final.

26 COM/2015/0601 final.