Governing Europe: the Status and Networking Strategies of Finnish, Estonian and German Subnational Offices in Brussels

Abstract

This article examines and compares the status of Estonian, Finnish and German regional and local EU offices. The research data stem from structured interviews. We are interested in the status of different actors and their strategies for positioning their ideas in the policy-making and law-making procedures. While local and regional actors established new forms of representation and co-operation with EU institutions, these new channels and institutions are not equally open and accessible to all. Whilst the number of actors in Brussels has increased, this does not necessarily mean that they are all included in the decision-making process itself. Furthermore, it is not only institutions that matter but the actors themselves, the people involved in the day-to-day construction of Europe and the personal networks they create.

In contrast to German regional offices, the regions' power houses in Brussels, the institutional position of Finnish and Estonian offices is rather weak. However, to the extent that interaction takes place between the EU institutions and the regions, without the involvement of state actors, it is easy to see how certain decisions are pulled towards a regionally acceptable content. While size and institutional status matters, this is a world where a skilful actor can build his or her own networks, if he or she is in the right place at the right time and knows the right people.

Keywords:

• EU offices
• multi-level governance
• networks
• Finland
• Estonia
• Germany

Acknowledgement

The authors would like to thank the participants in the workshop ‘Revisiting regional policy’ at the EUSA tenth biennial conference in Montreal, May 2007, and two anonymous referees for comments on earlier versions and, in particular, our interviewees. The study has been partially financed by the Academy of Finland's Power and Society in Finland programme.

Notes

On neo-functionalism, see, for instance, Haas (1964, 1966, 2004), Kohler-Koch and Jachtenfuchs (1996) and Schmitter (2004).

An early influential state-centric analysis of EC integration was provided by Stanley Hoffmann in 1966 (pp. 862–915). Another interesting intergovernmental depiction of EU integration is provided by Milward and Sørensen (1994). The outstanding scholar applying intergovernmentalist methodology today is Andrew Moravcsik, who developed the theory of liberal intergovernmentalism (see Moravcsik, 1991, 1993, 1998).

Appendix A contains a list of the interviewees and the dates the interviews were conducted.

On the characteristics of type I and type II MLG, see Hooghe and Marks (2003).

Interview with Alexander Heichlinger from the European Institute of Public Administration, published in Regions and Cities of Europe, February 2006, No. 50.

The Office of Bavarian municipalities started 15 years ago and, in early 2000, it founded an office community together with the association of Baden-Württemberg. According to one informant (interview 1, conducted on 12 February 2007), there are at present no discussions in the local government Land associations to establish an office in Brussels. Individual members from some Land associations of the DStGB do work in their Länder offices, for instance from Nordrhein-Westfalen. These are not independent offices. Furthermore, as part of the ‘the municipal family’, there is the Stuttgart Region European Office, a European Office of the Verband kommunaler Unternehmen (VKU—representing the interests of the local authority public utilities in Germany) and a European Office of the German Savings Banks Association (Sparkassen und Giroverband).

Within the joint working groups, heads of divisions (Fachreferent) of Länder and Federation meet each other or have joint information events with the EP or the Commission. This functions smoothly, according to one interviewee (interview 4, conducted on 23 February 2007).

The biggest German association is the Städtetag, with approximately 100 employees.

In this context, concrete support concerning individual applications is not provided, whereas strategic advice is, such as informing what kind of resources might be available for the project in question and to whom one should talk.

This means that from each ministry, one head of division works in the representation.

An Office maintained jointly by Hamburg and Schleswig-Holstein.

They work in the secretariat, in event-management or as janitors.

Four are from Bayern, they bring in the largest share of resources, while Baden-Württemberg and Sachsen have 1.5 positions each.

According to one informant (interview 3), his Danish colleagues can apply for a third additional year but, after that, the Danes have to return to Copenhagen.

One concrete example is funding for border regions. Furthermore, Bayern succeeded in getting agreement, within the context of Objective 2 funding, for an extra €75 million.

For instance, in the case of the office of three local government Land associations, municipalities contact the office if they have specific ideas and would like to know whether there are some sources of funding available to realize them. The office offers advice on programmes, informing, for instance, which programmes might be appropriate, arranging contacts with the Commission or with national contact points. As regards some funding programmes that are in great demand, for instance town-twinning projects, some further steps are taken. The offices may assist during the process of drafting applications by taking a close look at the drafts and coming up with ideas on how to optimize the chances of success for applications.

Many offices from that area are located in or near one particular street (avenue Palmerston). Those offices ‘form’ the Palmerston Group. The co-operation within the Baltic Sea States Sub-regional Co-operation (BSSSC) is also important. There is an intense co-operation between offices from Northern Germany, e.g. within the frame of Norddeutsche Zusammenarbeit (Northern German Cooperation), where representatives from those offices meet once a year to jointly evaluate the Commission's Work programme from the perspective of Northern German interests. In addition to this form of Nordic co-operation, all German Länder set up joint working group as regards specialist departments (e.g. economics).

See Article 23 Basic Law referred to above.

For instance, Schleswig-Holstein succeeded in demonstrating the necessity of an integrated maritime policy via the CoR into the Commission.

There is no direct translation that captures the meaning of the term in German. Some use ‘essential public provision’.