2016
DOI: 10.1080/13597566.2016.1236335
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Marble cake dreaming of layer cake: the merits and pitfalls of disentanglement in German federalism reform

Abstract: This article explains the zigzag of the stepwise federalism reform in Germany by accessing the theoretical concept of institutional incongruity. It is argued that the existing imbalance between competencies, policy problems and fiscal resources was further exacerbated as actors adopted inconsistent institutional 'layers' during the sequential reform. Two case studies on higher education and unemployment policy reveal that actors finally reverted to joint decisionmaking and revived ideas of solidarity in order … Show more

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Cited by 29 publications
(5 citation statements)
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“…Italy and Spain did not escape this trend towards decentralisation. In these countries, the dilemma between a stratified – but clearly arranged – set of competences (layer cake), versus an overlapping allocation of tasks and duties involving cooperation and bargaining (marble cake) (Kropp and Behnke, 2016), is resolved in such a way that SI is not so much the monopoly of a specific level of government, but, rather, involves shared steering of policy capacities. For this reason, this article focuses on how policy capacity is arranged between national and subnational governments rather than within units of government, and addresses the intergovernmental and territorial dimension of SI functions and how they are organised within the state.…”
Section: Social Investment Policy Capacity and Intergovernmental Rela...mentioning
confidence: 99%
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“…Italy and Spain did not escape this trend towards decentralisation. In these countries, the dilemma between a stratified – but clearly arranged – set of competences (layer cake), versus an overlapping allocation of tasks and duties involving cooperation and bargaining (marble cake) (Kropp and Behnke, 2016), is resolved in such a way that SI is not so much the monopoly of a specific level of government, but, rather, involves shared steering of policy capacities. For this reason, this article focuses on how policy capacity is arranged between national and subnational governments rather than within units of government, and addresses the intergovernmental and territorial dimension of SI functions and how they are organised within the state.…”
Section: Social Investment Policy Capacity and Intergovernmental Rela...mentioning
confidence: 99%
“…The importance of SI in Italy and Spain stems from the multilevel system (Agranoff, 1990) involving the state and local authorities, distributing a diverse set of tasks and duties among institutions and sectors. This arrangement reflects a 'marble cake' (Kropp and Behnke, 2016) approach to intergovernmental relations. Unlike 'layer cake' multilevel systems, where national and subnational responsibilities are clearly delineated, 'marble cake' systems display considerable overlapping and sharing of responsibilities.…”
Section: Introductionmentioning
confidence: 99%
“…However, now its shared‐rule with the EU is more illuminating. Germany's type of federalism has been described in numerous ways that pinpoint to its structural distribution of competences as well as the outcomes of this distribution: as “cooperative federalism” (Börzel, ; Jeffery, ; Scharpf, 2008), as “interlocking federalism” (Scharpf, ), as “federal with a stable equilibrium” (Braun & Trein, ), “unitary federal state” (Schmidt, ), “entangled multi‐level policy‐making” (Kropp & Behnke, ), “joint federalism” (Biela et al., ), and “integrated federalism” (Hueglin & Fenna, ). Germany's federalism is characterized by the commitment to consensus and harmonization between the Länder and the federal government on policy formulation, and this is in contrast to other types of federalism, such as the United States (Behnke & Mueller, ), contributing to its problem‐solving capacity from a process angle.…”
Section: Comparative Federalism Literature and Problem‐solvingmentioning
confidence: 99%
“…Kropp and Behnke () depict the zigzagging trajectory of German federalism looking at incongruity intrinsic to the game of power when Constitutional change is implemented and every change may lead to a new reform that postulates opposite goals. This institutional incongruity is typical of the change in the model, since it displays the incremental attempt to make reforms effective both in the light of societal and economic needs, and of political pressures by the parties.…”
Section: Change In the Pattern And Games Of Power In The Igrsmentioning
confidence: 99%