The (False) promise of solutionism: ideational business power and the construction of epistemic authority in digital security governance

Obendiek, Anke Sophia; Seidl, Timo

doi:10.1080/13501763.2023.2172060

Cited by 24 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 30 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…It also includes representatives from companies such as Deutsche Telekom and Orange as well as large European and national business associations. EU actors earmarked substantial funds for the project, with the Commission aiming to contribute €2 billion (Obendiek & Seidl, 2023, p. 1319. In 2023, they set up a designated IPCEI called Next Generation Cloud Infrastructures and Services (CIS), which is supposed to fund initial industrial use cases with a volume of €3.5 billion.…”

Section: Geoeconomic Contextmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Government actors were hardly able to counteract this. Gaia-X's organizational structure and the dominance of private actors in the initiative strongly reflect the desire of member states to make this "a project of the industry for the industry" (Obendiek & Seidl, 2023, p. 1321. Private companies-both European and foreign-made use of this hands-off approach by the member states to shift Gaia-X's design logic further towards the advancement of their profit interests and the stabilization of their business models via public funds.…”

Section: Intervening Logics and Alliancesmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Drivers and Limits of the Geoeconomic Turn in EU Infrastructure Policy

Abels,

Bieling

2024

PaG

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

In recent years, the EU has increasingly applied state-interventionist practices to initiate and implement infrastructure policy projects. This stands in stark contrast to a phase of liberalization of infrastructure networks and services accompanying European integration and fiscal consolidation and infrastructure decay during the euro crisis. This article argues that the new state interventionism is strongly driven by the changing global constellation of a “new triad competition” where the EU is increasingly competing over infrastructures with the US and China. As a consequence, EU infrastructure policy undergoes a geoeconomic turn that aims to control transnational value chains and related political-economic spaces. Drawing on concepts of critical geography and international political economy, the article outlines the core features of this geoeconomic design logic of infrastructures and contrasts it with complementary or competing ones. The article substantiates these arguments by analyzing EU decision-making on two cases of high-tech infrastructure in the fields of communication and energy: the federated data infrastructure Gaia-X and the Hydrogen Strategy. Both cases provide evidence for the geoeconomic turn in EU infrastructure policy. Yet, the analysis also highlights that the turn is at times supported but also hampered by a capitalist logic that is reflected in the positioning of European and non-European businesses, as well as the EU’s reliance on private action. Furthermore, it illustrates that an ecological and a social-integrative design logic to key infrastructures are largely subordinated. The conclusions reflect on the discrepancy between the EU’s geoeconomic agenda and its less far-reaching implementation.

show abstract

Section: Geoeconomic Contextmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Intervening Logics and Alliancesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Drivers and Limits of the Geoeconomic Turn in EU Infrastructure Policy

Abels,

Bieling

2024

PaG

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Agencification in the EU stretches the confines of the European regulatory state to the maximum by extending to policy domains that were formerly the exclusive terrain of national institutions. Although the rise of the European regulatory state has long been acknowledged (Levi-Faur, 2011;Majone, 1994;Rimkutė, 2021), scholars have recently observed the growth of the European regulatory security state covering policy areas such as defence, cybersecurity, border control, and health security (Dunn Cavelty & Smeets, 2023;Kruck & Weiss, 2023;Obendiek & Seidl, 2023). To illustrate, in view of the recent global health crisis, EU institutions and member states have agreed to strengthen the European Health Security Union to address cross-border health risks.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Widening Authority–Legitimacy Gap in EU Regulatory Governance? An Experimental Study of the European Medicines Agency’s Legitimacy in Health Security Regulation

Rimkutė¹,

Mazepus²

2023

Preprint

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Agencification in the EU stretches the confines of the European regulatory state to the maximum by extending to policy domains that were formerly the exclusive terrain of national institutions. Although the challenge to legitimize EU-level agencies is widely acknowledged, scant empirical research has been done on the conditions under which EU-level epistemic authority prevails or fails. To fill this gap, we examine whether EU agencies are perceived as more legitimate when the scientific nature of their regulatory outputs is made explicit and whether they start facing grave legitimacy challenges when national-level stakeholders signal disapproval with their scientific recommendations. We draw on a survey experiment with Dutch local politicians to study their legitimacy perceptions about the European Medicines Agency (EMA) and its mandate to authorize vaccines in view of cross-border health security risks. Our data suggest that the EMA is regarded as a highly legitimate agency and that disapproval by national-level politicians and citizens does not undermine its epistemic authority in the eyes of local decision-makers. This study contributes to the scholarship on non-majoritarian institutions’ legitimation imperatives by introducing novel research avenues and analytical tools to continue rigorous empirical testing of the well-established theoretical and normative claims.

show abstract

The Institutional ‘Success’ of the CoFoE via the ‘New Generation’ Citizen Panels: The European Commission Leads the Public-Private ‘Citizen Turn’

Oleart

2023

Democracy Without Politics in EU Citizen Participation

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The (False) promise of solutionism: ideational business power and the construction of epistemic authority in digital security governance

Cited by 24 publications

References 30 publications

Drivers and Limits of the Geoeconomic Turn in EU Infrastructure Policy

Drivers and Limits of the Geoeconomic Turn in EU Infrastructure Policy

A Widening Authority–Legitimacy Gap in EU Regulatory Governance? An Experimental Study of the European Medicines Agency’s Legitimacy in Health Security Regulation

The Institutional ‘Success’ of the CoFoE via the ‘New Generation’ Citizen Panels: The European Commission Leads the Public-Private ‘Citizen Turn’

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About