The Stein Rokkan Lecture 2016 Mission impossible? Reconciling economic and social Europe after the euro crisis and Brexit

Abstract

During the crisis, the European Union's ‘social deficit’ has triggered an increasing politicisation of redistributive issues within supranational, transnational and national arenas. Various lines of conflict have taken shape, revolving around who questions (who are ‘we’? – i.e., issues of identity and inclusion/exclusion); what questions (how much redistribution within and across the ‘we’ collectivities) and who decides questions (the locus of authority that can produce and guarantee organised solidarity). The key challenge facing today's political leaders is how to ‘glue’ the Union together as a recogniseable and functioning polity. This requires a double rebalancing: between the logic of ‘opening’ and the logic of ‘closure’, on the one hand, and between the logic of ‘economic stability’ and ‘social solidarity’, on the other. Building on the work of Stein Rokkan and Max Weber, this article argues that reconciliation is possible, but only if carefully crafted through an extraordinary mobilisation of political and intellectual resources. A key ingredient should be the establishment of a European Social Union, capable of combining domestic and pan‐European solidarities. In this way, the EU could visibly and tangibly extend its policy menu from regulation to (limited, but effective) distribution, reaping the latter's benefits in terms of legitimacy. The journey on this road is difficult but, pace Rokkan, not entirely impervious.

New Tensions over Social Europe? The European Pillar of Social Rights and the Debate within the European Parliament

“…In this regard, Ferrera (2017) highlights the existence of a compound dynamic of political tensions on Social Europe. The increasing difficulties of reconciling the social and economic dimensions of the European integration process, especially after the Euro crisis, have led to the emergence of a 'clash syndrome' in which old but exacerbated political divides overlap or intersect with new ones.…”

“…In this article, we do not reject previous approaches, but we intend to integrate existing theories on supranational conflict dynamics by considering the changed EU institutional and political scenarios and the impact of the recent crises on the European integration process. The 'clash syndrome' identified by Ferrera (2017) provides an interesting analytical perspective from which to grasp the still unexplored tensions that emerged within the EP on the European Pillar of Social Rights. As we will argue, these tensions went well beyond the traditional conflicts between left and right or pro versus against EU integration.…”

Free movement of people and cross-border welfare in the European Union: Dynamic rules, limited outcomes

“…These rules and rights have long been contested and their impact on the welfare state discussed (Kvist 2004;Hemerijck 2013;Blauberger and Schmidt 2014;Ferrera 2005Ferrera , 2017Anderson 2015;Conant 2002;Verschueren 2012Verschueren , 2015.…”

European Economic Governance in 2017: A Recovery for Whom?

“…This reflects the shadow side of the EU projectits policies often entrench inequalities, not only through the actual policies promoted, such as austerity, but also through the policy-making and integration structure itself. The imbalances we have discussed here reflect a broader asymmetry within European integration, one that favours deregulation and market liberalization over market correction and social regulation (Ferrera, 2017;Scharpf, 2013). Our contribution here shows how intersectional inequalities entrenched by EU economic policies, constitute a key feature of this asymmetry, which since the crisis and austerity, have now become even more acceptable to EU policy-makers and even more protected from contestation and democratic accountability in 2017.…”