Towards a Segmented European Political Order

Differentiation in the European Union in Post‐Brexit and ‐Pandemic Times: Macro‐Level Developments with Meso‐Level Consequences

“…Reforms sometimes are sometimes characterized by the codification of developments that have already taken place (March and Olsen, 1989, p. 114) or that reform processes mainly involve sense-making and meaning-formation based on senses of identity (March and Olsen, 1989). The long-term development of differentiated political orders, such as the EU, has been observed to fit into this picture (Bátora and Fossum, 2020). It should thus be apparent that the development of a differentiated EU political order is often not deliberately designed as a result of purposeful processes but rather subject to constraints.…”

“…Brexit eventually opened a new chapter in the study of differentiation (Leruth et al, 2019). Some of the recent literature on crisis, disintegration and differentiation in Europe also combines explanations based on collective actors' cost–benefit calculations – such as the promotion of equality of opportunity among EU members (Jones, 2018) and institutionalist explanations focusing on how crises are channeled through and mediated by pre‐existing institutional frameworks and resources (for example, Bátora and Fossum, 2020). Brexit thus largely reinvigorated differentiation as a central focus of research in EU studies.…”

“…Empirically, it has been on the rise ever since the ratification of the Maastricht Treaty in 1992. As Euroscepticism progressively became more mainstream, disintegrative tendencies feature more prominently in Europe's political order (Bátora and Fossum, 2020;Gänzle et al, 2020). Membership withdrawals or centrifugal moves away from the EU, such as Brexit or Switzerland calling off negotiations on a partnership agreement in 2021, have therefore been coined conceptually as differentiated disintegration (Schimmelfennig, 2018).…”

Introducing the Study of Nordic Cooperation

“…Focusing, inter alia, on the so-called 'migration crisis, ' Webber (2019) further expanded on a second comprehensive theoretical contribution-post-functionalismarguing that Hooghe and Marks' (2019) approach is best equipped to understand the consequences of the crisis on European integration, as post-functionalism argues that "[m]ass politicization and the growth of identity politics are likely to create 'downward pressure on the level and scope of integration"' (Hooghe & Marks as cited in Webber, 2019, p. 8). Recent studies provide rich empirical probes of how the EU has responded to crisis, whilst some few studies also aim to theoretically explain mechanisms of how the EU tackle crisis, e.g., through disintegration (Vollaard, 2018), or concep-tually assess effects of crisis on the European political order, for example by pushing the EU towards differentiation and segmentation (e.g., Bátora & Fossum, 2019). Both Vollaard (2018) and Bátora and Fossum (2019) suggests that the EU has muddled through crises, either by member-states balancing different choices of exit, voice and loyalty (Vollaard, 2018), or institutionally through lock-in mechanisms influenced by pre-existing segmented institutional arrangements (Bátora & Fossum, 2019).…”

Europeisk integrasjon, offentlig forvaltning og statsvitenskapen

“…Helt siden 1952 har EUs integrasjonsprosjekt vaert karakterisert av en blanding av stegvise og differensierte politisk-administrative reformer (også kalt «muddling through») samt enkelte omfattende integrasjonsbyks fremover (Nelsen og Stubb 2014). Kriser håndteres på grunnlag av eksisterende politiske løsninger og institusjonelle arrangementer (Bátora og Fossum 2020;Olsen 2010). Historien viser at EU trolig i hovedsak vil håndtere koronakrisen gjennom tilsvarende stegvise og pragmatiske løsninger.…”