Norm collisions in European Union sectoral governance during the COVID‐19 pandemic: How the European Commission reconfigures norms in crises

Abstract

This article argues that the COVID‐19 pandemic has incited the collision of norms in sectoral European Union (EU) governance and provided an open juncture for the European Commission to engage in norm reconfiguration. Herewith, the paper expands the conceptual scope of EU‐related norm research, which by focussing on the diffusion of norms within and beyond the EU has largely omitted dynamic perspectives on norms so far. We combine International Relations norm research with EU governance literature to scrutinise the normative underpinnings of the immediate crisis response within Commission sectoral strategies and working programs. Empirically, the paper focuses on the higher education and transport sectors, which have been particularly impacted by the COVID‐19 crisis and targeted by the EU crisis response. The interpretative‐qualitative analysis uncovers COVID‐19‐related collisions within the ideational constellation of EU governance and shows that the European Commission has engaged in different reconfiguration practices, potentially altering the norm constellation in the investigated sectoral governance areas.

Now they can cope? The Green Deal and the contested meaning of sustainability in EU sectoral governance

“…With their conception of governance architectures, Borrás and Radaelli (2011) have proposed a framework to assess the dynamics of normatively contested meaning within EU (multi-level) governance (also see our discussion in Felder and Stockmann, 2023). The authors define governance architectures as "strategic and long-term political initiatives of international organizations on cross-cutting policy issues locked in commitments about targets and processes" (Borrás and Radaelli, 2011, p. 464).…”

“…In this context, lock-ins are "path dependence that entrench technical, institutional, and behavioral systems with known technical and environmental disadvantages" (Seto et al, 2016, p. 427). In transport and mobility policy specifically, two examples of such lock-ins which are also reflected in the EU governance approach (Gössling and Cohen, 2014), are the dominance of individual motorized transport, generally dubbed as "car dependency" or "automobility (see, Paterson, 2007;Haas, 2021), and the entwinement of transport with economic prosperity and (in the 2 And indeed, not much later, also the emerging Covid-19 pandemic and more lately the energy crisis following the Russian invasion of Ukraine (see Dupont et al, 2020;Felder and Stockmann, 2023;Wiertz et al, 2023). EU case specifically) integration ("derived demand"; see Attard and Shiftan, 2015;García Mejuto, 2017).…”

“…First, the EU is shattered by what is increasingly widely understood to be a 'polycrisis' , underscoring the concurrent relevance of other competing ideational orientations for EU governance. There is room to suggest that the Commission has the capacity to link the Green Deal's initial objectives to crises such as those posed by the Covid-19 pandemic or the Russian invasion of Ukraine and may even use these as catalysts for normative reconfiguration (Felder and Stockmann, 2023). Indeed, the provisions for both the Next Generation EU pandemic reaction facility as well as the REPower EU program to react to the war-induced energy crisis provide ample links to the Green Deal and mobility as a focal sector thereof.…”