The Differential Empowering Effects of Europeanization on the Autonomy of National Agencies

Abstract

This article examines the influence of Europeanization on the relationship between ministries and agencies at the national level. The core argument is that the differentiated nature of the international environment (with policy development often transferred to the international level and policy implementation left at the national level) transforms national agencies into policy-developing actors that shape policies without being directly influenced by their national political principals. The increasingly common involvement of national agencies in European policymaking processes thereby increases these agencies' policy-development autonomy but does not change their role in policy implementation. We examine this argument by testing an innovative hypothesis-the differentiation hypothesis-on a combined data set of German and Dutch national agencies. Our empirical findings support the hypothesis in both countries, suggesting that similar effects can be expected in other contexts in which semiautonomous agencies are involved in transnational policymaking.

The Impact of the Eu on Agencification and Depoliticisation in Lithuania

“…This development is associated with the higher costs of politicisation in the Europeanised agencies, not only due to the control of EU institutions and their possible sanctions but also owing to the higher importance of their functions, which requires the appointment of more professional top managers. This conclusion is similar to the results of recent research on the impact of EU networks, which argued that the involvement of national agencies in EU policymaking increases their policy-making role, making it more difficult for parent ministries to monitor and control their performance (Bach, Ruffing and Yesilkagit, 2014).…”

Filling the gap in the European administrative space: the role of administrative networks in EU implementation and enforcement

“…During policy development and transposition, agencies are fairly attentive to their ministers (ibid., 10). These cannot be bypassed during transposition, given the need for binding national decisions (Bach et al 2015). During implementation, however, the agencies' more often act on behalf the Commission and sister agencies in the network (Egeberg 2006: 10-11).…”

“…Several authors have used PA theory (Egeberg and Trondal 2009;Maggetti 2007Maggetti , 2014aMaggetti , 2014bYesilkagit 2011), connecting EAN impact to intentional design, bounded rationality and control problems (Bach and Ruffing 2013), empowerment of agencies (Bach and Newman 2010;Bach et al 2015), strategic use of information (Danielsen and Yesilkagit 2014;Eberlein and Grande 2005) and the hierarchy between ministry and agency (Martens 2008a). At the level of individual agency members, organizational variables like vertical and horizontal specialization have been suggested (Trondal 2011).…”

“…At the same time, EANs raise a set of normative issues, related to the fact that EANs are mostly made up of civil servants and experts from the national and European administrations (Cengiz 2016). Mandating such administrative actors implies processes of depoliticization, devolving power towards the administration and blurring the lines of political responsibility (Bach et al 2015;Blauberger and Rittberger 2015: 374). The increased autonomy of regulatory networks reduces the influence of formal rule-making institutions (Danielsen and Yesilkagit 2014: 354), thus disempowering (supra)national majoritarian institutions and potentially the Commission as the Union's core executive.…”

Is there a ‘German school’ of comparative politics? An institutional perspective

“…This tradition has been continued (see, for example, Bach et al 2015) and extended to the complex subject of political and executive leadership at the European level, which is usually at least implicitly comparative (see, for example, Tömmel 2013;Müller 2016;Helms 2017;Tömmel and Verdun 2017).…”