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Public Goernance, Administration and Finances Law Review Vol.6.No. 2.(2021) • 83–100.
© e Authors 2022
DOI: 10.53116/pgar.2021.2.7
Socio-economic Governance in the EU
Ágnes Orosz*¤, Norbert Szijártó**¤
* Assistant Professor, University of Public Service, Department of Economic and International
Economics; Research Fellow, Institute of World Economics, Centre for Economic and Regional
Studies, e-mail: OroszAgnes@uni-nke.hu
** Assistant Professor, University of Public Service, Department of Economic and International
Economics; Junior Research Fellow, Institute of World Economics, Centre for Economic and
Regional Studies, e-mail: norbertszijarto@gmail.com
Abstract: is paper focuses on the complexity of socio-economic governance in the European
Union. We dene socio-economic governance as the process of governing societies in asituation
where no single actor can claim absolute dominance thus socio-economic governance is the
outcome of the interaction between European Union institutions (European Union decision-
makers) and member states (national policy-makers). Since the onset of the global nancial crisis
and the euro crisis a decade ago, social issues have become substantially prominent in EU
governance and policy debate. Furthermore, the Covid-19crisis brought again social issues to
the fore. ere is nodedicated social governance framework in the European Union but there are
several mechanisms (strategies, initiatives and regulations) through which social governance is
practiced. At the same time, the framework for European economic governance has substantially
been strengthened as aconsequence of the global nancial crisis and the euro crisis and can be
characterised by amatured but incomplete framework. On the one hand, this paper aims to
collect and investigate all governance tools related to economic and social issues in the European
Union, and on the other hand, this research examines the impacts of those governance tools on
member states.
Keywords: economic governance, social policy, socio-economic governance, European Union
1. Introduction
e European integration has survived various crises since its inception: the collapse of
the Bretton Woods system, the oil crises, the crisis of the European exchange rate mecha-
nism in 1992–1993, and most recently, the European Union was able to weather the
dramatic impacts of the global nancial crisis of 2008and 2009and avoided disintegra-
tion during the euro crisis. All these crises provided an impetus for strengthening the
governance of the European Union. Community-level responses to crises have created
an ever deeper and comprehensive framework for governance, particularly in economic
areas. is popular description or narrative of the European Union clearly congruent
with the reactive approach to the European integration based on the famous sentence of
84 Ágnes Orosz, Norbert Szijártó
Public Goernance, Administration and Finances Law Review • Vol. 6.No. 2.
Jean Monnet (1976): “Europe will be forged in crises, and will be the sum of the solu-
tions adopted for those crises.” However, it is worth taking into consideration that the
European Union project of combining the European single market, the Economic and
Monetary Union, and the actual architecture of the European governance framework is
still incomplete. Successive crises constantly test and challenge the current state of
European (economic and social) governance as has been the case with the coronavirus
crisis since the beginning of 2020.
Several factors, including the question of sovereignty, lack of willingness, unclear
division of competencies and lack of deep supranational redistribution among others,
hinders the great leap forward establishing acomplete economic union on the basis of
the actual economic, scal, nancial and social governance frameworks. Jones et al.
(2015) oer another explanation why European decision-makers postpone the radical
completion of the governance framework of the European Union. eir approach, the
so-called failing forward, merges two integration theories, the intergovernmentalism
and neofunctionalism, and claims that intergovernmental bargaining leads to incom-
pleteness because member states are having diverse preferences and always opting for the
lowest common denominator solutions. Moreover, if acrisis hit the European Union,
member states respond by again negotiating the lowest common denominator solution
to address that crisis. In this sense, successive crises can be considered triggers of the
spillover phenomenon from neofunctionalism. So, member states’ reluctance prevails to
perform the above-mentioned great leap forward, nevertheless, this creates continuous
but incremental deepening of the European integration, where the dierent stages of the
governance framework are perfectly separable along crises.
is paper investigates the complexity and evolution of the European Union’s
socio-economic governance framework. We dene socio-economic governance as the
process of governing societies in asituation where nosingle actor can claim absolute
dominance, thus socio-economic governance is the outcome of the interaction between
European Union institutions (European Union decision-makers) and member states
(national policy-makers). Since the onset of the global nancial crisis and the euro crisis
adecade ago, social issues have become substantially prominent in EU governance and
policy debate. Furthermore, the Covid-19crisis brought again social issues to the fore.
e global nancial crisis (and the euro crisis) and the coronavirus crisis provide break-
points in the evolution of both economic governance and social policy governance in
the European Union. us, we are able to separate three time periods regarding both
parts of European socio-economic governance.
e pre-global nancial crisis period represents our rst time period (between the
early 1990s and the eruption of the global nancial crisis). European economic govern-
ance can be characterised by the rules and regulations of the European single market,
the architecture of the Economic and Monetary Union, and scal rules of the Stability
and Growth Pact. EU directives covered relevant social policy issues during the pre-crisis
period, the Open Method of Coordination as aso ‘acquis’ provided institutionalised
harmonisation of social issues. Social policy institutions, in general, are built on non-
coercive initiatives for harmonising national social policies. Moreover, the Lisbon
Strategy, as a development plan, aimed to make the European Union the most
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Socio-economic Goernance in the EU
competitive and dynamic knowledge-based economy in the world capable of sustainable
economic growth with more and better jobs and greatest social cohesion.
e second period is a challenging decade between the global nancial crisis of
2008and 2009 and the ongoing Covid-19 crisis. e global nancial crisis hit hard
Europe and created asecond round of euro crisis undermining economic recovery in the
Southern periphery of the European Union. Ad hoc crisis response measures were
replaced by apurposeful institution building, the so-called new economic governance
of the European Union or Economic and Monetary Union 2.0, declared by the Five
Presidents’ Report in 2015and conrmed by the European Commission’s Reection
Paper published in late 2017.Moreover, we have witnessed the erosion of social safety
nets in numerous member states. e global nancial crisis (and the euro crisis)
evidenced in a sharp decline in economic and social well-being indicators, such as
increased unemployment, loss of income, rising poverty and increased vulnerability.
erefore, European Union decision-makers have eagerly worked on to strengthen the
social policy governance framework of the Community. Although a comprehensive
social policy governance framework has not been established, some pre-crisis initiatives
were incorporated into the European Semester. So coordination tools of European
socio-economic governance (including country-specic recommendations, in particular
social issues and the Europe 2020 priorities) were organised under the European
Semester and launched in 2010.Finally, since the mid-2010s, political guidelines (and
strategies) of the European Commission have signicantly strengthened to govern
socio-economic issues.
e second breakpoint is the coronavirus crisis erupted in the early 2020.Accurate
conclusions cannot yet be drawn regarding the evolving nature of the governance of the
European Union. Nevertheless, supranational responses to the Covid-19crisis initiated
by the European Commission partly envisions and determines the trajectory of future
evolution of the European socio-economic governance.
e separation of European economic governance and the governance of social
policy in the European Union is anecessary step, since there is an existing (matured)
framework for economic governance in the European Union; however, there is nodedi-
cated social governance framework, European Union decision-makers build on several
mechanisms (strategies, initiatives and regulations) through which social governance is
practiced. In this research our objective is to collect and investigate all governance tools
related to social and economic policy issues in the European union. Moreover, the
gradual evolution of economic and social policy governance framework in the European
Union generates permanent tensions between European Union bodies and member
states. If supranational institutions gain more competences over social policy issues–be
any of the following: monitoring, supervision, harmonisation, coordination, regulation
or complete control– then member states are required to delegate competences to
supranational level and thus lose competences (sovereignty) over policy issues, which is
not necessarily acceptable to all member states. So, this research briey studies how the
“hardening” socio-economic governance framework impacted the members states, how
member states adapted or disputed this kind of new intervention by the European
Commission.
86 Ágnes Orosz, Norbert Szijártó
Public Goernance, Administration and Finances Law Review • Vol. 6.No. 2.
e article proceeds as follows. e next chapter reviews theliterature, we build on
three strands of academic discourse: we dene governance related to the European
integ ration in anutshell, we determine economic governance and then we turn to the
governance issues of social policy in the European Union. e third chapter has two
parts and investigates the evolution of the European economic governance and the
European social policy governance. e fourth chapter attempts to unify economic and
social governance under the label of European socio-economic governance. And nally,
conclusions conclude.
2. Dening various forms of governance in the European
Unioncontext
Our theoretical framework is centred around three strands ofliterature. Firstly, we pro-
vide abrief review to dene the nature of governance in the European Union context.
Secondly, we investigate the European economic governance. And thirdly, we scrutiny
the governance of social policy in the European Union.
2.1. Governance in the European Union
ere are many ways to dene governance and there are many forms of governance.
Bevir (2012) provides asimplied denition: governance refers to all processes of gov-
erning undertaken by a government, market or network. Technically, governance is
asystem by which entities of an economy or state are directed and controlled. Other
scholars, such as Fukuyama (2013), relies on asingle actor regarding governance which
can be determined by agovernment’s ability to make and enforce rules, and provide ser-
vices. Kohler-Koch & Rittberger (2006) draw attention to the fact that governance has
become apopular research focus of European Union studies, but the denition of gov-
ernance still leads to confusion. is confusion can be solved by distinguishing between
the meanings of the conception of governance. us, Pierre (2000) provides two con-
cepts, the rst refers to state adaptation: “e empirical manifestation of state adaptation
to its external environment as it emerges in the late twentieth century” (Pierre, 2000, p.
3). e second deals with acoordination of social systems: “Conceptual and theoretical
representation of the co-ordination of social systems” (Pierre, 2000, p. 3). e rst
stresses ahierarchical structure for decision-making and the second oers asociety-cen-
tred approach.
Since the inception of the European Union (European Economic Community),
the question of governance has always been in the foreground. is popularity has
further increased since the launch of the European single market as the attention turned
to the policy-making in the European Union. e strengthened European Union policy-
making required new approaches and generated competing governance theories.
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Socio-economic Goernance in the EU
Some governance concepts are grounded on the multi-level nature of the European
integration. Multi-level governance is adecision-making process in the European Union
that vertically and horizontally spreads power (Marks et al., 1996; Bache et al., 2016). In
other words, regional integrations have multiple levels of decision-making centres,
including local, regional, national, and federal, thus governance in such complex systems
means the sharing of power among sub-national, national and supranational actors.
Other approaches also evolved to determine the nature of the governance of the
European Union. e ‘community method’ emphasises the role of supranational actors
such as the European Commission (Scharpf, 2003). Supranational bodies capitalise on
the transferred sovereignty, launch independent agendas to further support, harmonise,
coordinate or in extreme cases control specic policy areas. One strand of theliterature
of the ‘governance turn’ in European Union studies characterises the Union as aregula-
tory state (Majone, 1996). is approach claims that the European Union has reached
a high-level degree of political autonomy thus started exercising ‘political functions’
such as the provision of public policy. However, diverse national regulatory systems and
various preferences of national actors undermine the perfect functioning of aone-size-
ts-all supply of common public policy. Finally, scholars also argue for a network
governance in the European Union on the basis of public–private policy networks.
e Maastricht Treaty established anew version of governance, the open method
of coordination in the European Union as aresponse to the growing role of suprana-
tional decision-making in the Community. is new mode of governance was designed
for coordinating national economic policies via the use of recommendations and guide-
lines, instead of binding rules and regulations (Hodson & Maher, 2001).
We have demonstrated the various approaches to the governance of the European
Union. In order to provide asimplied version or acommon denominator of diverse
governance theories, we apply the approach of Peters & Pierre (2009). According to
Peters & Pierre (2009, p. 91.), the European Union is alarge territory with dierent and
complex economic, social and political structures, thus governance needs capacity:
“Governance implies the capacity of asociety to develop some means of making and
implementing collective choices.” In theory, institutions– supranational institutions,
rules and regulations–are tools to decrease the complexity of our life; in terms of the
European Union, institutions can be understood as an apparatus to govern the processes,
outcomes, preferences and behaviour through the maximisation of relevant actors’
benets. Empirically, this mechanism starts with the identication of a common
problem, and we can assume that common problems require common solutions.
However, reaching acommon solution in the nexus of member states, European Union
bodies and other actors is not easy. Member states insist on representing their own pref-
erences, therefore, the identication and decision on common goals generates long
lasting debates. If common goals are identied, the following step is to design and
implement the means (institutions) to achieve those purposes. And nally, this chain
ends with a feedback loop. rough this empirical process of governance, decision-
makers of the European Union are able to “govern” the complex structure of the
integration.
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2.2. European economic governance
Economic governance is apopular terminology in economics, political science and in
European Union studies as well. eoretically, the role of economic governance is to
ensure the proper functioning of markets, economic actions among actors and in general
all transactions that take place in the economy. According to Dixit (2003, p. 449), eco-
nomic governance is anecessary and obligatory part of the functioning of the economy:
“Almost all economic transactions need governance”. Scholars of institutional econom-
ics can quickly answer the question of what satises this need, their argument is that
legal systems properly and costlessly provide this service. Based on Dixit’s (2009)
approach, economic governance refers to the structure and functioning of the legal and
social institutions that support and determine economic activities and transactions by
protecting property rights, enforcing contracts and overcoming collection action dilem-
mas to administer physical and organisational infrastructure.
Since, the European economic governance is amatured framework in the European
Union, we can nd denitions provided by dierent bodies of the Community. e
European Parliament’s think tank denes economic governance as follows: “Economic
governance refers to the system of institutions and procedures established to achieve
Union objectives in the economic eld, namely the coordination of economic policies
to promote economic and social progress for the EU and its citizens” (European
Parliament, 2019, p. 1). e European Parliament also determines the policy areas of
economic governance that involves scal policies, macroeconomic issues, crisis manage-
ment, macro-nancial supervision and investments. e European Commission denes
European Union economic governance as to monitor, prevent and correct problematic
economic trends that could weaken national economies or negatively aect other
member states.
2.3. e European Union’s role in shaping social policies
Generally, social policy is a governmental interference with the aim to improve or
reform society. In amore detailed view, social policy consists of all means to meet human
needs for security, education, work, health and wellbeing. e European Union and its
member states share several objectives regarding social policy such as the promotion of
employment, improved living and working conditions, proper social protection,
dialogue between management and other members of sta, the development of human
resources with ensuring lasting high employment and the prevention of social exclusion
(European Parliament, 2021). European social policy coincides with the rst founding
treaties of the European Union. Hantrais (2007) claims that through the history of the
European integration, market-driven processes dominated over social policy objectives;
however, the social policy dimension of the integration has been present since the
launch of the project and has uninterruptedly gained more and more relevance through
time. e Lisbon Strategy reinforced the role of social policy without seeking any
harmonisation of national social policies.
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Socio-economic Goernance in the EU
e EU (bodies of the EU) is actively developing policies–employment and social
policies–to provide widespread practical benets to European citizens, for example: in
nding jobs, upgrading skills, coordination of social security schemes, ensuring better
working conditions, combating poverty and social exclusion, supporting the reforms of
national social protections systems, protecting and improving the health of citizens,
modernising health infrastructures, etc. ese policies and the provision of benets to
European citizens are on the one hand oen organised under comprehensive strategies
(such as the Lisbon Strategy, the Europe 2020Strategy, various social policy packages
and long-term operation programmes) and/or on the other hand, oen institutionalised
as elements of the European economic, social and legal governance (Employment Policy
Strategy, Open Method Coordination in the eld of social policy and European Social
Dialogue [Heise, 2012]).
e EU’s active intervention in European social policy leads to aquestion that how
much the EU prefers to inuence national welfare states and social policy models, and
what are the EU’s goals with the establishment of awide range of policies. In other
words, whether the EU intends to boost convergence among national social policies and
welfare state models? Or the EU just designs and creates minimum requirements for
social policy issues? Only few studies have tried to oer answer for these questions. De
la Porte & Heins (2015) investigate the EU’s post-crisis involvement in labour market
and social policy coordination. ey accentuate that strict budgetary institutions make
expansionary public spending dicult even in prosperous economies. Continuing this
argument, Graziano & Hartlapp (2020) explicitly state that former “social Europe” has
terminated. Alarge number of social policy initiatives, strategies and institutions were
replaced by macroeconomic governance tools ignoring social expectations, needs and
problems. In contrast, some papers highlight that increasing social policy spending and
strengthening welfare states are able to tackle the challenges posed by globalisation,
demographic changes, economic uncertainty and inequality (Starke et al., 2013;
Vanhercke et al., 2020).
3. e evolution of the European Union’s economic and social
policy governance framework–Empirical research
Our empirical research applies the framework of historical institutionalism through
which we can properly detect institutional changes in the socio-economic governance of
the European Union. Historical institutionalism embodies a complex framework to
understand the economic, political and social processes, and particularly concentrates
on the evolution of policy issues (policy changes). In astraightforward way, historical
institutionalism (HI) states that history matters, and for research purposes it is neces-
sary to identify the elements of policy-making which are stable through time (elen &
Steinmo, 1992; Pierson, 1994; Hall & Taylor, 1996; elen, 1999; Peters, 1999).
Historical institutionalism conceptualises the relationship between institutions and
individual behaviour as institutions shape individual’s behaviours; therefore, institutions
determine individual preferences. Moreover, it takes into consideration the asymmetries
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Public Goernance, Administration and Finances Law Review • Vol. 6.No. 2.
of power during decision-making processes, recognises path dependency and unin-
tended consequences–as institutions produce long-term intended or unintended paths
that structure anation’s response to new challenges–and nally, incorporates the role
of ideas, beliefs and mental models.
Drawing on historical institutionalismliterature, we analyse the institutional struc-
ture that had profound eect on shaping the EU’s economic and social policy
governance. Historical institutionalism accentuates how timing, sequencing and path
dependence in casual processes impact institutions, and thus shape social, political and
economic behaviour and change (Farrell & Newman, 2010). In the spirit of the histor-
ical institutionalist framework, this paper concentrates on the long-term trajectory of
the governance of the European Union economic and social policies. In this paper we
study the changing landscape of European economic and social policies and adherent
institutions, rules and regulations.
3.1. e evolution of European economic governance
e pre-global nancial crisis period of the European integration can be characterised
by the oen-used half-built house analogy. National monetary policies were delegated
to supranational level to the European Central Bank and the European System of
Central Banks, but scal policy remained decentralised but coordinated under the
Stability and Growth Pact. e two major pillars, the supranational monetary policy
and the rule-based scal policy were augmented by some ‘so’ coordination mechanisms
of nancial supervision and structural issues. In general, we can state that the tools of
the European economic governance during this period had limited capacity to inuence
economic outcomes and correct economic failures.
e primary objective of the European Central Bank was and is to achieve price
stability, and price stability means to anchor the ination rate at 2% or below. As
asecondary objective, without compromising price stability, the European Central Bank
supports general economic policies in the European Union (more accurately in the
Eurozone) such as economic growth, competitiveness, employment, social development
and the protection of environment.
Regarding the supervision of national scal policies, the Maastricht Treaty deter-
mined limits to government decits to 3% of GDP and public debt levels to 60% of
GDP if amember state would prefer to join the Eurozone. Later, this scal provision
was institutionalised under the Stability and Growth Pact to strengthen the monitoring
and coordination of national scal and economic policies and to enforce the decit and
debt limits instituted by the Maastricht Treaty. e preventive arm of the Stability and
Growth Pact ensures sound budgetary policies over the medium term: member states
are obliged to submit an annual Stability (for Eurozone countries) or Convergence (for
non-Eurozone member states) Programmes (and National Reform Programmes). And
the corrective arm of the Pact (namely the Excessive Decit Procedure) deals with the
non-compliance with sound public nances, and non-compliance with these recom-
mendations may lead to sanctions for member states. In 2005, the Stability and Growth
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Socio-economic Goernance in the EU
Pact went through areform process, and the ‘new’ Stability and Growth Pact better
considers country-specic circumstances and strengthens surveillance and coordination
of national scal policies. Moreover, the Excessive Decit Procedure was also amended
in order to respond easier and faster to non-compliance.
e Single European Act–the principle of four freedoms–ensures the free move-
ment of capital, labour, goods and services among member states of the European
Union. e European single market is the common denominator of member states
enhancing market-driven processes inside the regional integration. e free ow of
capital contributed to the deepening of nancial integration; nevertheless, decision-
makers of the European Union missed to set-up institutions related to nancial
supervision, regulation and monitoring and keep pace with the increasing nancial
integration. Only some harmonisation took place (the Financial Services Action Plan
and the Lamfalussy Process), moreover, the European Union institutionalised the Basel
I and Basel II regulations to govern the nancial and banking sector.
is framework was augmented by some so law initiatives such as the Broad
Economic Policy Guidelines and the European Macroeconomic Dialogue. ese plat-
forms were organised around discussion and information sharing without any binding
rules and regulations (Heise, 2012). Finally, it is worth emphasising, that during this
decade, the European Union had ahorizontal long-term project, the Lisbon Strategy
that aimed to transform the Union into the most competitive region in the world.
Potential results of the Lisbon Strategy were washed away by the global nancial
crisis at the end of the decade. e European Union (and the Economic and Monetary
Union) faced the most severe challenge of its existence so far; the global nancial crisis
and the subsequent Euro crisis have revealed various shortcomings of the economic
governance framework of the European Union: asymmetrical institutional structure of
the monetary union, poor or inadequate economic governance framework and power-
less regulatory systems, strong core-periphery dichotomy, and nally diverse welfare and
social structures. In summary, the heterogeneity of member states seemed to be an
unmanageable problem for European Union decision-makers.
Generally, the European economic governance is made up of four closely interre-
lated building blocks: monitoring of national economic policies, prevention, correction
and enforcement. e European Commission plays acrucial role in this new economic
governance framework by regularly monitoring macroeconomic developments of
member states to detect macroeconomic problems, unsustainable macroeconomic
trends and changes in member states’ competitiveness (Verdun, 2015). is framework
has been organised into annual cycles under the European Semester, in which the bodies
of the European Union and national governments have to carry out tasks related to
macroeconomic and budgetary areas in specic times and in specic order. Sound public
nances, avoiding substantial macroeconomic imbalances, implementing structural
reforms and facilitating economic growth and employment are the major objectives to
be achieved by the European Semester. However, other European Union bodies (and
tasks) represent inherent parts of the new economic governance framework.
e European Central Bank played a crucial role resolving the euro crisis. is
activity no longer aimed at achieving a stable inationary environment, but rather
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Public Goernance, Administration and Finances Law Review • Vol. 6.No. 2.
targeted the stability of the whole Eurozone economy. To carry out this task, the
European Central Bank has increasingly focused on the application of non-conventional
monetary instruments to clean-up the transmission mechanism channels, boost
economic recovery in crisis-ridden member states and support nancial stability through
large-scale renancing programs to commercial banks. Under a specic measure,
Outright Monetary Transactions, the European Central Bank ocially fullled the
lender of last resort function vis-á-vis sovereign member states of the Eurozone (De
Grauwe, 2013).
Since the eruption of the euro crisis, European Union decision-makers have signi-
cantly consolidated the scal framework. e new scal governance framework can be
characterised by the strengthening of rule-based scal regulations (Eyraud & Wu, 2015)
and creating apermanent rewall to backstop nancial contagion and support Eurozone
member states (Gocaj & Munier, 2013). e rule-based scal regulations are the
followings:
Ƿ e Six-Pack, introduced in 2011, aimed to develop and strengthen the Stability
and Growth Pact by ensuring the viability of national public nances through
either preventive and corrective actions and to reduce macroeconomic
im balances of member states.
Ƿ e Compact reinforced the initiative of the Six-Pack. Furthermore, the Treaty
on Stability, Coordination and Governance contains asecond and third pillar
above the Fiscal Compact. e objective of the second pillar was to bolster
economic governance and convergence among Eurozone member states, while
the third pillar formulated the Euro Summit.
Ƿ e “Two-Pack” improved budgetary coordination through the introduction of
acommon budgetary timeline and asystem of enhanced surveillance.
e European Union (as well as the Eurozone) lacked apermanent rewall or arescue
mechanism for sovereigns because of the strict “no bail-out clause”. In 2009, Greece
ocially requested nancial assistance from the decision-makers of the European
Union, and as the euro crisis escalated, decision-makers of the European Union had
noother choice than to establish rst temporary rewalls and then apermanent rewall
to provide nancial assistance to crisis-ridden member states and in general to prevent
the disintegration of the Eurozone. e temporary measures (rewalls) were unable to
backstop contagion in the Southern periphery of the European Union, so apermanent
rewall, namely the European Stability Mechanism, was created by melting the two
temporary mechanisms into one.
e European Union’s crisis management heavily concentrated on monetary and
scal policies in the rst years of the euro crisis. Responding to the global nancial crisis,
decision-makers of the European Union created amacroprudential supervisory body,
the European Systemic Risk Board, to regularly monitor systemic risks. Amicropruden-
tial supervisory body, the Banking Union, was only launched a few years later in
2014(Howarth & Quaglia, 2014). e Banking Union consists of aSingle Rulebook
and three pillars of supervision, resolution and insurance. e elements of the Banking
Union are the followings:
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Ƿ Single Supervisory Mechanism: this mechanism is the core of the supervisory
activities by overseeing all Eurozone and European banks (approximately
6,000banks).
Ƿ Single Resolution Mechanism: eective and rapid treat of banking crisis to mini-
mise impacts on the real economy. An element of the mechanism, the European
Resolution Fund, will be a permanent rewall for European banks in the
mid-2020s.
Ƿ European Deposit Insurance Scheme: the objective is to cover all retail deposi-
tors (but it is under negotiations).
Reforming the European economic governance also aimed at boosting competitiveness
and structural reforms that were neglected issues prior to the global nancial crisis. Two
instruments were created to deal with the obstacles of such reforms: the Euro Plus Pact
and the Macroeconomic Imbalance Procedure under the Six-Pack. e aim of the Euro
Plus Pact is to enhance structural reforms (improve competitiveness, employment,
nancial stability and scal stance of participating countries). Parallelly, the task of the
Macroeconomic Imbalance Procedure is to identify, prevent and address the emergence
of adverse macroeconomic imbalances that could negatively aect economic stability of
member states, or the European Unions as awhole.
Summarising, the European economic governance has been substantially altered
since the global nancial crisis. On the one hand, new objectives have emerged during
the euro crisis, and on the other hand, new institutions, instruments, rules and regula-
tions were created to tackle challenges stemming from the euro crisis and reach and
satisfy new objectives.
3.2. e evolution of social policy governance in the European Union
e European Council called for a fundamental transformation on its meeting in
2000in Lisbon. Anew strategic goal for the European Union was established in order
to strengthen employment, economic reform and social cohesion as part of aknowledge-
based economy (European Parliament, 2000). e new feature of this agenda explicitly
coupled economic and social agendas. To achieve these aims, the social model needs to
be modernised, while ensuring long-term sustainability of the social security systems in
the light of the ageing process, participation rates should be increased (Caminada et al.,
2010). e Lisbon strategy represented a twofold ambitious goal for the European
Union: “To transform the European economy of the 21st century (and make it the most
competitive knowledge-based economy in the world) and to innovate EU governance
through new forms of interaction between national practices and European objectives”
(Natali, 2010, p. 4).
In order to achieve convergence in the eld of social inclusion, the European Union
adopted an appealing approach, the “Open Method of Coordination” (OMC) as anew
form of EU governance. OMC is created as part of the employment policy and the
Luxembourg process, dened as an instrument of the Lisbon strategy (2000) (Eurostat,
94 Ágnes Orosz, Norbert Szijártó
Public Goernance, Administration and Finances Law Review • Vol. 6.No. 2.
2014). e OMC as dened by the Lisbon European Council (European Parliament,
2000):
Ƿ Implementation of the strategic goal will be facilitated by applying anew open
method of coordination as the means of spreading best practice and achieving
greater convergence towards the main EU goals. is method, which is designed
to help Member States to progressively develop their own policies, involves:
■ xing guidelines for the Union combined with specic timetables for
achieving the goals which they set in the short, medium and long terms
■ establishing, where appropriate, quantitative and qualitative indicators and
benchmarks against the best in the world and tailored to the needs of dierent
Member States and sectors as ameans of comparing best practice
■ translating these European guidelines into national and regional policies by
setting specic targets and adopting measures, taking into account national
and regional dierences
■ periodic monitoring, evaluation and peer review organised as mutual learning
processes
In general, OMC is aform of EU so law, aprocess of policymaking which neither leads
to binding EU legislative measures nor requires Member States to change their law. e
open method of coordination aims to spread best practices and achieve greater
convergence towards the main EU goals. is process reduced the member states’
options in the eld of employment policy, which was designed as an alternative to the
existing EU modes of governance (Eurofound, 2010). Even though the open method of
coordination is not binding, aso law can also be eective, because it allows for policy
experimentation and better problem denition. Regarding the diversity within the
European welfare models, so law is more suitable enabling dierent policy solutions in
dierent member states. In addition, OMC facilitates policy learning through the
regular exchange of ideas, deliberation, peer reviews, diusion of discourses,
“socialisation”, and bottom-up experimentation (Büchs, 2009).
OMC has been implemented in the areas of social inclusion, health care and long-
term care and pensions (social OMC). e social OMC is a voluntary process for
political cooperation based on agreeing common objectives and measuring progress
towards these goals using common indicators. e process also involves close co-opera-
tion with stakeholders, including Social Partners and civil society (European
Commission, 2014).
OMC is used by member states to support the denition, implementation, and
evaluation of their social policies and to develop their mutual cooperation. Atool of
governance based on common objectives and indicators, the method supplements the
legislative and nancial instruments of social policy. It is part of the implementation of
the process of coordination of social policies, particularly in the context of the renewed
Lisbon Strategy. e single social OMC established in 2005applies to the elds of:
1.the eradication of poverty and social exclusion; 2.guaranteeing adequate and sustain-
able pension systems; and 3.providing accessible, high-quality and sustainable health
care and long-term care (EUR-LEX, 2008).
Public Goernance, Administration and Finances Law Review • 2.2021
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Socio-economic Goernance in the EU
OMC can be understood as a building block of the “European Social Model”,
however there are optimists and pessimists about the success of this process. e
European Social Model refers to the institutional arrangements comprising the welfare
state (transfer payments, collective social services, their nancing) and the employment
relations system (labour law, unions, collective bargaining). e general term “social
model” refers to “ideal-types” in the Weberian sense, conceptual abstractions of distinc-
tive and central commonalities derived from avariety of empirical situations. “Ideal-types
are designed to help social analysis by virtue of their capacity for elucidating the under-
lying similarities and dierences across arange of complex social phenomena” (Martin
& Ross, 2004, p. 11). OMC instruments can strengthen “social Europe”, both at EU
level and the performance of national welfare states. “e European Union, acting as
a ‘semi-sovereign’ policy system, seems slowly but surely to be carving out a distinct
‘policy space’ regarding social policy–aspace which may gradually work to rebalance
‘soly’ and ‘from below’ the current structural asymmetry between negative and positive
integration” (Ferrera and Rhodes, 2000, p. 278).
Beside the optimistic views, there are several pessimists who doubt that this instru-
ment is powerful enough to balance the negative and positive consequences of
integration (Scharpf, 2002) and improve national welfare state performance. Pessimists
argue that European integration is apotential challenge for the national welfare states
because the creation of the single market increases competitiveness pressure which
might lead to adownward adjustment of social standards. Additionally, with the crea-
tion of the Eurozone, member states are nolonger able to assign an individual monetary
policy, which may put additional direct pressure on welfare systems (Büchs, 2009).
It can be concluded that on the one hand, there is atheoretical argument that
welfare states have become more similar, on the other hand, the European Union
promotes closer social policy coordination, the need to “reinforce”, “improve” and
“preserve” the “European Social Model” (Büchs, 2009).
Even without the eects of the crisis, the Lisbon Agenda had produced mixed
results, calling for revision (Armstrong, 2012). Europe 2020, as the successor of the
Lisbon Strategy is aimed at social purposes as well, creating conditions to deliver
a higher level of well-being for European citizens by 2030 and beyond. e Europe
2020Strategy was designed as aEuropean exit strategy from the global economic and
nancial crisis that started in 2008, targeting to improve the competitiveness of the EU
and achieve sustainable growth (Bongardt & Torres, 2010).
Europe 2020agenda presented itself as an integrated policy strategy with astrategic
focus based around the mutually reinforcing objectives of “smart”, “sustainable” and
“inclusive” growth. ere are seven “agship initiatives” in thematic areas: Digital
agenda for Europe, Innovation Union, Youth on the Move, Resource Ecient Europe,
An Industrial Policy for the Globalisation Era, An Agenda for New Skills and Jobs and
European Platform against Poverty. Each agship initiative acts as an umbrella vehicle
for more specic initiatives and, deploying arange of tools and instruments: e.g. legisla-
tion, non-binding recommendations, EU funds, policy coordination processes. Policy
proposals associated with achieving the economic aims of growth and competitiveness
96 Ágnes Orosz, Norbert Szijártó
Public Goernance, Administration and Finances Law Review • Vol. 6.No. 2.
must, nonetheless, take their social implications into account, meaning the social dimen-
sion of Europe 2020(Armstrong, 2012).
Europe 2020’s social agenda is the basis for “creating asomewhat stringent social
snake binding member states to remain within certain quantitative bands aer reaching
the headline targets (e.g. in terms of social inclusion levels) but also for establishing
a fully-edged EU system of social protection” (Ferrera, 2010, p. 65). e OMC
processes in the social sphere of the Europe 2020 strategy have remained largely
untouched (Michalski, 2013). It is apossible threat to Europe 2020’s social dimension
that it will lose out in the competition for political time and attention.
e OMC and any social policy coordination have been implemented in the areas,
where the EU has no formal competence and are regulated under the subsidiarity
principle.
e asymmetries in social policies within the European Union, especially in the
European South, has become even more stressed due to the recent economic crisis, since
“the politics of austerity predominantly aect the welfare state, hitting drastically social
rights, afact with explosive eect in social cohesion” (Zambeta, 2014, p. 3).
However, there has been political conguration and commitment to EU level social
policy; the initial dierences have remained salient. e eects of the recent nancial
and economic crisis on social policy divergence have exceeded the aermath of any
political tools (e.g. OMC) to promote EU level social policy convergence. e contin-
uing social OMC has been challenged by the nancial and economic crisis, it is crucial
to formulate ameaningful and substantive social dimension of EU policies.
4. Socio-economic governance in the European Union
Since the onset of the global nancial crisis and the euro crisis, social issues have become
substantially prominent in European Union governance and policy debate. Furthermore,
the Covid-19crisis brought again social issues into the fore.
We assume that the European socio-economic governance is the process of
governing societies in asituation where nosingle actor can claim absolute dominance,
thus socio-economic governance is the outcome of the interaction between European
Union institutions (European Union decision-makers) and member states (national
policy-makers). is approach is clearly based on the multilevel nature of the European
integration with supranational, national and sub-national actors. Moreover, socio-
economic governance in the European Union is substantially limited. Firstly, the
European Union decision-makers and national policy-makers do not necessarily accept
even the existence of socio-economic governance, rather it is treated as two separate
policy areas. European economic governance has been signicantly strengthened over
the past decade; however, it is still incomplete, e.g. there is no scal union in the
European Union (or in the Eurozone), or there is nofully-edged Financial Union. e
governance of the social policy in the European Union is almost primarily based on so
law with limited binding rules and regulations. Additionally, the role of the European
social policy has been considerably increased during the last two decades, its
Public Goernance, Administration and Finances Law Review • 2.2021
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Socio-economic Goernance in the EU
institutional set-up has also been reinforced and recongured, but eective institutions
have not been established. So, socio-economic governance can be referred to as ahalf-
built house. Social policy lost in the struggle for competences between the European
Union bodies and member states. Secondly, the impacts of the euro crisis and the actual
coronavirus crisis clearly demonstrated an active relationship between the European
economic governance and the European social policy governance. For instance, budg-
etary policy and social policy are inseparable, technically, social policy expenditures
(nancing the social safety net, education, pension and so on) represent the largest part
of the expenditure side of national budgets. Notwithstanding, this interaction did not
reach into the spotlight of decision-makers, meanwhile economists and political scien-
tists have long been investigating the issue (Vanhercke et al., 2020).
e shortcomings of the European socio-economic governance are crystal clear.
en, what can be highlighted as positive? Initially, the European economic governance
consisted of asupranational monetary policy and arule-based scal policy. As aresponse
to the global nancial crisis and the euro crisis, this governance framework has been
augmented by several new institutions, rules and regulations. On the one hand, this
process generated an overly complex system of economic governance, but on the other
hand, some new institutional elements now address areas, such as employment, pension
system, healthcare system, that are already close to social policy. Euro Plus Pact, the
Macroeconomic Imbalance Procedure and the European Semester were the most
important steps in this direction. Verdun & Zeitlin (2018) refers to the European
Semester as a new architecture of European Union socio-economic governance.
Moreover, Zeitlin & Vanhercke (2018) emphasise the socialisation of the European
Semester, through the European Union’s social policy objectives translated into concrete
claims. Yearly rounds of country-specic recommendations transmit the social policy
priorities of the European Union to the member states, moreover, there is an intensied
social monitoring of national reforms, and an enhanced decision-making role for
European Union social and employment actors. A deeper social policy governance,
slowly and gradually but surely, gains ground in the European Union. And the
strengthening of European social policy governance will eventuate in the creation of
eective socio-economic governance framework.
5. Conclusions
e economic crisis rapidly dismantled the well-being and welfare structures and states of
European countries; thus, adecade of prosperity and development fell into the dust. e
global nancial crisis was followed by the euro crisis when the countries of the Southern
periphery and Ireland went bankrupt again. Skyrocketing unemployment and years of
economic uncertainty substantially increased social spending in European countries.
Adverse eects of economic globalisation have intensied in European countries, emerging
social risks, economic uncertainty, and rapidly growing inequality posed another challenge
for social policies within the European Union. Since post-crisis economic recovery has not
been able to ensure rapid increase in individual well-beings and provide sucient number
98 Ágnes Orosz, Norbert Szijártó
Public Goernance, Administration and Finances Law Review • Vol. 6.No. 2.
of jobs, social dissatisfaction started growing larger. Other shocks such as Brexit and the
migration crisis generated additional problems and concerns, which can lead to asurge in
social expenses, meanwhile revenues have been stagnant.
Since the end of the 20th century, European states have been constantly challenged
by three interlinking factors, namely globalisation, demographic changes and new social
risks (Pierson, 2007), resulting in rapid changes putting the European welfare states
under constant pressure to adapt. ese challenges are accompanied with the harmful
eects of the 2008–2009nancial and economic crisis and the new unknown eects of
the current processes. Covid-19has aected the EU and its member states in dierent
ways; however, the EU have been able to set up arecovery plan, ‘Next Generation EU’
which integrates social and economic measures into the proposal for a 2021–2027multi-
annual nancial framework (European Commission, 2020).
Summarising, we have displayed the transformation of the European socio-
economic governance; even though that this framework has substantially been
reinforced and recongured by the decision-makers of the European Union (the combi-
nation of new institutions, instruments, rules and regulations), aer aseries of crises, it
is still incomplete. Nevertheless, a future crisis will test again this framework, and
scholars will have enough information to evaluate the eciency, resilience and depth of
the new European socio-economic governance. Given its complex nature, the current
EU governance system and its complicated and slow processes cannot oer rapid and
eortless solutions for economic and social problems. Good framework conditions and
incentives at European level can simplify the national implementation of dierent
economic and social policies.
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