POLI 359 Lecture Notes - Lecture 18: Neofunctionalism, Intergovernmentalism, Geopolitics
9 Aug 2019
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POLI 359 LECTURE 18
Lecture 18: Explaining cooperation in the EU
Recap:
• IMF and WB:
- the role of geopolitics (exam) → Stone (2004) and Dreher et al (2009)
- if there is an exam question on the IMF, bring in material from before the
midterm on informality
• Aid allocation
- who gets foreign aid?
- Which donors bypass?
- Bueno de Mesquita and Smith (2007) & Dietrich (2016)
4 theories of integration in the EU
1. Functionalism (Mitrany, 1933)
- dominant goal of actors is peace and prosperity
- divisions among nations may be solved by establishing a working web of
international functional institutions managed by the technical elite
- process of integration is gradual
- functional cooperation arises in the low-politics area of economics and
social life
2. Neo-functionalism (Haas, 1958)
- Premise: it assumes the decline in importance of nationalism and the
nation-state
- Actors: interest groups and political parties (below the nation-state)
- Utilitarian interest: integration is profitable
- Neo-functionalism has been widely used to explain EU integration
- In this theory, what is important is the economy → therefore there is a
democratic deficit in the EU because people in the EU are not accountable
to voters
- Neo-functionalism process
o Positive spillover effect → as soon as a market starts integrating,
there is a demand to integrate more and more (because the actors
benefitting want more and more → for example, when the EU
began to integrate the energy sector, and thus other industries
wanted this to happen for them) → this relates to the domino
effect
o Transfer in domestic allegiances → exports in effect EU countries
mobilize together for more integration (collusion across borders
between elites)
o Technocratic automaticity → EU integration is driven by
technocrats and voters and citizens in EU countries have little to
say about the process
3. Intergovernmentalism (Moravcsik)
- bargaining among states
- distinct between big states and small states
- emphasis on state preferences
- intergovernmentalism vs. neo-functionalism:
o any increase in power at a supranational level results from a direct
decision by governments
o integration, driven by national governments, is often based on the
domestic political and economic issues of the day
o the theory rejects the concept of the spillover effect that
neofunctionalism proposes
o the theory also rejects the idea that supranational organizations
are on an equal level (in terms of political influence) to national
governments
o in neo-functionalism the main actors are non-state, in
intergovernmentalism the main actors are state preferences
4. Supranational institutionalism
- Institutions – especially the voting system – matter in shaping the final
outcome
- Transnational interest groups collude with EU officials (against their own
governments)
- EU leads like Delors matter
- Supranational institutionalism vs. intergovernmentalism
o EU politics as a function of actors preferences and institutional constraints
due to unanimity rule or qualified majority smaller states affect the outcome,
and each member has a veto power
Research design
• DV: 1 if a new issue is included in the Amsterdam Treaty, 0 if the status quo
remains
• Independent variables:
- # of EU members in favor of the status quo
- large state position on the issue
- large state in favor of including the issue in the treaty
- large state in favor of excluding the issue in the treaty
• results:
- favoring supranationalism → every country large or small has veto
power, thus it is less likely that we see policy chance
The EMU
• let’s apply these theories to explain the establishment of the EMU (European
Monetary Union)
• crucial steps:
- Delors report: 3 stage approach to the EMU
- Maastricht Treaty: EMU framework and timetable
- Amsterdam treaty: growth and stability pact
Delors report:
