The Evolution of a Common Public Policy in the Eu: is It Possible at All? - an Institutional Economics Analysis of the Eu (post-) Lisbon Strategy

Abstract: The current financial and economic crisis shows again that the 27 EU member states are not able to react unanimously to common challenges. So far, not even the “big” member states like France, Germany and the UK have been able to follow a unified approach to cope with the upcoming problems of a global recession. By following the approach proposed by Spiller and Tommasi (2007) our paper analyses whether an effective and efficient public policy in the EU is possible at all given the current institutional framework. According to this line of reasoning, public policies are seen as the outcome of complex intertemporal exchanges among politicians. They depend on the given basic institutions (like the constitution of a country) and on the characteristics of the political institutions which have evolved within the thus defined political environment. Together with the particular features of specific policy issues they set the framework for the resulting public policies and their qualities. Using this framework, we focus on the so-called Lisbon Strategy which is a first attempt to introduce a common public policy in the EU beyond that of creating a common market. Based on what has been achieved so far, we identify the main institutional features which limit the evolution of an effective and efficient common public policy in the EU. Besides, we make some proposals for the post-Lisbon Strategy which will be introduced in the upcoming year.