Abstract
On the basis of extensive new empirical evidence, this article offers an assessment of how post-devolution Wales has determined the strategies employed in attempts to engage with, and influence, EU policy-making processes. The primary focus of the article is on domestic political capacity construction, rather than specifically about the impact of European integration on devolved politics (although the two are closely intertwined). What does the involvement of Wales in the European Union tell us about the nature of devolved government in Wales, and, more broadly, the management of the United Kingdom's European policy post-devolution? Addressing broader concerns with multi-level governance, the article proposes a framework based on political capacity building as a novel way for capturing how regional authorities seek to negotiate a position for themselves between the competing pressures of centralisation and decentralisation.
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Notes
We refer to the Welsh Assembly Government throughout, though the decision was announced shortly after the May 2011 Welsh Assembly election that the term Welsh Government would henceforth be used.
Cole carried out interviews in Brussels and in Cardiff in 2004, 2008 and 2010. He acknowledges ESRC Grant number: L219252007 ‘Devolution and decentralisation in Wales and Brittany’ for the 2004 interviews. The 2010 interviews formed part of a project on the Civil Service in Wales, part of the activities of the ESRC-funded Wales Institute for Socio-Economic Research, Data and Methods (WISERD). Palmer carried out interviews in Brussels and in Cardiff in 2003 and 2009. She acknowledges the Leverhulme Trust Project ‘Multi-level Governance in the EU’ for the 2003 interviews.
We use the expression regional as the generic term for designating sub-state authorities within the EU.
Interview, Welsh Assembly Government, 2010.
The UK contribution on ‘Regions and Nations in Europe’ to the Convention on the Future of Europe, submitted by Peter Hain (then Minister for Europe), was drafted on the basis of a text initially co-drafted by the Welsh and Scots. On the issue of the Welsh language, intensive networking led not only to Welsh being given recognised status in the EU in 2008, but also to WAG leading on issues of minority and lesser-used languages.
Interview, 2004.
Interview, 2010.
Interview, 2004.
Interview, 2004.
Interviews, 2004, 2008, 2009.
Roundtable on Wales and Europe, Wales House, Brussels, 4 July 2008.
Interview, 2009.
Interview, 2002.
Interview, 2009.
Interview, 2009.
Interviews with WAG officials, 2009.
Interviews with Latvian officials, 2008; contribution made by the representative of the Latvian EU office to the Wales in Europe conference, July 2008.
Interview, 2009.
Interview, 2009.
A new Memorandum of Understanding between the UK and the devolved governments was agreed in March 2010, weeks before the UK general election.
Managing EU regional policy in Wales was initially delegated to the Wales European Funding Office, which set in motion a complex institutional structure based on 29 partly overlapping partnerships, with representatives of the public, voluntary and private sectors. The originality was that partnerships were formed using the ‘thirds’ principle: with equal representation from public, private/social and voluntary sectors. Project selection, in the Objective One and Objective Two areas, was made by these partnerships, and then confirmed by WEFO. But the process was heavily criticised by the private and voluntary sectors, who complained (in interviews) of over-complexity, administrative inefficiency and too long a time lag before grants could be operational. By 2009, management had come full circle, with WEFO now a division within the Welsh Assembly Government and a powerful political steering over project selection by Welsh politicians.
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Cole, A., Palmer, R. Europeanising devolution: Wales and the European Union. Br Polit 6, 379–396 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1057/bp.2011.17
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/bp.2011.17