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At the table or on the menu? Impact of eurozone membership on negotiations in the Council of the European Union

  • In 1999, a group of member states of the European Union launched a common currency, the euro. The political weight and institutional set-up of this group have prompted fears that eurozone members might dominate non-members. This thesis studies political dynamics between members and non-members of the eurozone. Specifically, it explores to what extent eurozone membership explains negotiation performance in the Council of the European Union – the core arena for negotiations among member states. To this end, the thesis uses an original dataset of 303 negotiations conducted under the co-decision procedure between 1999 and 2016. The thesis makes a two-fold theoretical argument. First, it is argued that eurozone members have an incentive to build “minimum winning coalitions” under exclusion of non-members, as this increases their gains in Council negotiations. Secondly, this process is enabled by the institutional setup of exclusive eurozone-only bodies, most importantly the Eurogroup. On this basis, it is hypothesized that eurozone members should have a higher probability of inclusion in a winning coalition in the Council (H1), especially in the Economic and Financial Affairs (ECOFIN) Council (H2), but perhaps also in other Council configurations (H3). It is furthermore hypothesized that inclusion of eurozone members in winning coalitions increased during the euro crisis (H4). Contrary to theoretical expectations, the analysis yields four null findings. Eurozone members were not more likely to be included in winning coalitions, independently if a proposal was negotiated in the ECOFIN Council or other Council configurations, and regardless if negotiations took place during the euro crisis. The thesis provides a possible explanation for this puzzling finding. An analysis of coalition patterns reveals that eurozone members were too divided to exercise their collective influence in the Council. Rather than acting as a cohesive bloc, eurozone states were split internally along traditional cleavages structuring conflict in the Council.

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Metadaten
Document Type:Doctoral Thesis
Language:English
Author(s):Jan Nagel
Advisor:Henrik Enderlein, Mareike Kleine, Uwe Puetter
Hertie Collections (Serial Number):Dissertations submitted to the Hertie School (02/2022)
Publication year:2022
Publishing Institution:Hertie School
Granting Institution:Hertie School
Thesis date:2021/09/14
Number pages:144
DOI:https://doi.org/10.48462/opus4-4207
Release Date:2022/01/11
Notes:
Shelf mark: 2022D002 + 2022D002+1
Hertie School Research:Publications PhD Researchers
Licence of document (German):Creative Commons - CC BY - 4.0 International
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