EG-Sozialpolitik nach Verflechtungsfalle und Entscheidungslücke: Bewertungsmaßstäbe und Entwicklungstrends

Abstract

Until the 1990s, eC social policy was characterised by a joint-decision trap (Fritz W. Scharpf) characterized by a joint decision trap and a concomitant ‘corporatist decision gap’ (Wolfgang Streeck). The Maastricht Treaty, however, brought significant innovation in terms of EC competencies, majority voting, and corporatist decision patterns. The fact that some of these potential improvements have actually been put into practice — surprisingly for many — does not, however, mean that the problem solving capacity of the EC in social policy is satisfying. This article analyses several quite different yardsticks and shows that the ‘social dimension’ is more successful than was often expected, in the light of the less ambitious standards (closing labour law gaps induced by the Internal Market; Commission proposals compared to Council decisions). By contrast, the EC does little to fight devaluative pressures on the national social standards, and it does not yet make use of the specific potential for improvements in social policy which nowadays tends to exist on the supranational level rather than on the national one. Very recently, however, there has been a trend towards a new role for EC social policy in the 21st century: as a catalyst and, at the same time, corset for reforms decided upon at the national level.