Territorial Cohesion of What and Why? The Challenge of Spatial Justice for EU’s Cohesion Policy

Mikko Weckroth,Sami Moisio

doi:10.17645/si.v8i4.3241

Abstract

Over the past two decades, both academics and policy makers have discussed the meaning of territorial cohesion in the context of the European Union (EU). This debate on the meaning and content of territorial cohesion is becoming increasingly important in a Europe that is facing multiple crises. This article contributes to the literature on EU’s territorial cohesion policies by tracing the ways in which territorial cohesion has been defined, framed and justified as an EU policy. We analyse public speeches made by the acting commissioners for Regional Policy and inquire into the Cohesion Reports from 2004 to 2017 produced by the European Commission. In particular, we interrogate both the meaning of the concept of territorial cohesion and the justifications for pursuing territorial cohesion. We conclude with some critical remarks on the relevance of economic production-based definitions and justifications for territorial cohesion policies. Accordingly, we argue that treating macroeconomic production as an indicator of territorial cohesion harmfully consolidates a narrow understanding of societal wellbeing and development and imposes on all regions a one-dimensional economic scale to indicate their level of development.

Highlights

Territorial cohesion is a peculiar, elusive and contested policy that has become part of the territorial construction or what authors have conceptualized as the “territory work” of the European Union (EU), especially since the late 1990s
Territorial cohesion discloses the ways in which EU policies and Social Inclusion, 2020, Volume 8, Issue 4, Pages 183–193 academic research on those policies are eventually coconstituted: All EU policies are influenced by academic work
The first result of our analysis concerning what territorial cohesion is is that the primary meaning attached to the policy concept of “territorial cohesion” during the programming periods 2000 to 2006 and 2007 to 2013 seems to refer to the level of regional disparities in economic production expressed through Gross Domestic Product (GDP)

Summary

Introduction

Territorial cohesion is a peculiar, elusive and contested policy that has become part of the territorial construction or what authors have conceptualized as the “territory work” of the EU (see Moisio & Luukkonen, 2017), especially since the late 1990s. An analysis of the evolution of a policy should render visible the ways in which a particular political economy as well as academic concepts and theories are built into the policy discourse This is important given that territorial cohesion is implemented by the channelling of public money across Europe. Given that territorial cohesion is a political and highly contested spatial policy—and under re-working within the EU apparatus—our analysis seeks to render visible some of the ways in which certain political economic reasonings receive a spatial character in the context of territorial cohesion policies over the past fifteen years or so

Analysing Territorial Cohesion Policy

Research Material

Findings

Concluding Remarks