The OMC inclusion and national social NGOs: From enthusiasm to ...

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1. IntroductionFrom the first anti-poverty programme in the 1970s over the discussion about the Europeansocial model in the 1980s and 1990s to the introduction of the Open Method of Coordination(OMC) inclusion, the social dimension of the EU has remarkably advanced, even though itstill lags far behind the degree of economic and financial integration (Scharpf 1996) and mostprobably will continue to do so in the future due to strong national political resistance againstfurther harmonization in the field of social policy. NGOs did particularly benefit from thedifferent anti-poverty programmes as these and the support of the European Commission(hereafter Commission) led to the creation of the European Anti-Poverty Network (EAPN) in1990 which since became an important political lobbying organisation and informationprovider at EU-level (Halvorsen and Johansson 2005), gathering some 21 national povertynetworks as well as additional 26 European associations.What about national social NGOs, however? Where they capable of using the institutionbuildingat EU-level (de la Porte 2005) so as to increase their impact on domestic policydevelopment? This is the question that the present paper will address. More concretely, itaddresses the question how national social NGOs have reacted to and dealt with the OMCinclusion (2001-2005) and whether its framework has allowed them to increase their impacton national policy-making. National social NGOs have been chosen as the OMC inclusionclearly is an intergovernmental instrument. The realisation of its high ambitions, due to itsnon-bindingness, completely depends upon member states’ will to implement it. Therefore,the success or failure of this OMC must mainly be researched and evaluated at domestic level.In order to address this question, I am particularly relying on semi-structuredinterviews that I have conducted in France and Germany between January 2004 andSeptember 2005 1 . Furthermore, I have conducted semi-structured interviews with officialsfrom the Commission and several delegates both to the Social Protection Committee (7) andto its Indicator-Sub Group (6), the political and technical steering committees of this OMC aswell as 40 people who participated in the supportive peer review programme. Additionally,official statements from NGOs as well as governmental plans have been taken into1 For France, I am drawing on 12 in-depth interviews with involved actors that I conducted between January2004 and September 2005, four of which with the concerned administrations, two with a Sénateur which is at thesame time the president of the CNLE (see further down) and seven with representatives of the main NGOs,partly having leading functions within the French and European branches of the European Anti-Poverty Network(EAPN). For the German case, I am drawing on 19 in-depth interviews (three on the federal level, six on theregional level, two on the local level, six of national NGOs and two with involved researchers). The interviewswere conducted between May and November 2005.
consideration. The picture is completed by field research done by other scholars, more so inGermany than in France 2 .This contribution is a first account of the empirical findings related to the topic of interesthere. It therefore will contend itself with first ad-hoc plausibilisations, to be systematised andre-thought in a next step. The structure of the text is as follows. The next section will reviewhow the OMC inclusion can generally be researched and the place of social NGOs in itparticularly (2). The third part will proceed to the empirical account of the “relationship”between this OMC and national social NGOs, with a brief look at the EU-level (3). Finally, apreliminary explanation of the results will be provided before turning to a more generaldiscussion of the issues at stake (4).2. Researching the OMC inclusion in general and the role of national socialNGOs in particularThe OMC inclusion exists since 2000. At the end of that year, common objectives wereendorsed and one year later common indicators adopted. Member states agreed to writebiennial National Action Plans (NAPs) in which they lay out their policies and examples ofso-called good practices; the indicators can be found in the annexes. A Joint Report of theCommission and the Council follows which resembles more a summary than an evaluation ofthe NAPs. Since 2004, there have also been peer reviews 3 . Finally, a Communitarian actionprogramme against social exclusion is meant to support this OMC 4 .Researching the OMC inclusion – as well as other social OMCs – is quite difficult. This is sofor several reasons. First, this OMC has no binding elements at the EU-level other than thatthe member states did agree, in 2000, to develop such a process with common objectives andto write biennial action plans. However, as the common objectives are quite vague 5 and asmember states cannot be forced to translate them into national legislation or programmes, it isquasi impossible to causally relate a certain policy development to this OMC with any sort ofcertainty. Second, the much debated multi-level system that the EU forms adds to the(methodological) difficulties, leaving space for many intervening factors at varying levels of2 To my knowledge, only a single French researcher has conducted field research about this OMC.3 These take place 7-8 times a year. These take place in alterning member states, last one and a half days and aremeant to discuss and present particular “good practices” in greater detail, see Kröger 2006a.4 This action programme runs for the period 2002-2006 and mounts up to 75 million Euro – a small sumcompared with its ambitions. It is run by the Commission and has three motivations: foster research andstatistical work, support exchange of policies and networking.5 1) Access to employment and to resources, rights, goods and services, 2) prevention of the risks of exclusion,3) help for the most vulnerable and 4) mobilisation of all relevant actors.
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