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

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meetings and two meetings a year and largely follows the NAP agenda. In June 2003, aworkshop was organised in order to link this working group and the one working aroundlabour market policies. Both working groups – the French and the German – havecontinuously commented on the successive NAPs.Finally, even where no new structures were set up – and this holds true for almost all NGOsinterviewed here, it is reported that the awareness about the European dimension increased.But the social NGOs have not only mobilized internally, they also tried to mobilise outside oftheir own boundaries. This is true particularly for Germany where several attempts weremade, in different regions and originating in different large welfare organisations, to connectthis OMC to the regions and the local authorities, without success, however. A project meantto increase the awareness about this OMC has been initiated by a group of NGOs and waslargely financed by the Communitarian Action Programme against social exclusion. Theopening conference took place in June 2005 (!) and three regional workshops are organized in2005-2006 in order to bring the different stakeholders together, sensibilise them about theEuropean anti-poverty strategy and exchange about approaches to combat poverty regionallyand locally. Having been at the opening conference myself, a deficit that one can regularlyobserve at these types of events is the absence, by and large, of representatives of the regionaland local government and the economy. Rather, one will tend to find representatives ofNGOs, of local administrations and eventually of the academic community. This structuraldeficit, the absence of common fora for all actors, obviously does not increase the chances offinding solutions accepted at least by a large majority 13 and helping to significantly reducepoverty and social exclusion.For France, it is reported that since 2003 and for two years, the NGOs have tried to organise aconference about the regional implementation of the NAP 14 . Whereas the centraladministration was apparently supportive in the beginning, tensions between the central stateand the regions have increased since the regional elections in March 2004 which resulted in ashift to the left: “It’s the big problem, in France, with respect to the European process, thatthere is no participation of the sub-national authorities whatsoever. We have tried, in 2005, to13 Even though the existence of such for a does not imply that all actors are speaking the same (ideological)language.14 Interview with the president of EAPN-France, 29.9.2005.
develop a consultative mechanism. It was not possible due to political reasons” 15 . Politicalactors do simply not wish to implement a process established by another political majority 16 .Unsatisfied with their consultation by the central administrations, NGOs in both memberstates have asked for regular working groups within the respective administrations to beestablished. This was the case in Germany in 2002, and in 2003 in France. In both cases, therequest was rejected, or, as in the French case, where a letter was sent, not even answered.Turning to the issue of information gathering and learning, the results are quitedisillusionating. Information about other member states’ policies and so-called good practicesis provided in the NAPs; this information is meant to support supranational learning processesby providing inspiration for domestic policies from abroad. Two thirds of the intervieweeshad not seen a single other NAP, the rest indicated having seen a few. Equally, only a few hadtaken notice of the Joint Reports of the Commission and the Council. Those who hadacknowledged a few NAPs stated that they did not influence own approaches and that the“good practices” were of limited use. This scepticism is widely shared, stemming fromdomestic experiences. In France, the successive governments did never include a single NGOpractice in their NAPs but restricted themselves to governmental programmes. In Germany,the NGOs succeeded to place a good amount of practices in one of the annexes (not as official“good practice”) of the NAP 2003-2005. NGOs generally criticise that these “good practices”are not sufficiently contextualised, lack information on their financing, and that it is not clearwhether the target groups would also qualify the policies as “good practices”. The scepticismtowards the NAPs is also inspired by the domestic experiences insofar as these are seen asgovernmental reports, aligning policies already in place with a marked tendency to keep silentabout shortcomings and difficulties of the governmental policies. Finally, some intervieweesmentioned the language barrier as a reason for not having read other NAPs.For NGOs, and in both member states, “learning” seems to have meant to discover theEuropean dimension of the fight against poverty and social exclusion. This is stated by severalof the interviewees in both member states. Here, without any doubt, EAPN and its nationalbranches have played a pivotal role in disseminating information and mobilising theirmembers.15 Interview Direction Générale de l’Action Sociale (DGAS), September 2005. The DGAS is the coordinator ofthe process in France.16 Interview NGO key officer, September 2005.
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