City Representation Offices in Brussels: Which Practices for Which Objectives?
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CITY REPRESENTATION OFFICES IN BRUSSELS: WHICH PRACTICES FOR WHICH OBJECTIVES? A comparative study inside influencing strategies and administrative best practices for cities acting individually at the European level Master Thesis Course Code: USG6250 Théo Fievet Spring 2017 Master thesis is executed while an intern at the International Institute of Administrative Sciences in Brussels, Belgium. The responsibility of the content of the research is with the author only. The research does not in any way express the opinion neither of the International Institute of Administrative Sciences nor of the organisations that have contributed to this research. The author expresses his deep gratitude to all of those who have contributed to the completion of this master thesis. Title: City representation offices in Brussels: which practices for which objectives? Sub-title: A comparative study inside influencing strategies and administrative best practices for cities acting individually at the European level Student: Théo Fievet [email protected] https://www.linkedin.com/in/th%C3%A9o-fievet-9a473665/ Date of submission: 7th July 2017 Master European Governance 2015 – 2017 Utrecht University & Masaryk University Utrecht Student ID: 6046891 | Masaryk Student ID: 777657 Utrecht University Supervisor: Prof. Dr. L.A.J. (Linda) Senden / [email protected] Faculty of Law, Economics & Governance / Utrecht School of Governance Bijlhouwerstraat 6, NL-3511 ZC Utrecht, The Netherlands Masaryk University Supervisor: Dr. Vratislav Havlík / [email protected] Faculty of Social Studies / Department of International Relations and European Studies Joštova 218/10, 602 00 Brno, Czech Republic International Institute of Administrative Sciences Supervisor: Dr. Fabienne Maron / [email protected] Executive Secretary of the European Group for Public Administration & Scientific Administrator of the International Institute of Administrative Sciences Rue du Commerce, 96, 1000 Brussels, Belgium 1 Abstract Urbanization and calls for legitimation are two trends making the connection between cities and the policy-making system at European Union level more important than ever. The implication of cities, which represent most of European population and wealth, is called by all actors: the local players themselves but also the member states and the EU-institutions. Many channels already exist to make this link but none is perfect, making this link rather weak. Institutionalized channels are delegitimized, European-wide networks are cumbersome and individual actions are costly. As the two first ways have been significantly more studied, this research therefore proposes to scrutinize especially actions undertaken by individual cities so to help practitioners to best upload local interests at EU level. A comparative analysis of three major local players (Barcelona, Rotterdam and Helsinki) outlines the best practices used by local actors willing to get the most out of the multi-level opportunities offered by the EU. The method based on Wolffhardt et al.’s classification of city’s attitudes toward the EU and on Schwab et al.’s administrative practices adopted by local sector helps structuring the comparison and detect best practices for various local contexts. This method is necessary since the compatibility between adopted practices and the local context appears to be a key factor of success. The research outcomes form the basis of some administrative practices recommendations for cities willing to invest into their own representation office in Brussels. Although findings show it exists some universally valuable practices, most of these recommendations depend on a plurality of criteria of the local level that is to be represented in Brussels. Key Words: local representation, European Union, multi-level decision making, administrative practices, influence, EU funds 2 Table of Contents Abstract ....................................................................................................................................... 2 Table of Contents ......................................................................................................................... 3 List of figures ................................................................................................................................ 5 List of abbreviations ..................................................................................................................... 6 Chapter 1: Introduction ............................................................................................................... 7 Section I. Demarcation and contextualization: the “Europe of the Cities”? ....................................... 7 Section II. Research objective and its justification: the importance of cities in policy-making ........ 10 Section III. Research question and the road to answer: the thesis outline ...................................... 12 Chapter 2: Channels of Representation for Local Governments ................................................... 16 Section I. European institutional frameworks available to cities and their shortcomings ............... 16 Section II. City networks as coalitions of the smallest, and their shortcomings ............................... 19 Section III. Lobbying by individual cities, on the importance of Brussels Offices ............................. 22 A. Publicly stated cities’ objectives ............................................................................................ 23 B. Other objectives as found in the literature ........................................................................... 26 Section IV. Lacuna of the academic knowledge ................................................................................ 28 Chapter 3: Theoretical debates and Operationalization ............................................................... 31 Section I. Six Theoretical Frameworks to understand the EU-Cities relations .................................. 31 A. A chronological development of classifications of cities’ involvement at EU level .............. 31 B. Justification of theoretical framework: on the importance of contextualization for future generalization ................................................................................................................................ 35 Section II. Hypothesises and Operationalization: testing current local practices on Brussels offices ........................................................................................................................................................... 38 Chapter 4: Presentation and justification of the method of data collection ................................. 41 Section I. Case study: A selection of successful and comparable cities ............................................ 41 A. Comparability of case studies ................................................................................................ 41 B. Differences to be tested ........................................................................................................ 45 Section II. The process of semi-direct interviews: advantages and drawbacks ................................ 46 Section III. Credibility of the research ............................................................................................... 48 3 Chapter 5: Presentation of Results ............................................................................................. 50 Section I. The different administrative practices of the three case studies ...................................... 50 A. G4-Office/Rotterdam: A one-man translation office? .......................................................... 50 B. The Helsinki EU Office: A private-like antenna? .................................................................... 54 C. Barcelona Provincial Council Office in Brussels: Barcelona first lobby? ............................... 57 Section II. Conclusion from empirical investigation for the research and for practitioners ............. 61 A. Answer to hypothesis 1: a blurred categorization ................................................................ 61 B. Answer to hypothesis 2: partial influence of national system .............................................. 63 Section III. Different practices due to different systems ................................................................... 64 Chapter 6: Concluding remarks .................................................................................................. 68 Section I. Research question, researched answers: the telescope and the magnifying glass .......... 68 Section II. Looking back at expectations, theories and reality: some criticisms ............................... 70 Section III. Social and academic implication of the research ............................................................ 72 Sources ...................................................................................................................................... 74 Literature ........................................................................................................................................... 74 Interviews conducted ........................................................................................................................ 80 Appendices ................................................................................................................................ 81 Appendix 1: States Objectives of City Representation Offices in Brussels