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§ 5 (1) 10 Europäische Integration - Vertiefung

Die Studierenden sind in der Lage, die Funktionsweise und Ausdifferenzierung des politischen Systems der EU zu erklären. Sie können am Beispiel einzelner Organe und Institutionen interner und institutioneller Entscheidungsverfahren und der Ausprägung einzelner Politikfelder Fragestellungen diskutieren und beantworten.

The seminar's ambition is to offer students and young researchers a comprehensive, theoretically grounded and balanced reflection on

-       the EU treaties’ normative setting on policy initiation and the right of legislative initiative as well as

-       on the very functioning, potential development and reform of the EU’s fabric of governance with regard to the early phases of the legislative policy cycle.

Building on existing and ongoing research with regard to the subject matter, we want to learn, discuss and analyse how the right of initiative at the EU level compares with the situation in the Member States, how the EP and the Council have developed the use of the right to request legislative initiative from the Commission, how further instruments for legislative agenda-setting such as the European Citizen Initiative, the European Council’s strategic and operational political guidelines, or the Union’s advisory bodies’ right to adopt opinions on their own initiative contribute to shape the EU’s political agenda, and how the potential widening of the circle of stakeholders for initiating policy and legislation affects the EU’s functioning in terms of democracy, efficiency, effectiveness and transparency.

To visualize the structural features and momentum of policy initiation in the EU as well as the functionality of rules of procedure and inter-institutional agreements, the seminar makes use of tried and tested simulation games, with which negotiations at the level of the European Parliament, social partners (towards draft agreements) and the European Council (strategic and operational guidelines) can be practically understood.  The subsequent phases of reflection enable students to compare the experiences gained with findings from the academic literature.

Students will form simulated "delegations" of the EP's political groups or the Council's member states. Based on a set of rules of procedure and dossiers for negotations, they will

(a) draft initiatial policy papers on specific assignments,

(b) draft strategic papers on their negotiating position, and

(c) act as delegation during the simulation exercise.

For each assignment, students will receive a mark. The final mark will then be calculated on the basis of the student's overall, written and oral, performance.

Bräuninger Thomas/Debus, Marc (2009). Legislative agenda-setting in parliamentary democracies. In: European Journal of Political Research 48 (6), S. 804–839. DOI: 10.1111/j.1475-6765.2009.00850.x.

Daviter, Falk (2007). Policy framing in the European Union. In: Journal of European Public Policy 14 (4), S. 654–666. DOI: 10.1080/13501760701314474.

Kreppel, Amie/Oztas, Buket (2016). „Leading the Band or Just Playing the Tune? Reassessing the Agenda-Setting Powers of the European Commission”, Comparative Political Studies, 50 (8): 1118-1150.

Kreppel, Amie/Webb, Michael Webb (2019). „European Parliament resolutions—effective agenda setting or whistling into the wind?, Journal of European Integration, 41 (3): 383-404.

Maurer, Andreas; Wolf, Michael C. (2020): The European Parliament's Right of Initiative. Luxembourg: Office for Official Publications of the European Communities (OPOCE). ISBN 978-92-846-6737-6.

positive Absolvierung der Pflichtmodule 1, 2, 3 und 5