State- and Regulation-Theoretical Perspectives on the European Union and the Failure of the Lisbon Agenda

Abstract

This paper develops a state- and regulation-theoretical approach to the European Union as an emerging political system and its role in promoting economic growth. Based on critical reviews of alternative theoretical positions, it argues that: (a) the emerging Europolity is a crucial political site in an evolving system of multi-scalar meta-governance, organized in the shadow of post-national statehood, of the contradictory and conflictual processes of Europeanization in a still emerging world society; (b) the Europolity is a key element in an ongoing transition from different forms of Keynesian welfare national state to different forms of Schumpeterian workfare post-national regime, with the EU having a major role in promoting the knowledge-based economy and the modernization of social policy through new forms of economic and political organization; and (c) an important element in this new role for the Europolity is the open method of coordination, which can nonetheless be seen as flawed, for reasons that in part affect most forms of governance in capitalist societies and in part are specific to the open method of coordination in a European context.