No. 124 - Europe 2020 and national reforms: economic governance and structural reforms

Europe 2020 presses for structural reforms as a means of boosting economic growth and social cohesion. Yet tensions between national specificities and pressures from EU partners and the wider Union characterize European economic governance as a whole. Starting with a concise historical account of the Open Method of Coordination, the paper shows how the structural reforms' success depends on a series of factors such as their number, identifiability and the ease with which the beneficiaries can implement them, as well as on the existence of institutional mechanisms for compensating potential losers and/or distributing benefits more fairly, and other mechanisms capable of combating political shortsightedness and favouring the participation of otherwise silent stakeholders. The most important contribution of EU intervention is institutional capacity-building at national level, including with ironclad institutional rules, aimed at enhancing governments' accountability and improving policy evaluation tools.