Taming of the Shrews? Politics of the European Council

TheBMW Center for German and European Studies (CGES)was established in 1990 as one of three North American "Centers of Excellence," each supported by a ten-year grant from the German government and administered by the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD). At the end of the decade, BMW AG's $10 million endowment gift secured the Center's fundamental mission into the 21st century: to educate future generations of transatlantic leaders.CGES is also home to theMaster of Arts in German and European Studies (MAGES)program. TheBMW Center is located inGeorgetown's Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service.

BMW Center for German and European Studies

Join us in hosting Dr. Mareike Kleine for a discussion on the intricacies of the diplomatic norms underlying European Council collaboration

McGhee Library, ICC

The BMW Center for German and European Studies invites you to a lecture with Dr. Mareike Kleine of the European Institute. The discussion will focus on the informal norms that empower the European Commission in today's world. Lunch will be provided. Please note if you plan to attend in person or virtually. Keep reading for an overview of the lecture and Dr. Kleine's bio. The European Council is arguably one of the European Union’s most dynamic decision-making bodies. Both scholars and practitioners attribute its effectiveness to an informal norm of diffuse reciprocity. The norm encourages governments to demonstrate goodwill toward others seeking agreements, with the expectation that similar goodwill will be extended to them when they themselves require an agreement. This paper explores if and under what conditions the governments in the European Council can uphold this norm, despite frequent temptations – rooted in domestic politics – to violate it or exploit its inherent ambiguity. We argue that governments maintain this norm by presenting a unified front against the violator when their own domestic political dynamics create strong incentives to impose sanction on the perpetrator. In the absence of such incentives, the norm is more likely to be exploited or violated, putting it at risk of erosion. Through two empirical case studies – focusing on British prime minister David Cameron and Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orbán – we investigate perceived attempts either to exploit or to withhold goodwill in the European Council. We demonstrate how their peers assessed the occurrence of violations and coordinated appropriate responses to preserve the norm. The theoretical implications of our findings extend beyond the EU and contribute to the literature on informal governance in international organizations, information transmission within international institutions, and intergovernmental bargaining. Dr. Kleine is currently an Associate Professor in EU and International Politics at the European Institute. Her research interests include theories of international organisation and International Political Economy, informal and formal governance, the interplay of domestic politics and international institutions, negotiation theories and normative questions of global governance. She completed her PhD at Freie Universitatt Berlin. In 2013, she published her book Informal Governance in the European Union, an influential work on the impact of the EU and other international organizations during political shocks.

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