European Societies: Fusion or Fission? (Routledge E.S.a. Studies in European Society, 1)

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European Societies

Both at an international level and within individual states, Europe is being transformed. This book brings together many of the leading experts in the field to ask whether recent developments in Europe have brought about a higher level of integration or whether they are causing increased divergence and difference between countries. Combining acute observation and analysis with extensive empirical data, European Societies covers a wide range of subjects, including the move towards political democracy and market economy in central and eastern European societies, the project of the European Union, ethnic conflict, the rise of nationalism, social exclusion and the role of women in public life. European Societies will be an essential reference book for all those involved in the study of Europe. Contributors: Sheila Allen, Sara Arber, Margareta Bertilsson, Volker Bornschier, Marlis Buchmann, Rosemary Crompton, Godfried Engbersen, Ute Gerhard, Michal Illner, Mark Mitchell, John Rex, Dave Russell, Julia Szalai, Iván Szelényi, Piotr Sztompka, Göran Therborn, Alain Touraine, Patrick Ziltener. Thomas P. Boje is Professor of Sociology at the University of Umea, Sweden, and editor of Work and Welfare in a Changing Europe. Bart van Steenbergen is Associate Professor in the Department of General Social Sciences at the University of Utrecht and is editor of The Condition of Citizenship. Sylvia Walby is former President of the European Sociological Association and Professor of Sociology at the University of Leeds. Previous publications include Gender Transformations and Theorizing Patriarchy.

Routledge/European Sociological Association Studies in European Societies Series editors: Thomas P. Boje, Max Haller, Martin Kohli and Alison Woodward 1. European Societies Fusion or Fission? Edited by Thomas P. Boje, Bart van Steenbergen and Sylvia Walby 2. The Myth of Generational Conflict The Family and State in Ageing Societies Edited by Sara Arber and Claudine Attias-Donfut 3. The End of the Welfare State? Responses to State Retrenchment Edited by Peter Taylor-Gooby and Stefan Svallfors

European Societies Fusion or Fission?

Edited by Thomas P. Boje, Bart van Steenbergen and Sylvia Walby

London and New York

First published 1999 by Routledge 11 New Fetter Lane, London EC4P 4EE Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada by Routledge 29 West 35th Street, New York, NY 10001 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2001. © 1999 selection and editorial matter Thomas P. Boje, Bart van Steenbergen and Sylvia Walby; individual chapters, the contributors All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilized in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data A catalogue record for this title has been requested ISBN 0-415-19843-7 (Print Edition) ISBN 0-203-03142-3 Master e-book ISBN ISBN 0-203-17541-7 (Glassbook Format)

Contents

List of illustrations List of editors List of contributors Introduction

vii viii ix 1

THOMAS P. BOJE, BART VAN STEENBERGEN AND SYLVIA WALBY

OPENING ARTICLE 1 ‘Europe’ as issues of sociology

19

GÖRAN THERBORN

PART I Social exclusion and European integration 2 The revitalization of Western Europe and the politics of the ‘social dimension’

33

VOLKER BORNSCHIER AND PATRICK ZILTENER

3 European integration: disparate dynamics of bureaucratic control and communicative participation

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MARLIS BUCHMANN

4 Gender inequalities in European societies today

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SARA ARBER

5 The undocumented outsider class: illegal immigrants in Dutch society

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GODFRIED ENGBERSEN

PART II Citizenship and gender 6 The role of social movements in the project of civil society: the case of the women’s movement UTE GERHARD

105

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Contents 7 Women and democratization: some notes on recent changes in Hungary

118

JULIA SZALAI

8 Non-standard employment, citizenship and social exclusion in Europe

132

ROSEMARY CROMPTON

PART III Nationalism and ethnicity 9 Multiculturalism and political integration in European cities

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JOHN REX

10 Nationalism, national identity and citizenship in the new Europe

163

MARK MITCHELL AND DAVE RUSSELL

11

Nationalism: ethnicity and gender

178

SHEILA ALLEN

12 The Balkan tragedy: a universal or a particular issue?

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MARGARETA BERTILSSON

PART IV Transition and transformation in Central and Eastern Europe 13 The cultural core of post-communist transformations

205

PIOTR SZTOMPKA

14 The rise of managerialism: the ‘new’ class after the fall of communism

215

IVÁN SZELÉNYI

15 Second thoughts on the transformation in Eastern and Central Europe

234

MICHAL ILLNER

PART V Conclusion 16 European sociologists between economic globalization and cultural fragmentation

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ALAIN TOURAINE

Index

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Illustrations

FIGURES 4.1 4.2 4.3 4.4 4.5 14.1 14.2

Wife’s independent income as a proportion of couple’s gross income Factors perpetuating the subordinate position of women Three key resources influencing independence and dependence Distribution of personal income in 1991, British men and women aged 65+: from the state, from non-state pensions and total Percentage of older men and women with severe disability Social structure of reform socialism Social structure of managerial society

71 73 74 76 78 224 226

TABLES 1.1 4.1 5.1 13.1 14.1

The development of real GDP in five countries, 1989–94 Living arrangements of older men and women Rotterdam: country/region of origin of legal and illegal immigrants, 1989–94 Dichotomy of institution-building and culture-building Characteristics of managerial society

26 79 90 206 218

Editors

Thomas P. Boje is Professor of Sociology at the University of Umea, Sweden and Treasurer of the European Sociological Association. He was previously Associate Professor and for a period Head of Department of Social Sciences at the University of Roskilde, Denmark. He has been American Studies Fellow at the Department of Sociology, Harvard University and Jean Monnet Fellow in the Department of Sociology and Political Science at the European University Institute, Florence, Italy. He is author of Mobilitets -og beskaeftigelsesmonstre pa det danske arbejdsmarked 1980–81 (Mobility and Employment Patterns in the Danish Labour Market 1980–81) (The Copenhagen Business School, 1987); editor of Work and Welfare in a Changing Europe, also published as three special issues of the International Journal of Sociology 1994–5; and joint editor of Scandinavia in a New Europe (Scandinavian University Press, 1993). Bart van Steenbergen is presently Associate Professor in the Department of General Social Sciences at the University of Utrecht (Netherlands). He has previously been Secretary General of the European Sociological Association, Secretary of Studies of the Foundation ‘Working Group 2000’ and Visiting Fellow at Princeton University and the University of California at Berkeley. He is author of Het voorlaatste Oordeel, een kritische beschouwing van de Tweede Golf Wereldmodellen (The Last Judgement but One, a Critical Evaluation of the Second Wave of Global Models) (Bert Bakker, 1979), De Post-Materialistische Maatschappij’ (The Post-Materialist Society) (De Horstink, 1983), and Afscheid van de Twintigste Eeuw (Farewell to the Twentieth Century) (NGC, 1993); editor of The Condition of Citizenship (Sage, 1994); and co-editor of Advancing Democracy and Participation, Challenges for the Future (Centre de Prospectiva, 1992). Sylvia Walby was the founding President of the European Sociological Association and is Professor of Sociology at the University of Leeds. She has previously been the Professor and Head of Department of Sociology at the University of Bristol; Reader in Sociology and Director of the Gender Institute at the LSE; and Lecturer in Sociology at Lancaster University. She has been Visiting Associate Professor in Sociology at UCLA and Honorary Visiting Scholar at the Schlesinger Library, Harvard University. She is author of Gender Transformations (Routledge, 1997), Theorizing Patriarchy (Blackwell, 1990), and Patriarchy at Work (Polity, 1986); joint author of Sex Crime in the News (Routledge, 1991), Localities, Class and Gender (Pion, 1985), Contemporary British Society (Polity, 1988, 1994), Restructuring Place Class and Gender (Sage, 1990), and Medicine and Nursing: Professions in a Changing Health Service (Sage, 1994); editor of Gender Segregation at Work (Open University Press, 1988) and New Agendas for Women (Macmillan, 1999); and co-editor of Out of the Margins: Women’s Studies in the Nineties (Falmer, 1991).

Contributors

Sheila Allen is Professor of Sociology and University Equal Opportunities Adviser at the University of Bradford, UK. Her main research interests and publications are in the fields of the sociology of work, gender relations and race and ethnicity. She is currently writing a book on Feminist Contributions to Sociology. She is a past President of the British Sociological Association and a member of the Executive Committee. Sara Arber is Professor of Sociology at the University of Surrey, Guildford, UK. She has written extensively on gender inequalities in later life, women’s employment and inequalities in women’s health. Her books include Gender and Later Life (Sage, 1991); Women and Working Lives: Divisions and Change (Macmillan, 1991); and Connecting Gender and Ageing (Open University Press, 1995). Margareta Bertilsson is Professor of Sociology at Copenhagen University, Denmark. Her most recent work includes books on Scandinavian Sociology, From a Doll’s House to the Welfare State (edited with Göran Therborn, ISA-publication, 1998), on Social Constructivism (in Danish, edited with Margaretha Järvinen, 1998), and on The Good Life: On the Renaissance of an Old Discipline (in Swedish, with Mikael Carleheden, 1996). Her current interests focus primarily on social and legal theory. Volker Bornschier is Professor of Sociology at the University of Zurich. After studies of sociology and economics he received his PhD in Sociology in 1972. His habilitation followed in 1976, while he served on the faculty of Philosophy at the University of Zurich. From 1983–1996 he was President of the World Society Foundation. He was director of the research project ‘The Genesis of the Single European Act’, funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation, at the Sociological Institute of the University of Zurich (1995–1997). His latest book is on Western Society in Transition (Transaction Publishers, New Brunswick and London, 1996). Since 1997 he has been director of the Sociological Institute of the University of Zurich. Marlis Buchmann is Professor of Sociology at the University of Zurich and the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology at Zurich. Her major research interests are social change, labour markets, life course, career mobility, and gender. Her numerous publications include: The Script of Life in Modern Society: Entry into Adulthood in a Changing World (University of Chicago Press, 1989), and, together with Stefan Sacchi, ‘Mehrdimensionale Klassifikation beruflicher Verlaufsdaten – Eine Anwendung auf Berufslaufbahnen zweier Schweizer

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Contributors Geburtskohorten’, in Kölner Zeitschrift für Soziologie und Sozialpsychologie, 35 (3), 413–42 (September 1995).

Rosemary Crompton is Professor of Sociology at University City, London. Her most recent books are (edited with Duncan Gallie and Kate Purcell) Changing Forms of Employment (Routledge) and Restructuring Gender Relations and Employment (OUP, 1999). She is currently directing a cross-national project (ESRC R00235617) on Gender Relations, Employment and Occupational Segregation. Godfried Engbersen is Professor of Sociology at the Erasmus University of Rotterdam. He has written extensively on new forms of social inequality and urban marginality in advanced welfare states. He is the author of numerous books including (in English) Cultures of Unemployment: A Comparative Look at Long-Term Unemployment and Urban Poverty (Westview Press, 1993) and The Unknown City: Illegal Immigrants in Dutch Society (forthcoming). Since 1997 he has been editor of the Annual Dutch Year Report on Poverty and Social Exclusion (Amsterdam University Press). Ute Gerhard is Professor of Sociology and Director of the Centre for Women’s Studies at the University of Frankfurt am Main. Her main interests are in the study of law, social sciences and history. She has been co-editor of Feministische Studien, a journal for interdisciplinary women’s studies, since 1982. Several publications on women’s rights, the history of women and social policy, such as Verhältnisse und Verhinderungen Frauenarbeit, Familie und Rechte der Frauen im 19 (Suhrkamp, 1978) (Women’s Work, Family and Women’s Rights during the 19th Century), Gleichheit ohne Angleichung. Frauen im Recht (Beck, 1990) (Equality without Assimilation, Women in Law) and Unerhört. Die Geschichte der deutschen Frauenbewegung (Rowohlt, 1990) (History of the German Women’s Movement). Michal Illner is Director of the Institute of Sociology, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic in Prague and lectures in sociology at the Charles University in Prague. His main research interests include social aspects of local and regional development, local and regional policy and politics and social indicators. Recent publications include Local Democracy and the Processes of Transformation in East Central Europe, with H. Baldersheim and others (Westview Press, 1996), Changing Territorial Administration in Czechoslovakia, with P. Dostal and others (Amsterdam University, 1992). He also edited Czech Republic – Transformations after 1989 and Beyond (1993) and Human Development Report – Czech Republic 1997 (1998). Mark Mitchell is Dean of the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences at the University of Portsmouth in the UK and is a member of the interdisciplinary Nation and Identity in Contemporary Europe Research Group in the Faculty. He has a long-standing interest in the politics of race and racism and, with Dave Russell, has for the past ten years undertaken research in this field, focusing on the United Kingdom, South Africa and, more recently, the New Europe. John Rex was the Founder Chairman of the Departments of Sociology in Durham and Warwick. He was the Former Director and Research Professor of the British Economic and Social

Contributors

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Research Council’s Centre for Research in Ethnic Relations. He has held the Chair of the British Sociological Association and ISA’s Research Committee on Racial and Ethnic Minorities. He was a Member of UNESCO Experts Committee on the nature of racism and race prejudice. Dave Russell is Programme Director for Social Studies at the University of Portsmouth and is a member of the interdisciplinary Nation and Identity in Contemporary Europe Research Group in the Faculty. In collaboration with Mark Mitchell, he has published work on state and society in South Africa, as well as race and racism in Britain. More recently, his research has focused on the politics of race, immigration and citizenship in a broader European context. Julia Szalai is Deputy Director of the Institute of Sociology of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences and Chairperson of the Max Weber Foundation for the Study of Social Initiatives. Her research interests are: the comparative history of social policy; the social historical origins of ‘old’ and ‘new’ poverty; the gender-related aspects of post-Communist transformation. Recent publications (in English) include: Poverty in Hungary in the Period of Economic Crisis (World Bank Publications, 1990); Social Policy in the New Eastern Europe, edited jointly with Bob Deacon (Avebury, 1990); ‘Some Aspects of the Changing Situation of Women in Hungary in the Process of Transition’, in Signs (fall 1991). Iván Szelényi is Professor of Sociology at UCLA and a member of the Hungarian National Academy of Sciences. He is author/co-author of The Intellectuals on the Road to Class Power (Harcourt, Brace and Jovanovich, 1979); Urban Inequalities under State Socialism (Oxford University Press, 1983); Socialist Entrepreneurs (Polity Press, 1988) and Making Capitalism Without Capitalists (Verso, 1998). Piotr Sztompka is Professor of Sociology at the Jagiellonian University at Krakow (Poland). He is a member of Academia Europaea (London), American Academy of Arts and Sciences (Cambridge, Mass.) and a Vice-President of ISA. He was the recipient of the New Europe Prize 1995. His books include Society in Action (Polity Press, 1991), The Sociology of Social Change (Blackwell, 1993) and Trust: A Sociological Theory (Cambridge University Press, 1999). Göran Therborn is Professor of Sociology and Director of the Swedish Collegium for Advanced Study in Social Sciences in Uppsala, Sweden. He has previously held the European Chair of Social Policy in Budapest. His current research involves roads to/through modernity in different parts of the world, dimensions and historical waves of globalization, urban iconography, the family in the world, and issues of sociological conceptualization and of social policy. His publications include European Modernity and Beyond, Why Some Peoples Are More Unemployed Than Others, The Ideology of Power and the Power of Ideology, and Science, Class and Society. Alain Touraine founded the Centre d’Analyse et d’Intervention Sociologiques in Paris in 1981. He was a student at the Ecole Normale Supérieure. He has been President of the Société Française de Sociologie and Vice-President of the International Sociological

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Contributors Association. He is the author of numerous books including The Post Industrial Society, The Self-Production of Society, The Return of the Actor, Critique of Modernity, and What is Democracy?

Patrick Ziltener works at the Sociological Institute of the University of Zurich. He studied Sociology, History and Economics at the University of Basel, at the Freie Universität (FU) Berlin, and received his MA in Sociology at the University of Zurich in 1994. From 1995 to 1997 he was project coordinator in the research project ‘The Genesis of the Single European Act’, funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation at the University of Zurich. The results of this research project will be published in the volume Statebuilding in Europe: The Revitalization of Western European Integration, scheduled for 1999.

Introduction Thomas P. Boje, Bart van Steenbergen and Sylvia Walby

The aim of this book is to address the contemporary changes in European societies. Whether the social, political and cultural development in European societies and in Europe as a whole are undergoing fusion or fission was the core question at the Conference of the European Sociological Association in Budapest in 1995. At both the European level and within the individual European societies we find tendencies towards both fusion, convergence or integration, and fission, divergence or differentiation, in contemporary social and political development, and these two apparently contradictory tendencies of integration and disintegration occurring simultaneously at many different levels in the European House. The clearest form of systemic integration at the European level are the convergence of the Central and Eastern European societies to the model of political democracy and market economy found in the West, and the project of the European Union in Western Europe. Furthermore, women’s integration into public life in all European societies can be considered as one of the most profound forms of integration at the social level. While the process of European integration can be found mainly at the system level, the process of differentiation or disintegration is dominating at the social level. These disintegrative tendencies are especially pronounced around ethnic conflict, racism and nationalism, on the one hand, and around social exclusion derived from unemployment and poverty, on the other hand. In this introduction we shall consider some of the more important consequences of these processes of integration – fusion – and differentiation – fission. The paradigm of integration and differentiation in sociology can be traced back to the founders of the discipline. They raised the question how integration was possible in a society which was increasingly differentiated and individualized. For the classic sociologists the question primarily concerned the transformation of the traditional society integrated by status credentials and family bonds into a modern society in which the division of labour was ever more complex and in which market and state increasingly were the major integrative forces. In industrial society, class solidarity was a major dynamic force ensuring social integration. In today’s society, diversity and social divisions are primarily the result of gender, age and ethnicity, more than of class cleavages. Today, the questions concerning integration raised by the classic sociologists must be posed in relation to a fundamentally different environment.

2

Introduction

INTEGRATIVE PROCESSES IN EUROPEAN SOCIETIES The process of European integration took a new turn as a result of the economic and political transformations in Central and Eastern Europe in the early 1990s. The breakdown of the ‘communist’ regimes brought enthusiasm for the removal of the economic and social barriers between Western, Central and Eastern European societies. Furthermore, the internal collapse of these regimes raised aspirations that many Central and Eastern European citizens might be able to approach the Western European type of social life and standard of living. Indeed, the European Sociological Association was founded at the moment that Central and Eastern European countries were starting on their major political and economic transformations. In Central and Eastern Europe the collapse of communist rule, transition to a market economy and establishment of multiparty political systems moved the East closer to the models of democracy and market economies found in the West and were obviously considered as a remarkable step forward towards the idea of a unified Europe. For the Central and Eastern European citizens, these changes led to hopes for increased European integration shaped by a common European history and by their newly achieved civic and political citizenship rights. However, most of these expectations have not been fulfilled. There have been several limits to the hope that the East might become like the West and become more integrated into a wider Europe. One reason that the vision of the ‘common European house’ has been frustrated is by the closure of the borders of the European Union. In ‘Fortress Europe’ the establishment of insiders’ citizenship rights has involved the exclusion of the outsiders from Central and Eastern Europe as well as from other regions of the world outside the European Union. EU membership has not yet been extended to the countries of the East and the entry of the Central European countries into the EU community seems to be a long and problematic process taking place primarily on conditions defined by the large and powerful membership countries of the EU. Furthermore, the transformation of the economic and political system in Central and Eastern Europe has so far mainly taken place at the system level, while many aspects of everyday life have remained unchanged or have even deteriorated. In most Central and Eastern European countries the level of social inequality has increased and political powerlessness has grown for large groups of the population. The economic restructuring has only led to prosperity for minor groups of the population, resulting instead in widespread impoverishment for the large groups of citizens and the destabilization of the new and fragile political institutions. This has occurred because the Central and Eastern countries have given up important parts of the comprehensive system of public care and social security set up by the socialist regimes during the process of economic restructuring. The introduction of market economies, large-scale privatization of public institutions, and the requirements of the international loangivers have contributed to the decline in social protection and led to subsequent deterioration in standards of living and increase in social insecurity. A second major aspect of fusion in European societies is a result of the project of the European Union. Here the Europeanists have a vision of greater political and economic integration of which the creation and development of the Single European Market was merely the first stage. This process of economic and political integration

Introduction

3

has led to some harmonization of policies to regulate the labour market and in the development of a European environmental policy. The economic and political changes within the EU societies have also mainly occurred at the system level. A supranational system of institutions has been set up in order to create the Single European Market. The motives and inspirations behind the movements towards fusion in Western Europe have several origins. A historic determination to eliminate war between nation states in the European House, especially between France and Germany; has been a major reason for the moves towards integration in the development of the European Union. Furthermore, the growing globalization of capital and finance markets has generated a significant momentum for capital to combine and integrate at a European level to create a large domestic market. This has led to the Formation of a European economic bloc with supranational institutions, ensuring free movements of capital and labour within the community and facilitating the development of the European companies able to compete in the global marketplace. However, concurrently with the economic and political integration, a restructuring of systems of social protection has taken place in all European societies. This has not only been conditioned by the Formation of the European Union, but also by the ongoing profound transformation of the industrial societies. The changes have led to persistent high unemployment, changing family structures, and a growing risk of social exclusion. The motives driving these shifts in the welfare policies within the European Union are mainly inspired by economic liberalism and have led to policies of retrenchment in social protection and tight control of public expenditures. As a consequence of this development, most of today’s welfare systems are unable to handle the increasing social inequality and to provide social protection for the vulnerable groups of citizens. The result has been that the conditions for social citizenship have changed dramatically in the Western European welfare societies. Both in the process of transformation in East and Central Europe and that of political and economic integration in the project of European Union it might be important to distinguish between social integration and system integration. The transformation of the economic and political system in Central and Eastern Europe has led to system integration at the European level and, simultaneously, serious disintegration in the social relations of the individual Central and Eastern European societies. The same duality can be found in the process of integration in the European Union. Creation of the Single European Market involved a unified product market, harmonization of the labour market and monetary union, but concurrently with the economic and political integration at the system level new forms of diversity and social exclusion have appeared in the social relations. In conclusion, both types of fission have been dominated by system integration and have, in many cases, led to new forms of social exclusion and marginalization which, in turn, have reduced the level of social integration. A final instance of fusion is the increasing integration of women into the mainstream of European societies, and this is probably the most significant illustration of social integration to be found in today’s Europe. This process has happened especially in Western Europe, where women’s former exclusion from the public sphere has been reduced by their growing participation in education, employment, and political decisionmaking. Convergence for gender relations refers to the comparison between men and

4

Introduction

women. Immense changes have taken place across all of Europe. However, there are different accounts as to how this development should be interpreted. The rates of labour market participation for men and women are converging throughout Europe, though the labour market remains strongly segregated and women and men still differ significantly in their responsibilities for caring for family members, that is, children and the elderly. Are these differences in paid and unpaid work among men and women so great that talking about convergence in citizenship rights and economic power is meaningless? Are the changes in labour market involvement merely superficial and of no real significance for citizenship status, since women are segregated from men in employment, and take part-time rather than full-time work? What is the significance of these changes in gender relations for other social relations in the public as well as in the private sphere? In many European countries there are several coincident forms of women’s entry into the public sphere: for example, growing female labour market participation, and women’s entry into legislatures. The European Union has been committed to an effective regulation of equal opportunities and this has contributed to this process of convergence in the labour market and in social life across Western Europe. However, there are several contradictory tendencies in this process of equal opportunities. On the one hand, European level regulations now explicitly maintain that discrimination is contrary to the Treaty of Rome and the European Court of Justice supports this. On the other hand, deregulation in industrial relations and decentralization in wage bargaining seem to undermine the implementation of equal opportunity legislation. The process of convergence between men and women in occupational position has stopped and the gender wage gap is growing in some of the EU countries, for example in the Scandinavian countries. The differences between men and women in their participation in the society as a whole are still pronounced in most European countries, and this means that marked differences in European women’s effective citizenship rights still prevail both in relation to economic power and in their right to social protection. Gender relations have developed in many different ways in the countries of Europe. Some researchers argue that there will be a convergence between East and West now that the economic and political systems have become more similar. If so, will old Eastern practice influence the West, with women in employment as much as men, or will the East become like the West with similar patterns of lesser female employment and greater domestication of women? At the moment, most researchers find that Eastern women are losing ground both in the labour market and in the political sphere. More women than men have experienced unemployment and poverty, and Eastern women have in large number left the political institutions. For some, this development is seen as a new kind of division of labour where women are the ones who have primary responsibility for the community-based activities, while men continue to control the formal institutions in economy and politics. For others, the reduction of women’s labour market participation and political involvement in the Central and Eastern European countries means that they lose important elements of their citizenship status and, consequently, their previous widespread rights to social protection. In this respect, the situation of Eastern women will become more like that of Western women.

Introduction

5

DISINTEGRATIVE PROCESSES IN THE EUROPEAN SOCIETIES The other part of the basic sociological discourse – the process of differentiation, or fission – is well pronounced in economic and social development in today’s Europe. Most obviously, we have observed an intensification of ethnic and regional conflict throughout Europe, but especially in Central and Eastern Europe in the aftermath of the overthrow of the communist one-party systems. Most dramatically, these ethnic and regional conflicts have been in the former Yugoslavia, where ethnic groups that had developed a form of harmonious co-existence during the previous socialist regime, have restarted the old battles in new and pernicious forms, with ethnic cleansing as the most devastating consequence. Also, in Western Europe we have witnessed a growth of racism and ethnic conflicts. The West has seen a continuous history of racist practices in a range of institutional and national contexts. In the West, growth in racism is strongly connected to new forms of immigration and has extended to countries – such as the Scandinavian countries – which had previously thought that they were too tolerant for this to occur. Fission, or the process of differentiation, has taken place in a comprehensive way throughout Europe. The economic recession, restructuring of the European economies and skill redundancy have caused growing social and cultural inequalities, and have led to the social exclusion of large social groups based on gender, ethnicity, and regions. The main reasons for the comprehensive social exclusion in several European societies derive from unemployment, marginalization and poverty. The persistent high rate of unemployment, in both the West and the East, is a cause of considerable concern to the OECD and the EU. It has led to the loss of effective citizenship. In the West the causes for social exclusion have been linked to globalization and the falling competitiveness of the European economy, and in the East to the collapse of old staterun industries and collective forms of care and welfare provision. Novel forms of family patterns as well as changes in age composition of the population have led to new patterns of differentiation in the social structures. As people live longer, there develop groups with different interests in the allocation of resources and new forms of social divisions based on age and generation. The male breadwinner family model no longer exists, but rather there are a variety of family models: dual-career families, lone-parent families, and people living alone most of their life. This changing family pattern has complex interconnections with gender as well as class, and has led to significant differences in income and social benefits, since entitlement to benefits is typically based on previously earned income, a system that disadvantages women, and particularly lone mothers, throughout Europe. A search for new models in organizing the welfare system and providing social services has been a major concern in all European welfare societies. This concern has been discussed in many connections and probably most clearly formulated by the EU Commission in both the White Paper on ‘Growth, Competitiveness, Employment’ (European Commission 1993) and in the EU Commission’s papers on the social dimension (European Commission 1994). In these papers the EU Commission emphasizes the need for shared responsibility for providing social protection between private companies, NGO institutions and the welfare state, and for new, more active policies aimed at ensuring people’s integration into work and society.

6

Introduction

Evidently, we can agree with the EU Commission on the description of the problems of the welfare policies. Their proposals for solving these problems, however, are more controversial, and here strong disagreements emerge among politicians as well as academics. The question is whether the European Union is going to be a force which binds Europe together or whether increasing European Union integration leads rather to more pronounced differentiation in the individual societies and in Europe as a whole, with greater social exclusion and marginalization as a result. It is possible to distinguish between two opposing tendencies in the social and economic development of the European Union: deregulation, and the building of a social infrastructure. The tendency to deregulation is represented in the policies behind the Single European Market and the EU Commission’s White Paper mentioned above. The arguments are articulated through a market-oriented growth strategy based on the theoretical framework of neoliberal economic theory. Thus it is built on assumptions that the economic performance of the European Union will be improved if competition is increased and labour market ‘rigidities’ and ‘dependency-creating’ social protection are removed. Deregulation is the procedure neoliberal economists recommend to enable the European economy to recover international competitiveness, which is being lost due to processes of internationalization and globalization. Even the proponents of this development recognize that the consequences will be uneven, and that for some groups there will be negative consequences. In particular, social exclusion can be created as a result of reduced access to employment as industries unevenly decline, with implications on a regional level, as well as uneven implications for gender and ethnic groups who are unevenly represented in these industries. The alternative vision for the European Union is a strategy based on social steering through welfare state institutions by creating a social infrastructure to counteract the tendencies towards growing regionalization and social exclusion. Advocates for this vision argue that it represents the transcendence of the national disputes that have ruined so much of Europe’s past and present with warfare and racism. This vision presents the development of the European Union as a political solution to the problem of warring nations. Furthermore, it is argued that it provides the possibility of a regulatory framework at an international level to deal with problems of environmental degradation, globalization, and social dumping. At the European level it has been argued that social policies may counteract the tendencies to social exclusion which have been caused primarily by deregulation and the development of increased competition as a result of the Single Market: that is, they should help to prevent social exclusion whether based on region, gender, migrant status or whatever, and to promote social cohesion and social justice. This approach is based on theories of citizenship in which the social, economic and political are integral to each other, and in which economic development is best achieved in a high-wage, high-productivity economy with a high degree of social cohesion resulting from social justice. Citizenship rights are an important condition for participation in and membership of a community. A ‘new Europe’ based on common and unified citizenship rights is obviously the ideal for many advocates of European integration, but so far they have faced a tough task in persuading the majority of

Introduction

7

Europeans that creating a social and economic infrastructure may provide the needed social protection and prevent growing social exclusion. WHAT IS ‘EUROPE’? Fundamental to the analysis of fusion and fission in Europe is the definition of ‘Europe’ or ‘European society’ or ‘European societies’. The specificity of Europe can be understood, in many ways, as a distinctive type of culture, economy and polity, as the chapters in this book by Therborn and Touraine in particular address. The focus of the question is sharpened when lines are drawn for purposes of comparison. Europe may be thought of in comparison with North America, in particular the USA, and with Asia, in particular Japan, and many of the contributors, notably Touraine, Bornschier and Ziltener, do this. The definition of what is specifically European demands consideration of the fundamental characteristics of societies. Therborn argues that ‘Europe’ is more than a region of the world system of capitalism, not primarily a common market, different from a manifestation of a European culture, and not an ethnic community. Rather it is a normative area: ‘“Europe” is a set of supranational, suprastate normative institutions’. The norms are those of the ‘inviolability of the basic rights of human life and dignity’. This body of rules is governed by a strong European judiciary: ‘the Council of Europe, with the European Convention on Human Rights, its Court of Human Rights, and its European Charter’. Therborn argues that we have to distinguish the origin of European modernity which can be traced back to Christianity, the Renaissance, and the Enlightenment from the recent process of unification of European societies which has its background in the European world war and from the discovery of the gas chambers. This body of norms of human rights has resulted from what Western Europe has learned from recent European modernity, namely, that neither nationalism nor any other belief system should be single-mindedly pursued, but rather that they are dangerous and should be kept regulated. In this way Therborn characterizes the uniqueness of ‘Europe’ in a manner which is both positive and recent. Therborn charts an account of increasing European integration, especially that driven by the European Union, as a positive example of system building. However, he also points to three sources of disintegration: the growing gap between East and West, despite the changes in the East; the rise in unemployment; and the increase in ethnic tensions in the West as a result of recent migration into the West. Touraine positions Europe in between the major societal forms of America and Asia through an analysis of the different relationship between the economy, the state and culture. In American society there is a dissociation between the economy and culture and a weak state. The economy is governed by the market and a ruling class which is now a worldwide financial network, while in the cultural realm there is great diversity – a multiculturalism. The state is a loose and changing set of interest groups and lobbies. America contains a contradiction between mass production of symbolic goods on a global scale, and a diverse multicultural set of local communities. In Asian society there is a market economy, political authoritarianism and cultural nationalism. There is extreme integration of economic growth with cultural resources by a powerful authoritarian state.

8

Introduction

Touraine argues that the most important characteristic of current world evolution is the growing separation and dissociation between world market and fragmented cultural identities. This process is occurring throughout the world, but takes different forms in countries which are rich or poor, dominant or peripheral. In dominant or central countries, there is an internal cultural fragmentation, for example American multiculturalism. In peripheral or dependent countries, authoritarian regimes mobilize cultural resources to achieve a voluntarist, neo-Bismatckian type of industrialization. The political system is everywhere the central element of social organization, being loose in America and tight in the Asian case. Thus globalization does not mean homogenization of the world, nor the growing integration of national societies. Rather, there is both greater social inequality and exclusion within each country, and a greater distance between the dominant societies, which control the world market, and closed dependant societies, where authoritarian leaders mobilize cultural resources to resist the West. In Touraine’s view, Europe lies between the two extreme models of the American and Asian types. Europe is a third type with a different combination of internationalization of markets and fragmented cultural identities. Europe is the most political continent. The distinctiveness of Europe is the predominant role of the political system as the instrument of integration between economy and cultures. Europe remains dominated by the welfare state and the importance given to social integration. The dilemma for Europe and its sociologists, according to Touraine, is to create a way of integrating unity with diversity, of an open market-regulated economy with individual and collective identity, of the rearticulation of a globalized economy with fragmented identities. Is it possible for a society to manage diverse identities without the American solution of only regulation of the economy by the market and the law? In the creative resolution of such issues, argues Touraine, lies the future for both Europe and European sociology. Therborn and Touraine differ in their perspectives on the processes shaping European society. Therborn already sees a central set of European norms and values, and thus for him the ongoing political and economic process of integration might create a distinctive European identity. For Touraine, European norms and cultural values have been further fragmented and the role of the political system in creating social integration has been weakened. Therefore, formation of a distinctive European identity has to rely on creating a strong political state apparatus which is able to create political unification in combination with economic and cultural diversity. The book is divided into four parts: Social exclusion and European integration; Citizenship and gender; Nationalism and ethnicity; and Transition and transformation in Central and Eastern Europe. ‘Social exclusion and European integration’ examines the process of increasing integration of the European Union and asks Whether this is leading to a reduction or increase in social exclusion. ‘Citizenship and gender’ investigates the varied ways and extent to which women are becoming less excluded from the public sphere, especially employment and the state, in both East and West. ‘Nationalism and ethnicity’ addresses the increased fragmentation of European societies along the lines of ethnicity and nation in both the East and the West. ‘Transition and transformation in Central and Eastern Europe’ addresses the diverse transformations of Eastern and Central Europe.

Introduction

9

SOCIALEXCLUSION AND EUROPEAN INTEGRATION Integration is key to the project of the European Union. But does economic integration come at the cost of social exclusion? There are two dimensions here: first, deregulation and the creation of a Single European Market in order to increase the competitiveness of the European economy; second, European social policy intended to promote social cohesion and combat social exclusion. The economic policy was represented in the White Paper on ‘Growth, Competitiveness, Employment’ (European Commission 1993) and was itself composed of two elements: first, the completion of the internal market so as to give European firms the advantage of a large market in which to develop so that they could be competitive with global firms in the USA and Japan; second, to remove those forms of regulation which might privilege the firms or workers of one nation state over another. The social policy was articulated in the Social Charter and consolidated in the Social Chapter of the Maastricht Treaty and the Green Paper on Social Policy (European Commission 1994). This sought both to support workers’ rights and to provide safe and humane conditions of employment – such as uniform health and safety regulations, maximum hours of work, and parental leave – and also to remove discrimination by sex from employment relations (to further the implementation of Article 119 of the Treaty of Rome which laid down that there should be equal treatment for women and men in employment-related issues), for instance by granting the same rights to part-time, largely female, workers, as to full-time workers. These two policies may be considered either each to be necessary for the success of the other, or to be opposed. Further, there is a question as to the extent to which both the economic and social dimensions have been or will be implemented. These questions are addressed in different ways by our first two contributors in this section. The policies also have different implications in different countries: for instance, the equal treatment policies have had more impact on countries such as the UK where the existing policies are relatively weak as compared with Scandinavian countries where they are strong. The last two chapters here address changes in the rate and form of social exclusion on the basis of gender, age and immigration status. Bornschier and Ziltener ask how central the ‘social dimension’ is to the project of the European Union. They assess three possible answers: that the social dimension is a ‘cornerstone’ of the project of the European Union; that it is merely ‘packaging’ to sell an elite pact between European transnational corporations and the European Commission to the public; and that it is merely a ‘flanking’ exercise, necessary to cushion sociopolitically the impact of the internal market and technological change. On the basis of detailed analysis of the records of the central institutions of the European Union and of the major protagonists, they conclude that the social dimension has been a cornerstone of the project of the European Union from the beginning, although it had been set to one side for tactical reasons, leading to a significant measure of defeat. Bornschier and Ziltener situate the development of the renewed European Union project in the context of the pressures of globalization and in particular economic competition from America and Japan, which was difficult to meet on the basis of small national markets. An alliance between European transnational corporations and the European Commission to restructure the European economy was key to the new

10

Introduction

project. However, the role played by Delors and like-minded socialists meant that there was always the firm intention to build a strong social dimension. The significance of the role of Delors as a political entrepreneur in this process means that the overall theory is not simply one which can be reduced to geopolitics and global economic structures. We see here parallels with the theme of Touraine as to the essentially political nature of the determination of European social structure. But despite the intentions of the actors, Bornschier and Ziltener’s final evaluation is that the social dimension does not succeed. Buchmann likewise addresses barriers to the social and political integration of the European Union, as compared with the degree of economic integration, but from a different angle. She sees the limits stemming from the absence of a European public sphere and from the democratic deficit of European institutions. Buchmann draws on the distinction between system integration and social integration, arguing that while the former has occurred the latter has not. It is to the absence of a European public sphere – what others might call a European civil society – that Buchmann particularly directs our attention. A key lack here is that of a European-wide media which she regards as essential to communications between citizens, interest groups and political decision-makers. This relates to the relative weakness of European-wide intermediary institutions of interest formation and interest articulation, such as political parties, unions and professional associations. Rather, these are still organized primarily on a national basis. This process is compounded, she argues, by the functional technocratic rationality of the European political institutions, especially the most powerful of these, the European Commission. Despite these views, Buchmann considers that there is the potential for the development of a European public sphere and its associated social integration. As the European Union has created some forms of integration there has been a tendency to tighten the controls over immigration. Engbersen notes that this has also involved a tendency to more punitive regimes towards existing immigrants who do not have legal rights of residence across Europe. Nevertheless, most policies have been marked by contradictions. In this context Engbersen examines the position of illegal immigrants in the Netherlands where, until the 1990s, there was toleration of such people. This has changed, so that now there are active attempts to exclude illegal immigrants from gaining access to public services and employment, and an intensification of attempts at deportation. This new policy has the potential to drive such immigrants into illegal ways of earning a living and other criminal activities in order to evade identification. Yet, in practice, most illegal immigrants find niches which offer support, including employers who want to employ them and schools and housing agencies which have functional reasons to keep their doors open. While some live an isolated and marginal existence, others are semi-integrated into Dutch society. Arber addresses the changing social exclusion of different groups of women. Throughout Western Europe, women are increasingly participating in paid employment and benefiting from increased access to money and social integration. There are still major differences between European societies in this regard, however, with very little gender differentiation in employment rates in the Nordic countries, and a significantly greater differentiation in much of Southern Europe. There are further differences between countries in terms of whether this employment is part-time or full-time and in the conditions and wages typically obtained. Nonetheless, there has been a considerable integration of women into market work over recent years in Europe.

Introduction

11

A major caveat to this picture of the social inclusion of women, however, is the relative poverty of older women. Older women are less likely to have held jobs which provide a good pension, and many face an old age in poverty after the death of their husbands during a period of widowhood which, in the UK, is currently on average ten years. Poverty may lead such older women to be effectively socially excluded if they cannot afford to purchase the goods and services normal for social life today. It is to the interaction of gender and age that Arber points us in order to understand the increasing social integration of some women and the relative social exclusion of others. CITIZENSHIPAND GENDER There is increasing integration of women into the public sphere in Western Europe, including the market sector of the economy, education and the elected national legislatures. Across Western Europe there have been very large increases in the proportion of women in paid employment and, in many countries, elected to public office. However, despite these changes and those in household structures women still do the majority of the care for the young, sick and old at home. This may be seen to limit women’s effective participation in the public sphere and their full social integration. The extent to which women are able to combine paid work and housework depends not only on the structure of the household, but also on whether the state has created a welfare infrastructure which assists such reconciliation of working and family life. There is a further qualification on the thesis of women’s integration in that the employment in which they engage is disproportionately non-standard or ‘flexibilized’, that is, part-time or temporary work. Comparison between West and East on the social integration of women raises in sharp form the question of the relative significance of paid work, the family and nonmarket forms of work for the theorization of gender relations. This is because the full integration of women into paid employment in the East and the provision of public childcare is not thought by some writers in the East to produce the best circumstances for women. The debate as to what constitutes the best strategy to improve the position of women in society has often polarized women in East and West. It raises questions as to the effective routes to the integration of women into society and the relative significance in these of entry to employment, public care facilities, and political and social citizenship. Crompton argues that the integration of women in the West is seriously limited by the non-standard nature of much of this employment. Further, the systematic deregulation of certain aspects of the European Union labour market in the context of the pressures of globalization is reinforcing this trend. However, non-standard employment, such as part-time working, is very variable between EU Member States, suggesting that national processes are still playing an important role in shaping gender relations in employment. Crompton notes the tension between the policies for improving the competitiveness of the economy by deregulation with those social policies designed to produce a ‘level playing field’ and to prevent ‘social dumping’, between those which promote integration and those which lead to social exclusion. She argues for a broadening of the usage of the concept of citizenship to recognize

12

Introduction

that work-as-employment has been, in practice, the major source of the emergence of a European citizenship and its associated rights. Gerhard addresses the impact of women’s movements on the position of women and, in particular, on the constitution of civil society in different European countries. Early women’s movements had recognized the strong interrelationship between the public and private sphere in women’s lives, and had combined, on the one hand, efforts to win suffrage and civil rights in the public sphere with, on the other hand, the attempt to win legal equality in marriage and self-determination in the family. She argues that early women’s movements met only with modest success, since despite women gaining suffrage in most nation-states in the early twentieth century, this political citizenship was not followed by equality in civil or economic rights, or in the family. Gerhard argues further that the development of welfare states did not radically change women’s position in society. This was because the welfare state was based on a social compromise between labour and capital involving full employment for men and a family wage. This was based on a gender-specific division of labour in the family that defined women as dependent and responsible for the housekeeping. Social protection organized by welfare states was closely connected to the employment records of individuals and, with less than half of the female population in employment and a significant number of these women employed on part-time or temporary work, this meant that women were either not usually covered by the social protection or they were protected on a much lower level than male workers in full-time permanent employment. The social welfare systems thus had two tiers. Only in the Scandinavian welfare states was a universalization of the citizenship rights implemented together with equal social protection for men and women on a formal basis. However, even here the social rights of the citizens are still closely connected to waged labour, so that the social security system is still structured into one tier for waged workers and one for the impoverished groups outside active labour-market participation. Despite formal legal equality between men and women we still, in practice, find gender inequality in both paid and unpaid work and in their social security levels in Scandinavia. Gerhard discusses the contrasting position of women in Eastern and Central Europe. In the communist societies the women’s issue was ‘solved’ politically from above. The state legislated equal access to the labour market for men and women and guaranteed full employment by political and social measures. These measures included comprehensive childcare and care for the elderly, and thus changed the traditional role of women in the public sphere of society, but failed to relieve women of their extra responsibility for housework. Often, therefore, in the communist societies, women bore a double burden of paid and unpaid work despite formal equality. Gerhard argues that this gender-based inequality has been intensified during the transformation process to liberal market economies in Eastern and Central Europe. During this process, women’s labour-market participation has been reduced, and they have lost the right to work as well as their widespread rights to social protection. The result has been a retirement of women from both paid work and from other types of public activities, especially formal politics. Szalai argues that Western analysts are wrong to suggest that the position of women has declined in Eastern Europe since the fall of the wall. She suggests that in order to understand how the transformation to liberal market economies has changed

Introduction

13

women’s citizenship rights we need both to understand the significance of the informal sector of the economy and to examine the modernization process which took place in the communist societies during the 1960s and 1970s. Szalai describes this process in the case of Hungary. In the aftermath of the 1956 revolution, when alternatives to the socialist party were destroyed, the regime sought a social compromise between party and people. This involved privacy for families and private ownership of small familybased units producing agricultural and handicraft products. This private autonomy was accepted in exchange for unreserved loyalty in carrying out economic and political duties in the formal state-run institutions. This settlement made it possible for people to establish cultural practices and to organize skills outside the formal state institutions. In these activities, women played an outstanding role. Based on their traditional functions in the family they were the main organizers of these ‘private’ social activities. For reasons such as childbirth leave, women, unlike men, could exit temporarily from economic and political activities in the official institutions and build up the alternative institutions which became increasingly important with the erosion of the old socialist system during the 1980s. In the mid-1980s, three-quarters of the households were engaged in some kind of informal production and were collecting substantial income from these activities. During the change of economic and political systems in Hungary between 1989 and 1990, the informal social institutions took control of community-based institutions and became the framework for organizing fundamental parts of people’s everyday lives. Women were central to these informal social institutions and have remained in this position since 1989. However, as a consequence, many women have at least partially withdrawn from the ‘official’ labour market. According to Szalai, Hungarian women took over management of small-scale informal production and are managing the community-based activities in care of children and the elderly. When women enter the labour market in order to take up paid work, they do so in a way which fits in with their responsibilities in the community, that is, on a part-time or temporary basis. According to conventional Western notions, the public position of Hungarian women has deteriorated dramatically, including both their labour-market and formal political situations. Most women have disappeared from the parliament or elected governing bodies. Instead, they are responsible for governing community life and for decision-making in the local politics of welfare provision and social services. Szalai argues that these changes do not constitute a deterioration in the position of women in society. Gerhard, in contrast, argues that the withdrawal of women from public life is problematic, whether it is voluntary or not. They will be excluded from the political decision-making process that is creating new social citizenship rights based on a traditional liberal market economy. Further, the social system in Eastern Europe is likely increasingly to resemble those in the West, where participation in formal paid work is crucial for the level of social protection. NATIONALISMAND ETHNICITY The fragmenting – yet at the same time unifying – effects of ethnicity and nationalism lie at the heart of the debate on the fusion or fission of Europe. That these social identities and communities are in turmoil in many parts of contemporary Europe is

14

Introduction

central to many of the chapters in this volume. These processes are paradoxical and contradictory as a result of divergent pressures. On the one hand, we have the possible decline in the salience of the nation-state in the face of globalization and the increasing power of transnational corporations, global financial markets and institutions, the significance of global environmental concerns which are beyond the scope of the nation-state, and the development of regional supra-states, such as the EU. On the other hand, we have the resurgence of conflicts based on ethnic or national projects and the tearing up of old frontiers and empires based on one set of identities and power structures, to replace them with different and more pressing ethnic and national groupings. These themes echo the concerns of Touraine as to the relationship between globalization and cultural fragmentation in different societies, and the importance of the political in the construction of this relationship. Does globalization facilitate or reduce ethnic and national projects? They raise questions as to a European identity, and, in particular, Therborn’s thesis that contemporary (Western?) Europe should be defined in terms of a commitment to the values of universally conceived human rights. How does such a commitment find expression in the context of cultural diversity? In this section we turn first to an understanding of the theories of nationalism and ethnicity in the chapters by Rex and by Allen; then to the complexity of the different forms of citizenship in Western Europe and its relation to migration and nation in the chapter by Mitchell and Russell; and finally to confronting the explanation of the horrors of genocide in the former Yugoslavia. Both Rex and Allen explore the relationship between ethnicity and nationalism in the contemporary sociological literature. Rex suggests that much of the theoretical development on ethnicity has been related to the study of nationalism. He argues that this theorization does not adequately analyse a second project of ethnicity, namely, the formation of transitional migrant communities. He develops the notion of ethnic mobilization and shows how this can be deployed in order to understand the relationship between migrant groups and the nation-states where they currently live, exploring the contrasts and tensions between the goals of assimilation and multiculturalism. Ethnic mobilization involves ties of a global kind and may act as a brake on assimilation within one country of settlement. Cross-cutting the world of nation-states there are other structures which are based on transnational ethnic communities, which is why a theory of ethnicity is not encompassed by a theory of nationalism. Allen argues that understanding and explaining nationalism has become a crucial part of discussions of change in contemporary Europe. Her starting point is the actual divergence between state and nation and the problematic tendency until recently in much – but not all – sociology to elide the two. She argues that much important work now involves explicit discussion of the relationship between the two, for instance the recent work on citizenship. Her second main point is that many theories of nationalism incorrectly fail to include the gender dimension. In doing so, theories about nationstates and nationalism have tended to neglect the crucial way that gender relations are part of the formation of human organizations; instead, they have overemphasized ethnicity in explaining their development. On the other hand, during recent years, a growing number of scholars have included both ethnicity and gender in their research on citizenship and nationalism.

Introduction

15

Mitchell and Russell consider the thesis that a new European citizenship is developing and reject it. They argue that there may be a degree of internationalization of the governance of immigration into the European Union, but that this is not the same as convergence in the sphere of citizenship. Thus they argue that nation, nationalism and national identity remain central to the new European order. Here, Mitchell and Russell are strongly in opposition to Therborn, but more or less in harmony with Touraine, in emphasizing the remaining diversity of European societies and its consequences for creating the European House. In Germany there is still an exclusionary or ‘ethnic’ model which defines the nation in terms of ethnicity and deeprooted ties of culture and language; minorities are either excluded from citizenship or allowed only very limited rights. France is an example of a second model, where there is an inclusionary republican or ‘civic’ model of the nation in which all residents are entitled to be citizens, irrespective of ethnic origin, so long as they identify with and participate in the national culture. The UK is an example of a third, more recent, multicultural model, although it is more clearly found in Australia and Canada. Here, the nation allows scope for the maintenance of cultural and ethnic identities and differences; groups with ethnically diverse backgrounds are incorporated into the nation with the right to stay culturally distinct. These different models of citizenship remain despite the move to a more uniform EU immigration policy. Mitchell and Russell argue further that defensive nationalism is currently shaping the politics of inclusion and exclusion in Europe in a way quite different from the varieties of nationalism in Eastern Europe. This is partly a response to globalization and partly a defensive response to the perceived threat of East–West and South–North migration. It is the extreme forms of nationalism in Central and Eastern Europe, and, in particular, the tragic events in the former Yugoslavia which led to ‘ethnic cleansing’ and genocide, which have caused the greatest concern as to ‘fission’ rather than ‘fusion’ in Europe. Bertilsson addresses the possible explanations of these events. She agrees with Bauman that modernity is implicated in these events, but disagrees as to the manner of its involvement. Unlike Bauman, Bertilsson does not believe that the bureaucratic organization, with its effective means–end rationalization, is the cause of the events in the case of the former Yugoslavia. Rather, she argues that the massive ethnic revival in the Balkans is better understood as opposition to modernity itself. She suggests that ethnic resurgence is an attempt at seizing political subjecthood after its suppression during the period of socialist rule. Thus she argues that such revivals are part of modernity, and that this is not a particular tragedy but rather one which has universal features. In this way, Bertilsson implies that fission and fragmentation are essential features of modern Europe. TRANSITION AND TRANSFORMATION IN CENTRALAND EASTERN EUROPE The changes in the countries of Central and Eastern Europe raise the question of the fusion or fission of Europe in several ways, and, in particular, whether these countries are to become like the rest of Europe and move in a direction of integration with the West, or whether they are changing in different and perhaps disparate ways from the

16

Introduction

West. While early writers often argued that societies in Central and Eastern Europe are undergoing a transition to the Western European model after a deviant period of communism, more recent writers have argued that there is no single path of development and that the concept of transformation is more appropriate than transition. For instance, early on, Dahrendorf (1990) suggested that the events of 1989 marked the end of a ‘historical deviation which had begun in 1917’, while Habermas (1990) labelled them ‘rectifying revolutions’, and Offe (1991) suggested that the emphasis of the changes was on restoration rather than on a new revolutionary theory of society. However, the writers in this book – Illner, Sztompka, Szelényi, and Szalai – have the advantage of several years of collection of detailed evidence to support their quite different interpretation of these changes in which the concept of transformation is more appropriate than that of transition. Illner, in particular, rejects the interpretation of post-communist transformations as a return to a ‘normal’ path of development after the ‘deviation’ of the communist period. The societies developing in Eastern and Central Europe will not be simply later arrivals to the community of Western liberal capitalist states; they will not become simple copies of them, nor reproductions of the societies they were in pre-communist days. Rather, the transformations are producing new and unprecedented social forms. There are two main reasons behind his argument. First, there is greater continuity with the past than theorists of a revolutionary break or transition suggest. Social innovation is constrained by the social institutions developed both under communism and before. Illner suggests that we should not underestimate the importance of the impact of the development under the communist period of an egalitarian social welfare system, from which several groups benefited, despite the obvious lack of democratic process. Illner refers to the education system which delivered universal literacy, a general education and a skilled labour force, as well as specific subsidies to the rural and semi-rural populations, who enjoyed an increase in their standard of living under communist rule. The increase in the standard of living under the communist regime means that this period should not be written off as simply regressive nor communism as an ‘evil empire’. But second, and more importantly, Illner stresses the importance of long-term strategic factors that will increasingly differentiate the societies of Central and Eastern Europe, such as geographic location and strategic importance; economic resources; the kind and level of modernization; political history; and cultural traditions. So, for Illner, we should expect no development of an integrated European society, but rather, greater diversity. Szelényi likewise points to the divergence between the societies in the East and West of Europe. His focus is on the newly developing class relations in the context of the economic and political transformations. Szelényi argues that the new dominant class after the fall of communism is that of the managers and that the form of political economy in post-communism is best described as managerialism. The context of diffuse property relations, as a result of the particular processes of denationalization, facilitates this structure. The managers are a powerful group who control the society’s resources without owning them – indeed, they do not need to have ownership in order to have control. They have managed effectively to monopolize cultural capital, in particular the ideology of monetarism, which is the dominant belief system about political economy. Szelényi notes that the thesis of the rise of managerialism was first raised

Introduction

17

about Western societies, and that this was undermined by empirical evidence. The difference is that, in the West, managers’ aspirations to become the dominant class were defeated by a strong propertied bourgeoisie, which is not to be found in the East. The difference between ‘managerialism’ or ‘managerial capitalism’ and the type of private capitalism in most Western countries, is that in the latter we have identifiable owners, or groups of owners, who legitimate economic decision-making with ownership, whereas in post-communist societies there is more diffuse ownership with no identifiable owners to make decisions. Szelényi is not just noting the economic power of the new managerial class, but also arguing that it is their access to cultural capital which is crucial. The intelligentsia has a role but is co-opted. The crucial part of this cultural capital is the monopolization of the ideology of monetarism. In this way the hegemony of laissez-faire capitalism is complete, but it has a different form from that in the West. The uniqueness and importance of each society’s culture is a theme found also in the chapter by Sztompka as he explores the preconditions for stable democracies in Central and Eastern Europe. Sztompka argues for the importance not only of the political institutions of democracy, such as parliament, political parties and elections, but also for its cultural underpinnings in civil society. In order for there to be a full democracy it is necessary to have a fully developed civic culture. It is not enough to have political institutions such as parliaments, political parties and elections. He suggests that the societies of Eastern and Central Europe suffer from ‘civilizational incompetence’ as a result of the period of communist rule. These years created a ‘bloc culture’, based on a philosophy of dependence instead of self-reliance, of an allembracing collectivism and conformity, of rigidity and of intolerance. However, there were two other cultural traditions co-existing with this: the national or indigenous culture; and Western culture. These were both suppressed, but nonetheless had a presence during the communist period. Indeed, these societies generated mass movements in favour of democratic reform which struggled against the system, despite these inauspicious circumstances. We should not forget that it was from within that society that the democratic opposition emerged, spread and was able to mobilize large masses in the struggle against the system. Differences in national cultures means that there is considerable diversity in the receptivity of post-communist countries to democratic practices: for instance, the Czech Republic had a cultural tradition more conducive to democracy than that of Russia. Sztompka does think that the situation for democracy can become more favourable and indeed deploys the concept of ‘cultural lag’. In this way Stompka implies both the possibility of convergence of the East towards the democratic traditions of the West, utilizing the evolutionary language of ‘cultural lag’ and of ‘transition’, while yet highlighting the current dissimilarity of the civic cultures of these societies. A more optimistic note on the recent developments in Hungary was struck by Szalai in her examination of gendered patterns of economic development in her argument with Western feminists, such as Einhorn (1991), who suggest that the position of women is deteriorating significantly in Eastern and Central Europe. She argues that we cannot explain the patterns of inequality in the economy today without an understanding of the development of the informal sector during the period of communism. This sector involved the use of small one-acre private plots of land, and the labour time especially of women who had a three-year childcare leave following the birth of each child. This

18

Introduction

enabled women in particular to develop the skills and networks which are so important in a marketized economy, while men devoted most of their labour time to the formal state-run sector. Szalai argues that while women are few in the main formal political arenas, nonetheless they are significant political actors when situations arise in which they wish to intervene, such as new legislation on abortion. Hence she argues that initial analyses of statistics on the position of women underestimates the integration of women in contemporary Hungarian society. The most catastrophic changes in Eastern and Central Europe are the ones relating to war and genocide, to ethnic and national conflict. The tragic disintegration of the former Yugoslavia into warring ethnic nations, the fragmentation of the former Soviet Union with associated armed conflict, and many other incidents, demand consideration. Bertilsson asks whether Bauman’s thesis on modernity, with its means–end rationality, is the ultimate root of the conflicts in the former Yugoslavia. She concludes that rather than being part of modernity, it is better to see these processes as a form of resistance to modernity, that the massive ethnic revival in the Balkans is directed against modernity itself. Touraine argues that we should see the conflict in the former Yugoslavia not as cultural or religious, but as a result of a struggle by the Milosevic regime to transform his communist dictatorship into a nationalist one. These chapters on contemporary developments in Eastern and Central Europe demonstrate the importance of understanding difference in order to understand the whole picture. The different patterns of gender relations and of ethnic relations are crucial to understanding the changes in these societies. As their economies become marketized and some of their polities democratized, there will be some movement towards the freedoms and inequalities of the West. However, despite a common period of communist governance and its overthrow, the societies of Eastern and Central Europe have very significant differences both among themselves and with Western European countries, many of which date back to a period before their communist past. REFERENCES Dahrendorf, R. (1990) The Modern Social Conflict: An Essay on the Politics of Liberty, Berkeley: University of California Press. Einhorn (1991) ‘Where have all the women gone?’, Feminist Review, No. 39. European Commission (1993) Growth, Competitiveness, Employment: The Challenges and Ways Forward into the 21st Century, White Paper, Luxembourg: Office for Official Publications of the European Communities. —— (1994) European Social Policy: Option for the Union, Green Paper, Luxembourg: Office for Official Publications of the European Communities. Habermas, J. (1990) Strukturwandel der Öffentlichkeit, Frankfurt: Campus.

1

‘Europe’ as issues of sociology Göran Therborn

Here in Budapest we are gathering on the sacred ground of modernity, if such an oxymoron may be allowed, full of memories of battles, and with a spring of projects. A hundred years ago this was the site of the Magyar millennium, a monumental celebration of nationalism. Only a few years later, an embryonic Hungarian sociology, allied to poetry, hailed international modernity in journals with names of fanfares, The Twentieth Century (Huszadik Század), The West (Nyugat). Karl Polanyi presided over the Galileo Circle, and just after World War I Karl Mannheim got the first Chair of Sociology. From Budapest came some of the most important witnesses to and participants of the vicissitudes of twentieth-century modernity: Arthur Koestler, Georg Lukács, John von Neumann, Leo Szilárd, among others. The bomb, game theory, neo-Marxist dialectics, and Darkness at Noon, are all largely fermentations of the Budapest imagination. Budapest is a place for new ideas, and for reflecting about the old. That’s why we are here, I suppose. EUROPE AND THE SLOW TRAIN OF SOCIOLOGY In its basic thoughts, sociology is a slow train, plodding along in meandering motion. Sociology is more like the famous night train from Budapest to Trieste – as fast in the belle époque before World War I as eighty years later – than the ‘fields’ of feverish competitive showmanship, which Pierre Bourdieu has analysed so eloquently. ‘Europe’ has for long been a marginal subject of sociology, at most. It is true that our German colleague Richard Münch (1993) has devoted a recent book to it, full of the same straightforward modern energy as the project itself, but on the whole Europe has not been an object of research. Europe has rarely, if ever, been taken as an empirical embodiment of a key theoretical concept or of a fascinating general process, nor as a challenge to our imagination of social construction. In its dismissive, non-committal form, Durkheim’s ([1970] 1987: 295) off-the-cuff remark in a debate on patriotism in 1907 is representative: ‘Europe, or if you want, the whole civilized world’ (i.e., as a more vast fatherland was being created). It had no implications of theory and analysis, nor of practice, as Durkheim remained a French nationalist. In order to link up with a committed sociological approach to Europe we have to go back almost two hundred years, to the proto-sociology of Henri de Saint-Simon, the

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master of Auguste Comte. Experiences of the French Revolution produced an extraordinary analytical perspicacity with regard to history and social affairs among a number of intellectuals, among whom only Alexis de Tocqueville is now read and remembered. But there were several others; Saint-Simon and his first secretary Augustin Thierry were among them. In 1814 Saint-Simon and Thierry (1868: 153–218) published a booklet On the Reorganization of European Society. It is strikingly similar in tone to the project of Jean Monnet, Robert Schumann, and Konrad Adenauer 135 years later. With the difference that, writing before Waterloo but after the main Napoleonic wars, it is a reconciliation of France and England that is crucial. The project continues the prenationalist humanism of the Enlightenment, and suggests that England should have a two-thirds majority in an Anglo-French parliament, an early expression of what contemporary Germans would call Westbindung, Western embeddedness. With the same vision that de Tocqueville had when he foresaw the coming world prominence of Russia and the USA, Saint-Simon and Thierry (1868: 213) say that the ‘German nation’ ‘is destined to play the premier role in Europe, as soon as it is united under a free government’. Saint-Simon did correctly predict that the ancien régime was doomed, in spite of the Restoration and the Holy Alliance, and that the classes of industry were soon going to assert themselves. He did not envisage the rise of nationalism, which put his European project on a backburner for a long time. What actually happened in the latter respect was instead captured by Max Weber. Weber’s inaugural lecture at Freiburg in 1895 is the most eloquent social science homage to nationalism ever presented. It is militant: ‘There can be no truce even in the economic struggle for existence’; heroic: ‘We do not have peace and happiness to bequeath to our posterity, but rather the eternal struggle for the maintenance and improvement . . . of our national character’. It is explicitly particularistic: ‘the standard of value adopted by a German . . . theorist, can therefore be nothing other than a German policy and a German standard’ (Weber 1980: 436, 438, 437, respectively; emphasis omitted). Weber expressed his time well. He also pointed silently to where Europe would go; i.e., onto the roads to Verdun, to El Alamein and to Stalingrad, if not to Auschwitz. But Weber at Freiburg is dated, mid-time European modernity. That Weber is not the classic of contemporary sociology. Today we are back to the vista of Saint-Simon, after having travelled through the horrible interlude of Max Weber’s world and its extrapolations (or most of us have, at least). Weber’s Freiburg is no longer the academic Watch on the Rhine cutting the heart of Europe into two. It is a battered, half-deserted, half-cleansed village somewhere in the triangle between Zagreb, Belgrade, and Sarajevo. The slowness of fundamental sociology may reflect the course of social history. There is still a wagon of nationalism at the rear of the train of Europe. THE EUROPEAN BUILDING SITE Now, after all, Europe is becoming a hot area of research. Europe does embody some key concepts of sociology, it harbours fascinating, epochal social processes, and it

‘Europe’ as issues of sociology

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calls out our constructive imagination to test. But ‘Europe’ is a difficult thing. Where is it, where does it begin, where does it end? What does it mean? First of all, then, we should open our eyes to what it looks like. Europe today looks like a building site; rather like central Berlin as a matter of fact. Similar to the sense in which Paris was ‘the capital of the 19th century’, in Walter Benjamin’s characterization, Berlin is, more modestly and certainly more contradictorily, the capital of twentieth-century Europe. It has been a parade-ground of early twentiethcentury nationalism as well as the all-European example of socialist working-class organization, the tragic end of the brief hopes of a proletarian revolution, a short-lived centre of cultural modernity, the continental headquarters of Fascism and genocide, the meeting-point and the dividing line between the anti-Fascist victors, the walled-in monument of a defensive second-rate socialism, a major centre of the spirit of 1968 (in both its Western emancipatory version and its Eastern repressive form), and the place where communism was perceived to end. Most recently, Berlin was the stage of the major manifestation of art in this decade, and it is currently a hectic building ground, where Polish, Portuguese, and other workers, some legal some not but all fed by Turkish fast food, are building a German capital of uncertain meanings and implications. In contemporary Europe two major buildings are being constructed, Capitalism in Eastern and East-Central Europe, and the European Union. Both projects put challenges to the social sciences, which sociologists have been reluctant to take seriously, and which economists in the former case and lawyers in the latter have been only too happy to set their claws into. Both projects have key problems of social steering in common, like previously the EU project with the building of socialism. As I have recently presented a framework for the analysis of such long-term processes of deliberate change (Therborn 1995: ch. 16), I shall here approach some more specific issues. There are problems of system-building and of society maintenance. In the East, there are the intrinsic costs of systemic change, the issue of systemic options (are there several roads to capitalism, or is there only one?), and the questions of the cultural prerequisites of a successful capitalism and of the design of social institutions. In the West, and in Europe as a whole, it is crucial first of all to realize what kind of system is possible and desirable, as a ‘European Union’, and what that implies. But whatever the system, both Eastern and Western Europe are threatened societies, subject to powerful processes of social disintegration and dissolution. POLITICO-IDEOLOGICAL DEFINED SYSTEMS: THEIR CHANGEAND CHANCES Social transformations and systemic changes all begin in the ever-bright dawn of hope. The night-owl of historical and sociological wisdom is heard only afterwards, when the choices have already been made and when payments are due. Well before the anti-communist turn of 1989–91, social historians and social scientists knew that revolutions of politico-ideologically defined social systems were usually tremendously costly in terms of human suffering, while paradoxically often modest or contradictory in their production of social effects. The human and the

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Opening article

economic costs of the French and the Russian revolutions had been investigated in detail by phalanxes of scholars. Among the transformers of 1989–91 probably even fewer people than in 1917–19 paid any attention to empirical experience. Sociologically understandably, because the systemic change in Eastern and East-Central Europe was extremely, nay uniquely, fortunate by historical standards. There was no resistance from the previous regime, no foreign interventions, no foreign blockade. On the contrary, there was big international applause, and some money.¹ Nevertheless, the economic effects of the systemic turn are worse, in the most ‘fortunate’ cases of Poland and the Czech Republic, than those of the 1930s Depression on Germany. In the former Soviet Union and on the Balkans, the overall effect is similar to the wartime economic destruction (Unicef 1994: 94; 1995: 277; Maddison 1985: 18, 47).² No wonder that in the early 1990s Eastern Europeans were the unhappiest people on earth (Therborn 1995: 293ff.). Politico-ideologically defined systems have uneven and variable effects upon the life-course of people. True, on the whole Communist Eastern Europe was more egalitarian than Capitalist Western Europe, but, for instance, the Social Democratic Nordic countries did at least as well, in income distribution, gender equality and social mobility. Communist Europe was not one but several structures of life-chances in comparison with Capitalist Europe. Private property income was more important in supposedly socialist Poland than in several countries of Western Europe (Therborn 1995: 153, 156, 174). The political iron curtain was not a social one. This empirical sociological conclusion bears upon the current discussion of whether there is, say, a Czech or a Hungarian road to capitalism, or whether there is only one road (i.e., that provided by the most powerful foreign model). THE SPIRIT OF CAPITALISM REVISITED The cultural prerequisites of any successful long-term functioning and development of capitalism were part of the core teaching of classical sociology. Onto the current Eastern European market of ideas, classical sociology has two major contributions to offer. One refers to the potential social destructiveness of the market. In other words, to create a market economy is not the same as to create or to foster a civil society. Durkheim, in his famous work on the division of labour, highlighted the problems of anomie, of normlessness in unregulated market economies. An extreme example today of Durkheim’s chickens now returning to roost is Russian banking. Here, assassination seems to be the most frequent cause of death. At this point we must also refer to the great work of Karl Polanyi ([1944] 1957), a modern classic of economic sociology. To him, the ‘great transformation’ of nineteenthcentury marketeering led, by its own inherent impossibility, to Fascism. (Polanyi, of course, wrote in exile during the war.) Fascism may not be on the future agenda. But the critique of unbridled markets – of the commodification of social relations, for their tendencies of self-endangering social destructiveness – has a strong empirical as well as theoretical base in mainstream sociology.

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The point here is that anti-sociological market economies are likely to produce not only poor people, who might be discounted or discarded, but also violence, vandalism, and environmental destruction. The other classical sociological idea is that capitalist development requires not only a normative regulation but also an economic culture. Max Weber’s famous inquiry into the ‘spirit’ of capitalism (i.e., into capitalist culture) bears directly upon the question of what decides between a ‘backward’ and an ‘advanced’ or ‘developed’ capitalism. Weber distinguished very sharply between greed (what the Romans called auri sacra fames) or irrational speculation, and rational capitalism. The former had always existed, without necessarily leading anywhere economically, while the latter was a recent Western phenomenon. Weber’s point was, that any socially successful capitalism was not just private property, unregulated prices, and the maxim ‘enrich yourselves’, but that it involved a culture of values, norms and trust, of calling and time perspective (Weber 1988: 41ff. Cf. the author’s introduction to his essays on the sociology of religion, 1988: 4ff.). Capitalist prosperity is not a social ‘normalcy’. Some societies achieve it, most don’t. Europe before 1939 was not synonymous with success. After 1989 it is even less so. A developed market economy, an advanced capitalism, is not approached by a supply of luxury goods and opportunities of rapid individual enrichment. If that had been the case, Calcutta, Kinshasa, and Port-au-Prince and their likes would long since have been models of development. Here the arguments of radical development economics and conservative mainstream sociology, in the vein of Talcott Parsons, concur remarkably. Constitutional arrangements and economic forms are not enough. Underdeveloped societies are characteristically disjointed and segmented, which is why the accumulation of wealth in, for example, certain neighbourhoods of Port-auPrince has not led to much development of Haitian society. Sustained development and advanced societies require institutions of social integration. The design of new institutions of social integration has so far been largely neglected in Eastern and Central Europe. Since social integration is a major sociological stock-in-trade, we have a special responsibility for pushing it onto the agenda of transformation. SYSTEMIC INTEGRATION: EUROPEASANORMATIVEAREA With regard to the European Union, which is no longer to be an exclusively Western European project, we have to face a more elementary question – not primarily about the prerequisites of systemic construction, but about what system is being built. What European integration or union? The most obvious answer is, of course, an economic union of commercial interdependence. That was the start-up disk of Jean Monnet and others, a European functional integration of a supranational division of labour. Today, Europe as an economic subsystem would amount to a regional blurb on the Reuter screens of global markets. ‘Culture’ was Monnet’s alternative to trade and divisions of labour. And regional literati may still be called upon to sermonize on the ‘European idea’, the ‘European tradition’, the ‘European identity’. Other intellectuals might, if need be, be called upon to fulminate against the colonialist, racist, sexist, and Fascist history and/or character

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Opening article

of Europe. (For the sake of academic peace I am here forsaking recourse to footnotes of reference.) Against all this, I would venture the proposition, that the ‘Europe’ being built is something more than a region of the world system of capitalism, and something different from a manifestation of a European culture – from an expression of European collective representations as a Durkheimian might put it. The most important, and the theoretically most fascinating, aspect of the European integration project is the emergence of Europe as a normative area, as a loosely coupled system of regulatory norms. In order to get a handle on what is happening we need to abandon a sociological vulgata of social cohesion posed in poles of division of labour – common values or identity. An excellent analytical point of departure is, then, David Lockwood’s (1964) article ‘Social integration and system integration’. Over thirty years after its publication, it should be used with somewhat of the same impious imagination that Lockwood himself used with regard to Karl Marx. Lockwood’s distinction directs our attention to the difference between a coupling of actors and a fit of systemic parts. The Europe being created is not an ethnic community, and could not be. The genetic code of current Europeans is of Middle Eastern, Lower Don/Kurgan and Northern Asian origin (Cavalli Sforza and Piazza 1993). Nor is Europe becoming a cultural unit, in spite of some French efforts. Indeed, Europe has largely lost its cultural identity. The classical, and most specific, cultural European identity of Greek and Roman Antiquity has disappeared, by and large. The world of Solon, Pericles, Caesar, Cicero, Augustus and others does not make much sense to contemporary European politicians. Even among intellectuals a knowledge of the Odes of Horace or the Metamorphoses of Ovid is no longer to be expected. If Europe is to have any meaning and substance it is not as an object of identity, as part of any identity politics. It is as a focus of institutionalization. The actually ongoing building of Europe is a process of system integration, of building a loosely coupled, open system, very different from the rigid ideological complexes of the Cold War, but also without the forceful dynamic of the world system of capitalism. As such, ‘Europe’ is a set of supranational, suprastate normative institutions. The European Union is the most concrete and tangible of this set, with a highly visible political apparatus and a substantial budgetary underpinning. The EU does not operate mainly as a ‘common market’ (its impact on trade has been uneven and unsystematic), but as a normative area governed by an extensive body of rules, vigilantly and strongly protected by a European judiciary, to which even nation-states are held liable. EU legislation is chiefly commercial, although adherence to certain basic norms of democracy and human rights is expected from all Member States. This became quite clear in the entrance process of post-dictatorial Greece, Portugal, and Spain. (NATO, it should be remembered, has never posed any demands of democracy and human rights as criteria for membership.) Members, except the UK, have also committed themselves to certain basic norms of social policy (Council and Commission of the European Communities 1992: 196ff.). The Council of Europe, with the European Convention on Human Rights, its Court of Human Rights, and its European Social Charter, has made Europe into an area of human rights, more specific and more binding than any other area of the world.

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(‘Europe’ in the Council of Europe sense does not yet include some of the countries of the former USSR and of the former Yugoslavia, it should perhaps be added.) A third major institution of normative Europe is the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), officially constituted in 1992 and 1994 (when the name changed from ‘Conference’ to ‘Organization’), but going back to the institutionalized thaw of the Cold War, the Helsinki Agreement of 1975. The seventh section of the latter listed a set of fundamental freedoms and rights to act and provided for a review process. The now permanent OSCE has a special monitoring and dialogueinitiating Office on democratic institutions and human rights, located in Warsaw. Also with regard to heeding UN conventions, there is a tendency for European countries to emerge as a supranational normative area, for instance with reference to the Convention on the Rights of the Child. While Western European governments and non-governmental organizations are paying serious attention to the Convention and to the hearings of its official monitoring Committee, the United States, for instance, has not even ratified the Convention. (See further, Therborn 1996.) This normative system construction has its cultural prerequisites. But the culture underpinning the new European set of normative institutions is not any deep and ancient culture of Europeans. Rather, it is a collection of Western European lessons from recent European modernity: that nationalism, and any other ‘ism’ pursued with a single mind, is dangerous and should be kept regulated; that the inviolability of the basic rights of human life and dignity constitutes a supreme norm, overriding any social construction. This is not ancient Greece, Christianity, the Renaissance, or the Enlightenment. It is the conclusion from the last European world war and from the discovery of the gas chambers. The European road to and through modernity has also left a certain legacy of social norms, reflecting European experiences of class and gender. Elsewhere (Therborn 1995: 282ff.) I have summed them up as ‘public collectivism’ and ‘family individualism’. Collective bargaining, trade unions, public social services, individual rights of women and of children are all held more legitimate in Europe than in the rest of the contemporary world. They are expressed in the social documents of the EU and of the Council of Europe. Rather than a celebration of European culture and identity, this current normative Europe might be seen as what Massimo Cacciari (1994: 157, 166–7), the Italian philosopher and the current mayor of Venice, has called the ‘occidente della sua storia’, the sundown of European history, as a ‘silent maturation of the Coming’, of Europe going into the serene evening of its own culture.³ ‘Europe’ as a normative area is a social construction that brings us into the heart of sociological theory and analysis. It also has a considerable social appeal. It is not exclusive, it requires no visas and has no border guards. It extends, and is extensible as far as adherence to its norms go. It does not prescribe any particular form of social integration among social actors. It provides a field for a limitless number of cultures and lifestyles. Put in Habermasian terms, it is a system that allows and protects a number of different lifeworlds. It is as a supranational normative area that Europe has asserted itself. This is the only thing Europe has left to tell the world, and it is being followed and imitated in new

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Opening article

shapes in the Americas, in Asia, and in Africa, with variable (but so far mostly modest) success. The European system of regulatory norms and courts is the most institutionalized manifestation of what our Portuguese colleague Boaventura de Sousa Santos (1991) has drawn our attention to: ‘the transnationalization of the legal field’. The attempts to turn the EU into a competitive corporation, or at least a Ministry of industry and foreign trade and/or into a political superpower, have all failed miserably, most recently in Bosnia. PROCESSES OF DISINTEGRATION However, dialectics has not left Europe. Together with system building and system integration, at least three processes of social disintegration are also gathering momentum. Fission and fusion occur simultaneously. The old economic distance between Eastern and Western Europe, which narrowed in the 1950s and early 1960s and then grew again, widened to an abyss in the period 1990–3. It is still widening, in absolute terms. We may get a glimpse of the problem by comparing the economic development after 1989 in the two poorest EU countries and in the three most favoured ex-communist countries (Table 1.1). How the GDP of the two groups of countries relates exactly in terms of purchasing power parities may still be open to debate, but that of the EU countries is generally considered clearly above that of the Visegrad group. However, the latter have gone backwards, in total resources, while the former have advanced further. Table 1.1 The development of real GDP in five countries, 1989–94 (Index: 31.12.1989 = 100)

1.1.92 1.1.95

Greece

Portugal

Czech R .

103.1 104.1

108.3 108.3

78.4 79.7

Hungary

Poland

82.6 83.5

84.0 91.6

Sources: OECD, Economic Outlook, June 1995; Unicef, Central and Eastern Europe in Transition, No. 3, 1995.

How far this precipitating chasm between ordinary people may be compensated for by the rapprochement in consumption of the upper and upper middle classes will be an important topic of power investigation. How the drawing together of youth cultures and youth expectations will liaise with the diverging situations of the old and the middle aged is another grand issue, connecting us with the generational sociology that Karl Mannheim pioneered. In any case, there is a contradiction between, on the one hand, the European unification around parliamentary democracy and the market economy, and, on the other, the growing apart of life-chances in the East and in the West. Second, the economic wedge of social division is sharpened by a historical turn of contemporary developed capitalism. Modern, successful capitalism is no longer, as it was for about three decades after World War II, by and large a positive sum game. The happy times when employment, capital accumulation, wages, taxes, pensions, and profits all grew together have left us – maybe for ever. Anyway, currently and for the

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foreseeable future, even successful, socially embedded capitalism is producing and reproducing losers (the unemployed, the marginalized, the ghettoized) on a growing scale. How far this process will go is impossible to tell. It would be premature to say that it is beyond political remedy. On the other hand, there are no signs anywhere that anything serious is being done about it. The unemployment rate of the European Union is climbing upwards from one business cycle to the next. Monetary union and monetary convergence occupy the politicians’ agenda, and the willingness of the employed to pay for the unemployed is going down. Even under the best conditions, the new capitalism of Eastern and East-Central Europe is likely to produce a vast pool of permanent losers. Immigration is something to be proud of, the sincerest form of social flattery. The inequality, or, if you want, perversity, of European modernity was well expressed in the fact that, for all its global prosperity, Europe was until the early 1960s a continent of emigration. Until then, Europe, and the United Kingdom in particular, was enjoying a strange wonderland, ruling large parts of the rest of the world, sucking in its surplus, and exporting Europe’s surplus population to it. Now this has changed. In a sense it means that Western Europe is becoming what East-Central Europe once was – a multiethnic, multicultural society. Multiculturality was once the characteristic of the whole strip, from the left bank of the Dnieper to the Oder–Neisse running from Vyborg/Viipuri on the Finnish Gulf to Thessaloniki/Selänik/ Soloun on the Aegean Sea and to Constantinople/Istanbul on the Bosporus: the world which has entered literature through what Elias Canetti has told us of Ruse (in Bulgaria) and Czeslaw Milosz of Vilna (or contemporary Vilnius), and which was finally destroyed in the last world war and its aftermath. Immigration brings a new cultural richness to Western Europe. Nowadays, it is tangibly expressed in a widening gastronomic horizon, and in Creole suburban music, from Stockholm to Paris. But you may also encounter this new world of Europe in the literature of Hanif Kureishi and others. However, it would be unsociologically naïve to suppose that multiculturality would arrive and settle without tension, friction, and conflict. Here we have a third tendency of social disintegration, manifested in xenophobia, discrimination, and ethnic violence. After all, the Russian Pale of Jewish settlement, the Sudetenland or Transylvania were never models of cultural harmony and social integration. Its very openness, inwards as well as outwards, is the weakness of the system of Europe. As such, it provides no solution to the new negative dynamics of capitalism and its production of economic losers and social misery. It does not cope with the anomic conditions coming out of multiplying contemporary economics with processes of individualization and cultural diversification, with the production of everyday violence. To tackle these processes of disintegration and social destruction, Europeans, East and West, will have to draw upon a positive lesson from European modernity: collective action for securing individual rights is possible. The efforts of the labour movement and the policies and institutions of the welfare state have shaped the developed modern societies of Europe more than any other part of the world. Today and tomorrow, new forms of collective action and of solidarity are called for.

28 Opening article BY WAY OF CONCLUSION Dear colleague, you are not sitting for yourself in a vast world, singly facing forces or fashions of globalization, individualization, and postmodernism. As a European sociologist you are part of the building and rebuilding of a continent. Ours is an era of social design, of new social systems in Eastern and East-Central Europe and of a union of Europe. Practice is bringing us back to the concern of the early origin of our discipline, after the end of the French Revolution. Classical and central questions of sociology have become crucial issues for the construction or destruction of Europe, deriving from the European road to and through modernity: the emergence and the erosion of norms, the regulation of markets, the culture of capitalism; the parameters of large-scale social reorganization, the possibilities of social steering, the closure or openness of social systems, forms of system integration and of social integration; bases of collective action, the social effects of economic polarization, the implications of new generational divides; the dynamics of identities, nationalism and post-nationalism, the handling of ethnic encounters, and multiculturality. How these sociological questions are answered in the practice of power will decide much of the future of Europe and of Europeans. Sociologists have usually been both suspicious of and suspect to power, with good reasons for both. But we have also a tradition, strengthened in recent decades, of speaking up to the powers that be. And as social scientists, we have no escape from social responsibility. NOTES 1. The historian’s view of comparative social revolutions is not, of course, identical with the bitter experience of the participants. While from a cool historical observer’s perspective the Eastern European social change appears extraordinarily lucky, a participant may see the limited Western aid as an expression of ‘the Choir of the Old European Hypocrisy’, as the Hungarian writer Peter Nádas put it in his acceptance speech on receiving the German Book Prize of European Understanding. 2. Poland’s GDP fell by 19 per cent in 1990/91, that of the Czech Republic by 21 per cent in 1991/ 92. In the Depression of the 1930s the peak to trough fall of the German GDP was 16 per cent. 3. The double meaning of ‘occidente’, which is also well captured by the German ‘Abendland’, is lost in the purely geographical English ‘West’.

REFERENCES Cacciari, M. (1994) Geo-filosofia dell’ Europa, Milano: Adelphi. Cavalli Sforza, L.L. and Piazza, A. (1993) ‘Biologica e genetica’, in P. Anderson et al. (eds), Storia d’ Europa, Vol. 1, Torino: Einaudi. Council and Commission of the European Communities (1992) Treaty on European Union, Luxembourg. Council of Europe (1992) Human Rights in International Law, Strasbourg: Council of Europe Press. Durkheim, E. ([1970] 1987) ‘Pacifisme et Patriotisme’, in La science sociale e l’action, Paris: PUF. Lockwood, D. (1964) ‘Social integration and system integration’, in G. Zollschan and W. Hirsch (eds), Explorations in Social Change, Boston: Houghton Mifflin.

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Maddison, A. (1985) Two Crises, Paris: OECD. Münch, R. (1993) Das Projekt Europa, Frankfurt: Suhrkamp. Polanyi, K. ([1944] 1957) The Great Transformation, Boston: Beacon Press. Saint-Simon, H. de and Thierr,y A. (1868) De la Réorganisation de la société européenne, in Oeuvres de Saint-Simon et Enfantin, Vol. 1, Paris: E. Dentu. Sousa Santos, B. de (1991) ‘Law in the world system: from legal diaspora to legal ecumene’, unpublished paper. Therborn, G. (1995) European Modernity and Beyond, London: Sage. —— (1996) ‘Child politics: dimensions and perspectives’, Childhood, No. 1. Unicef (1994) Crisis in Mortality, Health and Nutrition, Florence: Economies in Transition Studies Regional Monitoring Report No. 2. —— (1995) Economies of Transition, Vol. 3, No. 2, Florence. Weber, M. (1980) ‘Freiburger Antrittsrede’ (English translation as ‘The national state and economic policy (Freiburg address)’), Economy and Society, 9. —— (1988) ‘Die protestantische Ethik und der Geuist des Kapitalismus’, in Gesammelte Aufsätze zur Religionssoziologie I, Tübingen: J.C.B. Mohr/UTB.

Part I

Social exclusion and European integration

2

The revitalization of Western Europe and the politics of the ‘social dimension’ Volker Bornschier and Patrick Ziltener

THE REVITALIZATION OFWEST EUROPEAN INTEGRATION Western Europe’s move towards political union entered widespread public debate only at the beginning of the 1990s. However, it had begun almost a decade earlier, culminating in a bargain to recast the Community which was struck in 1985 with the Single European Act. These events mark a historic step from a Community paralysed by lethargy and budgetary squabbling in the ‘Eurosclerosis’ era to one in which the Community showed muscles in putting in place political structures ‘that will give it a prime role in helping define the post-Cold War world order’, as the Community presented itself to the world at Seville’s 1992 Universal Exposition. The change within the Community during the mid-1980s finds its expression in two documents published by the Community – the Commission’s White Paper (1985) for the European Council (heads of state and governments) regarding the completion of the internal market, and the Single European Act, adopted in December 1985 by the European Council and formally approved by the Council of Ministers (ministers of foreign affairs) on 28 February 1986. The first initiatives of the Commission to establish the internal market can be traced back to 1981. The internal market project was established and pushed ahead by the Commission and the European Round Table of Industrialists (ERT). The ERT is an informal panel founded at the initiative of Commissioners Etienne Davignon and François-Xavier Ortoli in April 1983; it was composed of 17 top European industrialists, and was later expanded to include 40 members. Wisse Dekker – head of Philips, already an influential figure in the ERT and later its president, who formulated the ‘Agenda for Action: Europe 1990’ – and Lord Cockfield – then vice-president of the Commission, under whose auspices the White Paper ‘Europe 1992’ was drafted – shared the same intentions: a Single Market. At least since April 1983, the informal panel of the ERT (informal because it is not a body within the institutional framework of the Community) and the protagonists of the Commission worked together towards this goal. The Single European Act marks the transition to proper statehood. It is called ‘single’ because it regulates European policy cooperation by treaty and changes existing treaties of the Community at the same time. Since its adoption, the superior body of the Community, the European Council (heads of state and governments of the

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Member States), coordinates political and economic policies with the president of the Commission, who is a member of the European Council with equal rights. Since the 1980s, the Community has assumed the challenges resulting from its comparative economic weakness in the triad formed by the United States, European Union and Japan. Recently, it has also begun to advance more binding normative theories designed to facilitate the necessary institutional innovations. The thrust towards a new beginning in Western Europe with the European Union as the centre of activity can clearly be shown in the White Paper of December 1993, largely influenced by the problem of unemployment. Whether the strength of European civilization is sufficient, and whether it will prove possible to break the inertia and the resistance of vested interests, is not yet certain. But the Commission’s White Paper (1994), subtitled ‘The Challenges and Ways Forward into the 21st Century’, addresses nothing less than ‘The new model of European society’. The elite pact: European transnationals in search of a political entrepreneur Our theory of the European integration process focuses on a bargain between European transnational corporations and the Commission (Bornschier 1994). Two groups of actors – transnationals and states – are considered to shape the world political economy via the theoretical mechanism of the world market for social order and protection (Bornschier 1988: 367 ff.; 1996: 50 ff.). Protection is a neglected element of national and economic production functions. Governments produce order and provide this public utility to capitalist enterprises as well as to citizens under their rule. By supplying this utility, governments affect the quality of their territory as a location in the world economy. This approach models both the demand and supply for social order and regulation provided by states within a single analytical framework. It differs from neofunctionalism because transnational business interests do not only emerge as a response to the integration process. At the same time it differs from neorealism in so far as according to our theory governments do not only compete in a politicomilitary sense, but also as providers of social order, regulation and protection for business. States as suppliers of conducive conditions for production are also involved in a genuine economic competition. In this theoretical framework of competition among political entrepreneurs for mobile capital, and competition among economic entrepreneurs for state services and protection, we may assume similar competitive strategies for both classes of actors. Not only transnationals, but also states, may form strategic alliances or even merge. Such mergers of state services are, however, much easier if supranational institutional preconditions are present and available for political entrepreneurship. Such a supranational focus for initiative was ever present in the form of the Commission, whose independence and role as initiator was stipulated in the original treaty of 1957. Why, then, the relaunch in the early 1980s? The mechanism of bargaining between political and economic undertakings and the implied economic competition between governments is part of a cyclical theory of social change, which refers to the rise and decline of societal models and of hegemons (Bornschier 1988, 1996). The pressure to rearrange the political economy is most urgent

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when cornerstones of a societal model (Keynesianism) and interstate coordination run into crisis and when the relative decline of the hegemon (United States) and emerging new competitors (Japan) jeopardize the stability of the world political economy. An important factor behind the timing of the relaunch of the European Community was the relative decline of the United States as hegemon. Europe could no longer rely totally on its relationship with the United States. Japan was suddenly in the number two position. The competitive disadvantages of Europe as an industrial site were first felt by European transnational corporations. After the economic crisis of the 1970s, the United States as well as Japan recovered more easily than Europe. The USA, despite its loss of competitiveness, was able to take advantage of its own large and rather homogenous internal market, and Japan enjoyed the advantage of elaborate strategic planning, which had been essential for Japan’s extraordinary rise. One area where action was taken fairly early was high technology, an area particularly threatened by Japanese competition. European cooperation in hightechnology areas began in the first half of the 1980s and culminated in such programmes as ESPRIT and RACE (Research and Development on Advanced Communication Technologies in Europe, started in 1985). These programmes were the direct result of collaboration between European corporations and the EC Commission under the initiative of Etienne Davignon. In 1983 the European Roundtable of Industrialists was formed – again with the participation of Etienne Davignon – under the presidency of Pehr Gyllenhammar of Volvo and including the chief executive officers of companies such as Philips, Siemens, FIAT, and Daimler-Benz. The members of the Commission were well aware of the power of these industrialists and the fact that they could influence their home governments. The European transnational corporations directly and indirectly demanded that the political entrepreneurs in Europe provide them with the combined advantages their rivals were enjoying in the United States and Japan. This demand was met by the Commission, which created a new project for political union along the following guidelines: a large homogenous market combined with strategic planning, particularly with regard to advanced technology. Andrew Moravcsik (1991) proposes an alternative elite bargain thesis, claiming that the Single European Act can be explained on the basis of national interests and interstate bargaining between the three big Member States – Germany, France, and Britain. The advantage of our theory over Moravcsik’s is our acknowledgement of a demand from European business corporations and a recognition of this need coupled with the will of the European Commission to meet this demand (Bornschier and Fielder 1995; Bornschier 1996: 344–69). The inclusion of the strategic advantages of its two rivals – a larger market and ‘technology corporatism’ – into a new political project may well be explained by our elite bargain thesis. But, apart from ‘more market and strategic planning’, social compensations were one of the core elements of the Single European Act. However, the ‘social dimension’ is the weakest part in the new political package of the 1980s. Nevertheless, it is difficult to explain the transfer of the Western European social policy tradition to the EU level in the framework of the elite bargain model so far elaborated.

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THREE THESES ON THE POLITICS OF THE ‘SOCIAL DIMENSION’ From the fact of the economistic tilt of the integration thrust of the 1980s, and the low rank of the ‘social dimension’ within it, three competing theses can be derived: the cornerstone thesis holds that, from the beginning, the Europeanization of social policy was a cornerstone of the policy package of the supranational political entrepreneur, the EC Commission. The design of this policy area in the Single European Act (most importantly, Articles 21 and 22 of the Single European Act – Articles 118a and 118b in the Treaties) remained narrow for merely tactical reasons so as not to endanger the strategic goal of the renewal of the societal model in a European framework. The flanking thesis states that the core of the project, which was legally established by the Single European Act, was the economic union. When it became apparent that this effort might not be successful (particularly due to the public debate about its social consequences in the years 1987–8), it became necessary to cushion sociopolitically the impact of the internal market and technological change. In neofunctionalist reasoning, the politicization of social policy after the Single European Act was a spin-off of the intensified economic integration, so that the latter could be successful. The packaging thesis argues that the weak social policy regulations together with the abundance of rhetoric at the time of the initiation of the new beginning in Western Europe were merely an expression of the selling of the elite pact, with its elements of the internal market and technological advancement, to the European public: ‘Packaging the package.’ According to this thesis, social policy regulations at the European level were not really sought after by the main actors. The packaging thesis and cornerstone thesis contradict each other. The explanatory power of the packaging thesis is undermined by the fact that the social policy content was greater prior to and during the Single European Act negotiations than it was in the final agreement. On the other hand, the cornerstone thesis can explain this fact as an expression of the tactical hindsight of the political entrepreneur, undertaken so as not to unnecessarily endanger the strategic goal of the renewal of the European societal model. The fact that social policy first moved to centre stage some time after the passage of the Single European Act can be explained by both the cornerstone thesis and the flanking thesis. The flanking thesis would argue that it was the successful adoption of the White Paper (‘Completing the Internal Market’) and the ratification of the Single European Act that awoke from their slumber those actors (in particular, the European trade unions) interested in social flanking. In contrast, the cornerstone thesis assumes that the social flanking was an essential element of a renewed European societal model from the beginning. The flanking thesis and the packaging thesis do not really contradict each other, but rather could be incorporated in an expanded version. After the adoption of the Single European Act, those actors who stood behind a mere ‘packaging’ of the elite pact could not prevent other actors from pushing for the rhetoric to be turned into concrete policy measures, that is, the Europeanization of social policy. The real difference in explanations for the course of the social policy debate lies, then, between the cornerstone thesis on the one hand and the two other theses (flanking thesis and packaging thesis) on the other. Our research findings mainly

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support the cornerstone thesis. Since 1984, the intention of the political entrepreneurs had been to anchor the social sphere in the renewed European societal model. The tactical procedure of anchoring this policy area moderately in the Single European Act was risky. In the long run, the entire strategy, as measured by the intentions of the political entrepreneurs, failed. We can also see that in the second stage of the statebuilding project, namely, in the Treaty on Political Union, the inclusion of the ‘social dimension’ remained far from that which the political entrepreneurs wanted originally. The Social Protocol was not an actual part of the agreement on Political Union, but a supplementary agreement to which only eleven of the twelve Member States agreed. In this chapter, evidence for the theses outlined above is summarized. Further details can be found in Ziltener and Bornschier (1995). This chapter restricts itself to a narrow definition of social policy, leaving aside the politics of cohesion of the EC, which also includes social policy measures, although predominantly in a regional context. The packaging thesis: selling the internal market project At first glance, the packaging thesis seems to gain support from the fact that social policy proposals in the 1984–5 integration policy package play only a minor role, while in official pronouncements they are, on the contrary, held high. Similarly, the high status given to the ‘social dialogue’ and to its participants in the mid-1980s debate is not reflected in the policy outcome. Shortly after taking office at the beginning of 1985, Jacques Delors, president of the EC Commission, invited representatives of the Union of Industrial and Employer’s Confederations of Europe (UNICE), the European Centre of Public Enterprises (Centre Européen des Enterprises Publiques, CEEP), and the European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC) to a talk at the ‘Val Duchesse’, a small palace on the outskirts of Brussels. The goals that Delors had pursued from the outset with the ‘social dialogue’ were reflected in the Venturini Report of 1988. The dialogue of ‘social partners’ on a European level was supposed to lead to the recognition by the ‘social partners’ of a ‘joint responsibility to manage the changes deriving from the single market and adopt a more “European” attitude by planning their strategy within the framework of a Europe without frontiers and by managing their own internal contradictions’ (Venturini 1988: 63 f.). In the area of the legal regulation of employment relationships this meant subjecting European collective agreements to compulsory standardization and coordination at the different national levels (intersectoral and sectoral agreements, company bargaining). In this way a ‘method involving social regulation and harmonization of employment and working conditions, charaterized by a combination of directives and regulations on the one hand and arrangements resulting from the social dialogue on the other’ would emerge (ibid. 65). According to Ross (1995: 45), Delors’ relaunching of the social dialogue, ‘his first social policy step’, was above all a trust-building exercise. In the longer run he strove for more substantial contractual agreements. However, after initial optimism, Delors had to confess that after three-and-a-half years the results were rather sobering.¹ In Delors’ estimation too there was the danger that longer-term fruitless activities undertaken as part of the ‘social dialogue’ could disguise actual social policy stagnation.

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From the beginning, the unions, among whose ranks the significance of the ‘social dialogue’ was not uncontested, were sceptical as to whether such a dialogue could really lead to binding agreements about such issues as working hours and new technologies.² The Union of Industrial and Employer’s Confederations of Europe (UNICE) had declared itself principally in favour of a ‘social dialogue’ on a Community level. It declined, however, to enter into binding decisions involving European agreements because of the differences between the industrial relations and collective bargaining structures in the individual EC Member States. Furthermore, the social and labour market policies were deemed to be the domain of the nation-state, and the bargaining power of the national employer’s associations would not be sufficiently reflected. Individual national member associations of UNICE, such as those of Italy, Luxembourg, and France (with restrictions), were ready, primarily for domestic reasons, to lead the European ‘social dialogue’ to a higher degree of obligation and a wider range of issues. However, the majority of the UNICE member associations declined the expansion of the dialogue.³ Similarly, the ‘European social area’ project, which was repeatedly highlighted in official EC documents, remained to a large extent fruitless. In 1984 the Council had emphasized that measures should be undertaken for the gradual establishment of a European social area in order to strengthen solidarity in the social sphere (Falkner 1994: 188). However, the Council failed to propose any concrete ideas for its practical transformation. The same notion was also contained in the Commission’s programme for 1985, in which Delors presented the concept of ‘The European Social Area’ in his introductory speech before the European Parliament on 12 March 1985. He stressed that the advantages of the single market would be given away if some countries tried to grasp advantages at the price of social regress. The European social area should thus prevent social dumping and its unfavourable effects on employment.4 The ad hoc committee for institutional reforms (Dooge Committee),5 created by the European Council in Fontainebleau in June 1984, demanded in its final report6 submitted to the European Council in Brussels in March 1985 ‘the gradual realization of a European social area as the logical result of an economically integrated, dynamic, and competitive Community’. Thereafter, in contrast to the internal market project, nothing happened in the social policy arena for a long time. At the important summit of the European Council in Milan, which accepted the White Paper on the completion of the internal market, social policy radio silence was the order of the day. In 1985, the ETUC expressed itself in favour of the internal market project, but criticized the absence of a ‘social dimension’ in the Commission’s White Paper. The simultaneous development of a ‘European social area’ would be an imperative in order to prevent social regress.7 The Economic and Social Committee of the EC, despite basically agreeing with the report, sharply criticized the fact that it did not contain concrete and approved proposals about a working programme for the formation and realization of a European dimension in the social domain (Falkner 1994: 189). The Single European Act of December 1985 underlined the statements of the Treaty of Rome, to the effect that social policy, particularly social security, is and remains a national matter. It states that Article 110, paragraph 1 (qualified majority voting8) ‘shall not apply to fiscal provisions, those relating to the free movement of persons, and those relating to the rights and interests of employed persons’ (Article 100a, paragraph 2).

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At the same time, the new Article 118a provides for the gradual implementation of minimal social norms in the area of occupational health and safety by means of decisions by a qualified majority. Article 118b confirms the efforts of the Commission concerning the development of the dialogue between management and labour on a European level which could, if the two sides consider it desirable, lead to relations based on agreement. The negotiations for the Single European Act have been interpreted in the research literature as a process of limiting the scope and intensity of reform, a process necessary to gain the acceptance not only of Britain, but also of other Member States who, when it came to drafting a document, suddenly proved quite jealous of their sovereignty: ‘The maximalist programme of broad reform was progressively sacrificed in favour of the minimalist programme limited to those procedural and substantive changes needed to liberalize the internal market’ (Moravcsik 1991: 42). The ‘social dimension’ merely played a subordinated role in it.9 However, the packaging thesis is refuted by the simple fact that the original social policy form of intensificiation of the integration project, at least with respect to some central actors like the Commission and the French government, was much more substantive than eventually reflected (in its diminished form) in the Single European Act. Even if the incorporation of Articles 118a and 118b is regarded more as a byproduct and less as a planned act arising from premeditated action based on the fulfilment of the ‘social dimension’ (Berié 1992: 58, n. 115), and even if the expansion of the majority voting principle into the social policy area was extremely limited, the fact that these articles were included at all signifies the existence of strong interests sympathetic to social policy integration, interests which influenced the outcome of the negotiation. The interpretations of the negotiation process as an increasing restriction on the range of reforms also point in this direction. What these interests were and which kind of integration project was behind this will be exemplified by the politics of the French Socialists. The cornerstone thesis: the ‘Delorist project’ In 1984, at the time of his nomination to the Commission presidency, Jacques Delors was Minister of Economy and Finance of Mauroy’s socialist government (1981–4) in France. This administration began with a left-socialist, Keynesian economic policy (expansive state spending, wage increases, reduction in working hours, nationalizations, etc.). Initially the EC level played a subordinate role. In October 1981 Prime Minister Mauroy requested Deputy Minister for European Affairs, A. Chandernagor, to prepare a memorandum on European revival of a European social area in which, among other things, the creation of an ‘espace social européen’ (European social area) was proposed.10 This programme included three goals: 1.

placing employment in the centre of Community social policy by developing cooperation and reorganizing Community policy; 2. stepping up the social dialogue at the Community and national level, both within the company and elsewhere; 3. improving cooperation and consultation on matters of social protection.

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With the exception of the Danish interest in the social policy recommendations, this initiative provoked no response from the other European partners and was never discussed in the Council. Nevertheless, this memorandum of the French government is the birth certificate of the concept of a ‘European social area’, taken up again some three years later. The expansive economic policy of the French government quickly led to a crisis due to increasing trade imbalances, rising inflation and devaluation of the franc. By 1982, with the decisive participation of Delors, the first package of measures was adopted to check price and wage inflation and to overhaul the budget. In the Socialist Party a furious fight raged around the question of France’s withdrawal from the European Currency Exchange System and the introduction of protectionist measures to defend the national economic policy against the world market. Delors asserted all his influence to keep France in the European Currency Exchange System (see Delors 1992: 15, 23). In March 1983 Mitterrand decided against a strategy of delinking. The final abandonment of the national Keynesian policy was connected to a strategic reassessment of Community politics in the French Socialist Party. In this way, 1984 (and particularly the first half of the year, during which France held the Council presidency) became the year of the renewed Bonn–Paris axis and thereby the initial phase of the relaunch of integration. From Mitterrand’s speech on 7 February 1984 in The Hague (Europa-Archiv 7/ 1984, D 198) and also from his press conference following the session of the European Council in Fontainebleau in June 1984 (Europa-Archiv 15/1984, D 446), it becomes evident that the social policy dimension was a central element of the French initiatives to continue and to accelerate European integration. At the inspiration of the French presidency, subsequently also taken up by the Irish presidency, meetings took place between the Council, the Commission, the UNICE and the ETUC (see Kohler-Koch and Platzer 1986).11 On 18 July 1984, Delors was nominated as president of the EC Commission. Before assuming office, he visited the capitals of the Member States to clarify possible means and bases for relaunching the integration project. He met with heads of state and government and with national parliamentarians, as well as with trade union leaders and employers. In his worldview formed by ‘personalisme’, a progressive form of Catholic social doctrine, he had always put an emphasis on agreement, balancing competing interests, and cooperation between different societal groups.12 In his activities for the French union Confédération Française et Démocratique du Travail (CFDT), for the Commissariat au Plan and as a consultant on social questions to the prime minister Chaban Delmas, Delors had strongly advocated the development of a ‘politique contractuelle’ (politics of collective agreements). It became clear to Delors that the completion of the EC internal market by means of deregulation must be the sole undisputed core of the new thrust towards integration. He had already consistently endorsed the Common Market as the only basis for a project opposed to the ‘déclin’ of Europe. In contrast to the views of some national governments and interest groups, however, for Delors as well as for the French government, the creation of an internal market was not an end in itself. It was always Delors’ aim to bring the project back into ‘balance’, to achieve the primacy of politics (Delors 1992: 17). For Delors, European cooperation was therefore not only the fight against economic decline, but also against social regression (Delors 1992: 70, 14). The ‘European societal model’ had a central orientation function for Delors; it is characterized

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by values such as solidarity, equal opportunity, a high level of social protection, and through ‘concertation’ of all partners in production. Thus social policy was an inseparable part of the relaunch of European integration. For the French Socialists, the European integration process held the promise of recapturing political control of the economy through a new system of supranational governance as well as in industrial relations, internalizing external effects that increasingly pre-empt the authority of individual national regimes, and extricating European industrial relations from the dictates of competition among regimes and market forces. Their goal was the defence and continuation of the tradition of the inclusion of unions and workers’ interests in the shaping of labour relations and political regulations in general. In this sense, current efforts to add a ‘social dimension’ to the internal market are best understood as ‘attempts to preserve, if only by default, the historical labour-inclusiveness of European industrial relations against strong economic and political pressures for deregulation by anchoring it in tripartite supranational institutions able to promote a new convergence among national regimes along labour-inclusive lines’ (Streeck 1993: 89). If we have correctly described the ‘Delorist project’, the question arises as to why its protagonists did not raise the creation of an encompassing ‘European social area’ to the condition of a sine qua non from the beginning. Ross (1995: 39) describes Delors’ strategy as an attempt to seize the available opportunities for action from the area of all political possibilities, to accumulate through success the necessary resources and to invest these again in the expansion of this area. With this strategy the transition from market-building to state-building was supposed to be achieved. In the course of the integration process, elements of state-building would emerge, that is, the transfer of national sovereignty to the EC, whose weight would thereby become greater. To implement this strategy, a mobilization of the Brussels apparatus, especially of the General Directorate V, was necessary. Delors’ most important instrument was his cabinet. Many of its members came from the French Socialist Party and/or the Confédération Française et Démocratique du Travail (CFDT). When necessary, his cabinet went around those of other Commissioners and established parallel networks to achieve the desired results (Ross 1995: 36). Delors’ cabinet was the site of conceptual innovation in the sphere of social policy; core concepts and papers were drafted there, sometimes up to the point of detailed drafts. Despite the absence of executive authority, the Commission as the only supranational political entrepreneur – a ‘corporate actor’ (Schneider and Werle 1989) with established political independence, fully developed rights of initiative and thereby great possibilities in agenda-setting – was well suited for implementing Delors’ strategy. He conceived the Commission in a central role as ‘ingénieur de la construction européenne’ (engineer of European construction) and made it clear from the time he took office that the Commission’s right of initiative would be fully utilized (Delors 1992: 46). The allies of the Commission The administrative planning and management authorities within the EC are largely self-sufficient and only weakly influenced by the representative political bodies of the EC (see Bach 1993: 265). However, Delors cleverly recruited the support of the latter

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(i.e., the European Parliament and the Economic and Social Committee) as part of his strategy. They were allies of the Commission insofar as they could be counted on as generally sympathetic to integration and to the sphere of social policy (see Springer 1992). In many reports the European Parliament favoured the extension of EC social policy13 and proposed in its draft treaty of February 1984 competing responsibilities within the proposed Union for areas of social and health policy.14 The Economic and Social Committee15 published a report by R. Beretta, ‘The European Social Area’ (Venturini 1988: app. 6) which asked for Community legislation guaranteeing basic social rights ‘immune to competitive pressures’ as a ‘key stage’ in the creation of the single market (para. 1.6). Both the European Parliament and the Economic and Social Committee advocated a broad interpretation of the social policy articles of the Single European Act. The European Court of Justice’s consistent broadening of EC jurisdiction (Falke 1993) contributed to a ‘Europeanization’ of various policy areas. In the domain of social policy the court placed its emphasis on the ‘indication of a social responsibility of the Community’ in the founding treaties of the EC and also the Single European Act, by raising it to the level of a quasi-constitutional welfare state principle (see Streil 1986; Schulte 1993b). Evaluating the cornerstone thesis In the research literature on European integration the weak anchoring of social policy at the beginning of the relaunch was a ‘negative decisive moment’, a phrase that captures the fact that social policy would not become part of the project (Berié 1992: 57). Schlecht’s (1990) thesis that the Commission did not see the development of the European social system as a logical prerequisite for the creation of a single market contrasts with our claim that it was a tactically conditioned abstinence, undertaken with the goal of not creating any obstacles to gaining the acceptance of the internal market project. A statement of EC Commissioner Lord Cockfield also indicates that this linkage with social policy demands would have clearly slowed down the integration thrust, if not completely hindered it: ‘Had “linkage” been accepted it would have resulted in intolerable delay being imposed on the Internal Market Programme and in the light of subsequent changes in the economic and political climate this delay could well have frustrated the programme altogether’ (Cockfield 1994: 46). In any case, this step-by-step process became a politically risky path, considering the different goals of the national governments with respect to integration and the structural weakness of the sociopolitically progressive actors at European level. Above all, by following this path, leave had thereby been taken from the simultaneous realization of the European social area. In the course of the two years following the Luxembourg summit, the socio-politically progressive actors were weakened further by a number of factors. The most important setback was the British Council presidency in the second half of 1986 that resulted in a neoliberal retaliation against social policy, with proposals for the extension of the British policy of deregulation of the labour market to European level.16

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The flanking thesis: the subsequent creation of a ‘social dimension’ Most advocates of the flanking thesis make reference to the events of 1988, when fears about the sociopolitical consequences of the realization of the internal market spread among the unions, increasingly also among politicians, and above all among members of the European Parliament (see Berié 1992: 58; Mosley 1990:154; Teague 1989: 75). New initiatives in the sphere of social policy had already arisen during the Belgian Council presidency (the first half of 1987). In May 1987 the Belgian Labour Minister Hansenne advanced the concept of a ‘pedestal of social rights’. The Belgian suggestion was presented for consideration at a Val Duchesse meeting. But instead of sinking into obscurity, which according to Teague (1989: 77) was the strategy of the British and other national governments, from this point on the core concept of the social flanking of the internal market develops: the Community Charter of Fundamental Social Rights, or Social Charter. With this the project of a ‘European social area’ took on the form of a policy for the implementation of fundamental social rights in the EC. By 1987, due to the Council presidencies of sociopolitically progressive Member States and, secondarily, to the European Parliament and the Economic and Social Committee, there was a social policy dynamic within the EC institutions, albeit somewhat limited. However, this is not sufficient to explain the public debates and social policy developments in 1988. An important element was the adoption of the so-called Delors Package (the reform of the financing system and agricultural policy, and the doubling of the structural funds) by the European Council at its special summit in Brussels in February 1988. With this, some of the structural problems of the further expansion of the EC were at least temporarily solved, which, in turn, produced a general change of climate in the EC (Hort 1988). Furthermore, it freed Commission resources. New unionist dynamics and public debates Thatcher’s third electoral victory and the British ratification of the Single European Act led to a reassessment of the EC by the British unions. Up to that time the political project of the British Trades Union Congress (TUC) had been a renewed national Keynesianism and with it a rejection of the EC. In October 1987 the General Council of the TUC reversed its position (see Silvia 1991: 632; Springer 1992: 124 f.). This reorientation had great significance for the ETUC as a European actor. Consequently, the ETUC unions proposed a number of suggestions for a European social programme as the ‘social dimension’ of the internal market, which were presented at the Stockholm Congress (May 1988). The principal demand contained therein was for the ‘simultaneous completion of the European internal market and its social dimension’. Naturally, Delors welcomed the new unionist dynamic at the European level, which he had always sought to advance and which he would continue to promote. He toured from one labour union conference to another. Besides his Stockholm speech, ‘Nourrir le dialogue sociale’ (Fostering the Social Dialogue) (Delors 1992: 71 ff.), his visit to the Congress of the British TUC in Brighton was extremely important. In the land of

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Thatcherism, he received ovations for his speech, ‘Construire l’Europe sociale’ on the creation of a social Europe (Delors 1992: 66 ff.).17 Thatcher’s speech at the College of Europe in Bruges (20 September 1988) must be understood as a reaction to Delors’ speech in Brighton. Against the growing pressure for social policy initiatives at the EC level she counterposed the concept of the EC as ‘a European Single Market with the minimum of regulations – a Europe of enterprise’: ‘We have not successfully rolled back the frontiers of the state in Britain only to see them reimposed at a European level, with a European superstate exercising a new dominance from Brussels’ (Thatcher 1993: 745). The speech provoked serious protest on the part of many national governments and other European actors. Stephen George (1991: 204) interprets these reactions as a sign that she appeared to be reneging on a package deal that the other states believed they had concluded with Britain in the Single European Act. The mobilization of the unions at different levels was not without its effect. The critique of the economistic tilt of the relaunch of European integration found its echo in public debates about the social consequences of the internal market project, in particular on key issues such as rising unemployment, ‘regime shopping’, and ‘social dumping’.18 New departure in Hanover The European Council meeting in Hanover in June 198819 emphasized that the internal market measures must not reduce the social protection level in the Member States. Moreover, the single market should serve as the means for improving the living and working conditions as well as the work and health protection of all citizens. The European Council thereby dealt for the first time since 1974 with the social problematic underlining the necessity of creating, simultaneously and in a balanced manner, the ‘social dimension’ of the single market in 1992 (see Berié 1992: 58; Däubler 1989: 41). Delors, whose mandate was extended for four years in Hanover, now set the Brussels apparatus into high gear in order to make the most of this social policy momentum. He gave the Economic and Social Committee a mandate to draft a Social Charter. The Commission document, ‘The Social Dimension of the Internal Market’ (September 1988) (see Venturini 1988: annexe 7), presented guidelines for a social policy programme. The ETUC thought this did not go far enough, while the UNICE reacted positively with respect to a number of suggestions (see Tyszkiewicz 1989). In that same month, the new French government, once again socialist, put forward proposals for the elaboration of a charter which would guarantee fundamental rights. Similarly, in September the interdepartmental working party presented the report, 1992: The European Social Dimension (Venturini 1988). These initiatives, in conjunction with the Social Charter, also resulted in a revitalization of the ‘social dialogue’ (see Delors 1992: 121). Evaluating the flanking thesis One can point to the five following factors explaining the new momentum in the social policy sphere:

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1. the constellation of Member States: the Council presidencies of sociopolitically progressive Member States, particularly Belgium and Germany, and the change of government in France; 2. the Commission, which had been mobilized following the adoption of the Delors Package, and Delors’ enormous efforts in this area; 3. the convergence of the unions’ EC policies and successful mobilizations following the reorientation of the British TUC; 4. the support of union demands by the Commission, particularly through the Commission president, and broad sections of the public; and 5. public pressure for a social flanking of the internal market, and with it the threat of withdrawing support for the European integration process20 and/or decreasing voter support for Socialist and Christian Democratic governments.21 While the packaging thesis was refuted above, the flanking thesis is more difficult to evaluate. On the one hand, it is at least partially refuted through supportive evidence for the cornerstone thesis: what happened was not (simply) a subsequent social policy attempt at flanking. On the other hand, the thesis encompasses the efforts of the unions, which, initially overrun by the integration dynamic and weakened by diverging EC policies, subsequently tried to implement a ‘social dimension’. Additionally, social policy proposals also arose from some national governments and took on greater importance in the course of 1987 and 1988. To what extent this was due to the late perception of possible undesirable social consequences of the realization of the internal market, to the threatening loss of legitimation for the integration project, and/or to the dreaded loss of voter support in national elections, is difficult to judge. The defeat of the ‘Delorist project’ (1989–91) In the following years the fight for a ‘social dimension’ focused on the implementation of an EC Charter of basic social rights, originally a proposal of the Belgian presidency in 1987. In a speech to the European Parliament in January 1989 Delors spoke of a social charter as the means to make concrete ‘the European societal model’ and to bring it to life (Delors 1992: 121). He connected this with the hope for a breakthrough in the ‘social dialogue’. It is not possible to reconstruct here the subsequent history of the Social Charter project: the British resistance, the French pressure during its Council presidency in 1989, the negotiations between the ‘social partners’, and the watering down of each consecutive proposal in detail (see Ziltener and Bornschier 1995). Eventually, at the December 1989 meeting of the European Council in Strasbourg the ‘Community Charter of the Fundamental Social Rights of Workers’ (Social Europe 1/1990) was adopted by eleven states as a political declaration of intention of an advisory nature. Therein, the following ‘fundamental social rights of workers’ were listed: freedom of movement; employment and remuneration; improvement of living and working conditions; social protection; freedom of association and collective bargaining; vocational training; equal treatment for men and women; information, consultation and participation for workers; health protection and safety at the workplace; protection of children and adolescents; and the integration of elderly and disabled persons. The Social Charter essentially confirmed the original sociopolitical conception of the EC, according to which, social policy regulations at the level of the EC were related

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first of all to the realization of the fundamental freedoms of the internal market (see Schulte 1993b: 39 f.). On no account should the legally non-binding Social Charter be mistaken for the fulfilment of the project for a ‘European social area’ or the ‘social dimension of the internal market’. The demand for a charter of binding rights, whose enforcement would serve as the basis upon which all could appeal, as conceived and demanded by the unions and the European Parliament, had not been fulfilled. The opportunity for such a change had been missed with the Single European Act (Berié 1992: 61), a consequence of Delors’ ‘step-by-step’ strategy and the initial postponing of the ‘social dimension’. Maastricht: A further attempt At the EC summit in Maastricht in December 1991, in light of British resistance, 11 states decided ‘to continue along the path laid down in the 1989 Social Charter’ and, leaving Great Britain aside, to finalize for this purpose a Protocol on Social Policy. The Agreement on Social Policy provided for majority voting in the areas of working environment and conditions, information and consultation of workers, equality between men and women, and integration of persons excluded from the labour market (Article 2, paragraph 1). Explicitly reserved for unanimous voting in the decision procedure are the areas of social security and social protection of workers, protection of workers when their employment contract is terminated, representation and collective defence of the interests of workers and employers (including co-determination), conditions of employment for third-country nationals, and financial contributions for promotion of employment and job creation (Article 2, paragraph 3). Important areas of labour law are excluded from Community regulations, including ‘pay, the right of association, the right to strike or the right to impose lock-outs’ (Article 2, paragraph 6). After Maastricht, the social policy momentum dissipated. Just as it had during the negotiations, the issue of economic and monetary union continued to dominate. At the same time, results of the referenda in Denmark and France reflected a strong upswing for the opponents of the integration process, at least in its existing form. The October 1993 ruling of the German Bundesverfassungsgericht (Federal Constitutional Court) declared that there is no competence for a common social policy in the Maastricht treaty (Kaufmann-Bühler 1994: 4). Within the meaning of the ‘Delorist project’, the continuation and further development of the welfare state at European level (le modèle européen de société) as a central pillar of the European integration must be regarded as a failure, and with that the failing of the ‘Delorist project’ altogether. Springer (1992: 121 f.) compares the body of social policies with the economic measures contained in the White Paper and concludes that the two are in no way of equal weight. In the judgement of Wolfgang Streeck (1994: 10 f.), the second wave of social policy proposals in the 1980s (which followed a progressive phase in the 1970s) was turned back even more decisively than the first. Apart from structural obstacles (see below), this can also be traced back to Delors’ step-by-step strategy. If at first social policy was not placed in the foreground so as not to endanger the internal market project, it was subordinated again after a short, turbulent phase to another policy area, this time the economic and monetary union (EMU) project. Lange (1992: 225) points out that for Delors himself EMU was more important than social policy progress.

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Considering the overall lack of social policy progress, two unusually successful areas of EU social policy22 remain to be explained by further research: the equal treatment/opportunities policy, and the occupational health and safety policy. The former can be attributed to the legislative resources in the treaties of Rome, whose expansion was not considered at the time and corresponds with the broadening of jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice. The occupational health and safety policy, as we have already described, is the only social policy area with majority voting in the Single European Act. As a result, it is the only area of successful high-level harmonization efforts. In the literature on this topic,23 the two most important specific reasons for the exceptional success of this area are identified as: 1. its tight connection with the realization of the free movements of goods; and 2. the ‘stage-managed’ corporatism (inszenierter Korporatismus): the special function of the European standardization associations. CONCLUSION In this chapter we first framed the politics of the ‘social dimension’ in the overall picture of the Western European integrational thrust of the 1980s. Our version of an elite bargain model is a less obvious explanation of the politics of the ‘social dimension’. In this context we have discussed and evaluated three theses that extend the initial theoretical approach. The cornerstone thesis emphasizes the politics of the Commission itself and received greatest support from the evidence. Our findings suggest that the creation of a ‘European social area’ was from the beginning a central demand of protagonists in the relaunch of European integration. Initially, the ‘social dimension’ had been set aside for tactical reasons. In 1988 the representatives of the ‘Delorist project’ renewed their efforts for implementing it. These efforts were connected with his relaunching of the ‘social dialogue’ in 1984–5 and his offer of an alliance with the trade unions for the purpose of pushing ahead with the ‘social dimension’. In contrast to the allies of the Commission in the other central areas of the integration package – that is, the single market project and technology policy – this alliance was comparatively weak and it met with the greatest resistance. One might object that the person of Jacques Delors plays too great a role in this picture. But this objection must be confronted with the following observations. First, Delors led the EC Commission for ten years with a strong hand and left his mark on it. Second, along with Mitterrand, Delors stands for a definite, and, since 1983, hegemonic tendency in the French Socialist Party, and, one might also add, a tendency that is hegemonic in Western European social democracy as well. Two central processes in the political–ideological reorientation of Western European social democracy in the 1980s have both intersected with Delors the political actor. These are: 1. the departure from a nation-state-based, left-Keynesian reform politics, and the transition to austerity politics; and 2. the relaunching of the EC level.

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Thus our concern with Delors is not so much a concern with the person as it is a concern with a particular political project, what we call the ‘Delorist project’. On the other hand, the history of the ‘social dimension’ of the internal market indicates how limited the opportunities for implementing such a political project are in the face of deep-seated differences as to the place and goal of European integration. We refer here not simply to the resistance of the British government. Many observers of EC development in the 1980s share the view that British obstruction in EC social policy created the possibility of ‘cheap talk’ on the part of other Member States (e.g. George 1991: 204 f.). That is to say, many social policy programmes and resolutions only emerged because all partners could be assured in advance that they would fail in the Council or remain toothless. It is surely the case that one reason for the failure of this political project is to be found in the present institutional structure of the EU. In the first place, the predominance of the Council, and thereby the national governments, which have worked throughout the entire history of European integration to defend their position as ‘Masters of the Community’. Next, the meagre weight of the other EC organs, which are precisely those most sympathetic to social policy integration, must be taken into account. Däubler (1989: 43) points out that the greater the expressions of social policy engagement in the drafts and announcements of the various EC organs, the less their own decision-making authority. Additional reasons lie in the specifics of the interest mediation system at the EU level. The representation of interests in and around the EU is, following Streeck and Schmitter (1991), best described as pluralist rather than corporatist. Organizationally fragmented, only slightly hierarchical, and often structured as internally competitive, peak associations at the EU level can only pursue their function in the formulation and combination of interests in a limited way. Lepsius (1991: 31) sees built-in structural obstacles due to the limits of aggregation and the diffuseness of considerations of compatibility in relations among the twelve Member States. Despite the efforts of the Delors Commission, the existing EU decision-making processes discriminate against the unions, precisely in the area of social policy, which is dominated by intergovernmental relations. According to Ebbinghaus and Visser (1994: 245 f.), national governments can easily pursue a ‘reactive strategy’ and employers can hide behind their veto power. In addition, they can also rely on the fact that the deregulation policy of ‘mutual adjustment’ encourages competition among regimes in the area of labour and social policy. The unions have much to fear considering the ‘Regulierungslücke’(regulation gap) between the insufficient EU regulation authority and the goal of deregulation pursued by Member States (as well as the EU treaty). In contrast to employers, the unions cannot rely on reactive politics that rest on national governments. Thus pro-active efforts aimed at re-regulation come quickly to a standstill in the face of polymorphous EU decision-making through the veto power of national governments and the blocking strategy of the employers. However, the weaknesses of the unions can also be traced back to internal problems, particularly the variability in the traditional conflict structures, the patterns of social mobilization, and the forms of mediation of interests. Furthermore, the varying degrees to which industrial relations are regulated, the variety of trade union and party-political goals, alliances and resources of power in the different Member States, also contribute to the resulting divergence of interests.

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Behind these lie even more fundamental processes. First, the dissolution of the world politico-economic regime and the erosion of the regulatory capacity of nationstates due to globalization. Second, the decay of the hegemonic Keynesian-corporatist societal model of the postwar era and with it the loss of legitimation. Third, the shifting of relative political strength since the late 1970s away from the Western European left. The integration project of the 1980s can be seen as a response to these processes (Bornschier 1996: ch. 14; Ziltener 1999). The limited success of the elite pact model of integration makes clear that certain prerequisites for a European state-building project must still be created: 1. a societal basic consensus, in the sense of a renewed social contract; 2. the broader inclusion of populations and their representative bodies (parties, unions, and social movements) in the shaping of the integration process, thereby overcoming the shortcomings of democracy at the EU level;24 and 3. the recapturing and development of political formations and possibilities for intervention as the means for this. NOTES 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9.

10. 11. 12. 13. 14.

15.

Delors (1992:77f., 121) at the ETUC Congress 1988; see also the Jahrbuch der Europäischen Integration 1985, p. 291. See also Jahrbuch der Europäischen Integration 1985, p. 297; Siebert (1989); Kohler-Koch and Platzer (1986:172 ff.). UNICE monthly reports, here as found in Jahrbuch der Europäischen Integration 1985, p. 292; see Kohler-Koch and Platzer (1986:168 ff.); Tyszkiewicz (1989:70 ff.). In Bulletin der EG, Suppl. 4/1985; Europa-Archiv 7/1985, 187 ff. This committee meeting consisted of representatives of heads of state and governments; Ripa di Meana represented the Commission. In the Jahrbuch der Europäischen Integration 1985, pp. 404 ff. Press release; in Jahrbuch derEuropäischen Integration 1985, p. 296. Article 100a stipulates qualified majority votes for the measures for the approximation of the provisions laid down by law, regulation, or administrative action in Member States which have as their object the establishment and functioning of the internal market. For an analysis of the social policy dimension in the Single European Act negotiation process, introduced into the negotiations rather late and mainly due to pressure by the Danish and French government and the Commission, see Ziltener and Bornschier (1995) and De Ruyt (1989). In Bulletin der EG 11/81; see Venturini (1988: 26); Lequesne (1989: 153 f.). In the course of 1984 there were informal contacts between the UNICE and the ETUC which were subsequently resumed. For Delors’ political biography see Grant (1994) and Ross (1995). For the most important proposals of the European Parliament and a list of the most important EP reports from 1986 to 1988, see Venturini (1988: app. 5); see also Hohmann (1992). Article 56 of the draft treaty regarding social and health policy included, among other things, the creation of comparable conditions for the preservation and creation of jobs, the need for the Community to take action in the area of rights of association and collective bargaining (particularly with regard to the conclusion of EU-wide wage agreements) and worker participation. Generally, the EC would have committed itself under Articles 2 and 4 of the draft to the maintenance and development of social rights, which follow from the national constitutions and the European Social Charter. The draft treaty can be found in Europa-Archiv 8/1984; see Däubler (1989: 53 f.). The Economic and Social Committee has a consulting function for the Commission and the Council of Ministers. It consists of representatives of national and European associations

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16. 17. 18. 19. 20. 21. 22. 23. 24.

Social exclusion and European integration (employers, workers and different interests such as craft workers, consumers, farmers, etc.) who are appointed by the Council on the basis of nominations from the national governments. One of its nine sections covers the social policy sphere and compiles position papers as part of the general EC decision-making process or in response to specific inquiries on the part of Council or Commission. The ‘Action Programme for Employment Growth’, worked out by the British Department of Employment; see Teague (1989). See Volle (1989: 61). Colchester and Buchan (1990: 185) credit Delors’ initiative as having a positive effect on the TUC and Labour, who then departed from their anti-EC bunker. See also, among others, Venturini (1988: 63); Däubler (1989: 2). Final conclusions in Europa-Archiv 16/1988, D 443 ff.; conclusions in the social policy sphere also in Venturini (1988: 69); see also Delors (1992: 69 f.). According to the Eurobarometer survey the percentage of respondents who thought the internal market was a ‘good thing’ dropped 6 to 10 per cent from autumn 1987 to autumn 1988 in Belgium, Germany, France and the Netherlands (see also Mosley 1990: 154). Colchester and Buchan (1990: 185), who see the ‘social dimension’ as a reaction to ‘the freemarket bias of project 1992’, emphasize the argument regarding the threat of voter losses for the Socialists, but also the Christian Democrats on the continent. Streeck (1994: 12) makes reference in this respect to ‘two areas of encapsulated federalism’. See also Konstanty and Zwingmann (1989); Streeck (1994); Eichener and Voelzkow (1994). However, complaining about shortcomings of democracy should not mask the need for a debate on the constitution within which it is positioned at different levels.

REFERENCES Addison, J.T. and Siebert, S. (1991) ‘The Social Charter of the European Community: evolution and controversies’, Industrial and Labour Relations Review, 44 (4). Bach, M. (1993) ‘Integrationsprozesse in der Europäischen Gemeinschaft: Vom Zweckverband zum technokratischen Regime?’, in H. Meulemann and A. Elting-Camus (eds), 26. Deutscher Soziologentag. Lebensverhältnisse und soziale Konflikte im neuen Europa, Tagungsband II: Sektionen, Arbeits- und Ad hoc-Gruppen, Opladen: Westdeutscher Verlag. Berié, H. (1992) ‘Maastrichter Beschlüsse – Auf dem Weg zur Sozialunion’, Zeitschrift für Sozialreform, 8. Bornschier, V. (1988) Westliche Gesellschaft im Wandel, Frankfurt am Main: Campus. —— (1994) ‘The rise of the European Community. Grasping towards hegemony? Or therapy against national decline?’, in M. Haller and R. Richter (eds), Towards a European Nation? Political Trends in Europe, Armonk, NY: Sharpe; also published in International Journal of Sociology, 24 (1), 1994. —— (1996) Western Society in Transition, New Brunswick: Transaction Publishers. —— (ed.) (forthcoming) Statebuilding in Europe: The Revitalization of Western European Integration. Bornschier, V. and Fielder, N. (1995) ‘The genesis of the Single European Act. Forces and actors behind the relaunch of the EC in the 1980s: the Single Market’, paper presented at the 2nd Conference of the European Sociological Association, Budapest. Cockfield, Lord (1994) The European Union: Creating the Single Market, Chichester: Chancey Law. Colchester, N. and Buchan, D. (1990) Europower: The Essential Guide to Europe’s Economic Transformation in 1992, New York: Times Books and Random House. Commission of the European Communities (1994) White Paper: Growth, Competitiveness, Employment: The Challenges and Ways Forward into the 21st Century, Luxembourg: Office for Official Publications of the European Communities. Däubler, W. (1989) ‘Sozialstaat EG? Notwendigkeit und Inhalt einer Europäischen Grundrechtsakte’, in W. Däubler (ed.), Sozialstaat EG? Die andere Dimension des Binnenmarktes, Gütersloh: Bertelsmann Stiftung.

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Delors, J. (1988) La France par l’Europe, Paris: Clisthène-Grasset; trans. (1991) as Our Europe, London: Verso. —— (1992) Le Nouveau Concert européen, Paris: Editions Odile Jacob. De Ruyt, J. (1989) L’Acte unique européen: Commentaire, Bruxelles: Editions de l’Université de Bruxelles. Ebbinghaus, B. and Visser, J. (1994) ‘Barrieren und Wege “grenzenloser Solidarität”: Gewerkschaften und Europäische Integration’, in W. Streeck (ed.), Staat und Verbände, Politische Vierteljahresschrift – Sonderheft 25, Opladen: Westdeutscher Verlag. Eichener, V. and Voelzkow, H. (1994) ‘Europäische Regulierung im Arbeitsschutz: Überraschungen aus Brüssel und ein erster Versuch ihrer Erklärung’, in V. Eichener and H. Voelzkow (eds), Europäische Integration und verbandliche Regulierung, Marburg: Metropolis. Falke, J. (1993) ‘Von der Implementation zur Selbstimplementation? Zur Kontrolle der Anwendung des Gemeinschaftsrechts in den Mitgliedstaaten’, in H. Meulemann and A. Elting-Camus (eds), 26. Deutscher Soziologentag. Lebensverhältnisse und soziale Konflikte im neuen Europa, Tagungsband II: Sektionen, Arbeits- und Ad hoc-Gruppen, Opladen: Westdeutscher Verlag. Falkner, G. (1994) Supranationalität trotz Einstimmigkeit: Entscheidungsmuster der EU am Beispiel Sozialpolitik, Bonn: Europa Union. George, S. ( 1991) Politics and Policy in the European Community, 2nd edn, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Grant, C. (1994) Delors: Inside the House that Jacques Built, London: Nicholas Brealey. Hohmann, B. (1992) ‘Das Europäische Parlament im Prozess der EG-Sozialgesetzgebung seit Inkrafttreten der Charta der Sozialen Grundrechte der Arbeitnehmer – ein Tätigkeitsbericht’, Zeitschrift für Sozialreform, 5. Hort, P. (1988) ‘Eine Bilanz der deutschen EG-Präsidentschaft’, Europa-Archiv, Folge 15. Kaufmann-Bühler, W. (1994) ‘Deutsche Europapolitik nach dem Karlsruher Urteil: Möglichkeiten und Hemmnisse’, Integration, 1. Kohler-Koch, B. and Platzer, H.-W. (1986) ‘Tripartismus – Bedingungen und Perspektiven des sozialen Dialogs in der EG’, Integration, 4. Konstanty, R. and Zwingmann, B. (1989) ‘Europäische Einigung und Gesundheitsschutz in der Arbeitsumwelt’, WSI Mitteilungen, 10. Lange, P. (1992) ‘The Politics of the Social Dimension’, in A.M. Sbragia (ed.), Europolitics: Institutions and Policymaking in the ‘New’ European Community, Washington: The Brookings Institution. —— (1993) ‘Maastricht and the social protocol: why did they do it?’, Politics and Society, 21 (1). Lepsius, M.R. (1991) ‘Nationalstaat oder Nationalitätenstaat als Modell für die Weiterentwicklung der Europäischen Gemeinschaft’, in R. Wildenmann (ed.), Staatswerdung Europas? Optionen für eine Europäische Union, Baden-Baden: Nomos. Lequesne, C. (1989) ‘Europapolitik unter Mitterrand: Die französische Präsidentschaft als Etappenziel’, Integration, 4. Moravcsik, A. (1991) ‘Negotiating the Single European Act: national interests and conventional statecraft in the European Community’, International Organization, 45. Mosley, H.G. (1990) ‘The social dimension of European integration’, International Labour Review, 129. Ross, G. (1995) Jacques Delors and European Integration, Cambridge: Polity Press. Sandholtz, W. and Zysman, J. (1989) ‘1992: recasting the European bargain’, World Politics, 42 (1). Schlecht, O. (1990) ‘Grundlagen und Perspektiven der Sozialen Marktwirtschaft’, Unpublished thesis, University of Tübingen. Schneider, V. and Werle, R. (1989) ‘Vom Regime zum korporativen Akteur. Zur institutionellen Dynamik der Europäischen Gemeinschaft’, in B. Kohler-Koch (ed.), Regime in den internationalen Beziehungen, Baden-Baden: Nomos.

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Schnorpfeil, W. (1994) Die Europäisierung sozialpolitischer Teilbereiche in der Europäischen Gemeinschaft, Mannheimer Zentrum für Europäische Sozialforschung (MZES), Arbeitspapier AB II Nr. 4, Mannheim. Schulte, Bernd (1993a) ‘Die Entwicklung der europäischen Sozialpolitik’, in H.A. Winkler and H. Kaelble (eds), Nationalismus – Nationalitäten – Supranationalität, Stuttgart: KlettCotta. —— (1993b) ‘Einführung’, Soziale Sicherheit in der EG, 2. Aufl., München: Beck. Siebert, G. (ed.) (1989) Wenn der Binnenmarkt kommt . . . Neue Anforderungen an gewerkschaftliche Politik, Frankfurt am Main: Nachrichten Verlag. Silvia, S.J. (1991) ‘The Social Charter of the European Community’, Industrial and Labor Relations Review, 44, July. Springer, B. (1992) The Social Dimension of 1992 – Europe Faces a New EC, New York: Greenwood Press. Streeck, W. (1993) ‘The rise and decline of neocorporatism’, in L. Ulman, B. Eichengreen and W.T. Dickens (eds), Labor and an Integrated Europe, Washington: The Brookings Institution. —— (1994) ‘Neo-voluntarism: a new European social policy regime?’, paper presented at a Conference on European Law in Context: Constitutional Dimensions of European Economic Integration, European University Institute, Law Department, Florence, 14–15 April. Streeck, W. and Schmitter, P. C. (1991) ‘From national corporatism to transnational pluralism: organized interests in the Single European Market’, Politics & Society, 19 (1). Streil, J. (1986) ‘Der Beitrag des Gerichtshofes der Europäischen Gemeinschaften zur Entwicklung des Sozialrechts in der Gemeinschaft’, in H. Lichtenberg (ed.), Sozialpolitik in der EG, Referate der Tagung des Arbeitskreises Europäische Integration e.V. in Augsburg, October 1984, Baden-Baden: Nomos. Teague, P. (1989) The European Community: The Social Dimension. Labour Market Policies for 1992, London: Kogan Page. Thatcher, M. (1993) The Downing Street Years, London: HarperCollins. Tyszkiewicz, Z. (1989) ‘European social policy – striking the right balance’, European Affairs, 4. Venturini, P. (1988) 1992: The European Social Dimension, Luxembourg: Office for Official Publications of the European Communities. Vogel-Polsky, E. and Vogel, J. (1991) L’Europe social 1993: Illusion, alibi où réalité? Bruxelles: Editions de l’Université de Bruxelles. Volle, A. (1989) Grossbritannien und der europäische Einigungsprozess, Forschungsinstitut der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Auswärtige Politik – Arbeitspapier zur Internationalen Politik Nr. 51, Bonn: Europa Union Verlag. Ziltener, P. (1999) ‘Strukturwandel der europäischen Integration’, PhD thesis, University of Zürich, Münster: Westfälisches Dampfboot. Ziltener, P. and Bornschier, V. (1995) ‘The politics of the “social dimension” in the Commission’s project to revitalize Western European integration’, paper presented at the 2nd Conference of the European Sociological Association, Budapest.

3 European integration Disparate dynamics of bureaucratic control and communicative participation Marlis Buchmann

The process of European integration aims at transforming the national Member States into a supranational entity, the contours of which have become more evident over the last years. In a historical perspective, this process may be regarded as another wave of modernization fuelled by the further development of the world system and the fierce economic competition among European nation-states, the United States and Japan (Bornschier 1994). Like all other waves of modernization, it is full of tensions, conflicts and contradictions. The development of modern society, from its inception to its present state, has been characterized by the breaking down of economic, political and cultural barriers. This process is accompanied by the loss of traditions, that is, the well-known and familiar, the tried and tested, and the establishment of more encompassing societal arrangements. In this respect, the current wave does not differ from its predecessors. However, the particular economic, political and cultural issues that are at stake and the tensions and conflicts that arise are unprecedented. Particularly important lines of conflict haunting the process of European integration are the great disparities in the various components of integration. There is no doubt that the economic and politico-administrative integration of the European Community exceeds the social and cultural integration by far. Over the last decades, most achievements have been accomplished in the realm of economic integration. The fully integrated internal market established as of 1993 is the most compelling sign. And the ratification of the Maastricht treaties, the formation of the European Union, represents a milestone in European politico-administrative integration. By contrast, the development of a political culture, the formation of a sense of community, and the emergence of a common cultural identity on the European level lag tremendously far behind. That is to say, with regard to political, social and cultural realms, national and/or subnational frames of reference still predominate people’s world views, values, interests and loyalties. There are only very modest signs of Europe-wide feelings of solidarity. To characterize these great disparities in the various components of integration, we may employ Habermas’ distinction between systemic and social integration (Habermas 1981): in the European Community, systemic integration greatly exceeds social integration. It is interesting to observe that the non-synchronization of systemic and social integration has engendered substantial tensions and conflicts within the EC in the recent past. The referenda of the Maastricht treaties held in Denmark and France and the controversial discussions they brought about both inside and outside these two countries provide ample evidence. It is my contention that the tensions and conflicts

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resulting from the different paces of integration will increase in the years to come. This will make the process of European integration more difficult. However, the controversies emanating from the disparate dynamics of economic and social integration are prerequisites for a greater public salience of themes associated with European integration, which, in turn, may help form a stronger sense of community and identity on the European level. In order to substantiate my claim, I would like to discuss some of the causes responsible for the non-synchronization of systemic and social integration in the formation of a supranational, Europe-wide societal order and point to some developments that are likely to increase the level of tension accompanying the further process of European integration. While the first part of the chapter focuses on the constraints on the formation of a European political culture and sense of community, the second part is devoted to the discussion of possible new measures to be instituted in the individual Member States of the European Union that may help further the process of European social integration. CAUSES OF THE GREAT DISPARITIES IN SYSTEMIC AND SOCIALINTEGRATION I now turn to the question of why Europe has rapidly grown together in the realm of economics, greatly outdistancing processes of social and cultural integration. Among the numerous causes, I would like to highlight the following: the momentum of economic integration; particular features of the institutional structure of the European Community; and the absence of a European public sphere. These three causes are interdependent; it is only for analytical purposes that they are presented separately. The momentum of economic integration With the institutionalization of the four so-called basic economic rights in 1993 – that is, the free movement of goods, persons, services, and capital within the EC member states – the competencies granted to the European Community have been greatly enhanced. The effects of this major step towards economic integration are not limited, however, to the economic realm. This is true in several ways. First, the implementation of free movement for the four basic economic assets involves the regulation of a wide array of social, political and cultural matters: for example, the exchange of students, the mutual recognition of educational credentials, and workers’ participation in the decision-making process on the company level, to name just a few (Lepsius 1991; Münch 1993). Second, the intensified economic activities propelled by the free movement of goods, persons, services and capital bring about new problems or aggravate existing ones that, in turn, demand regulation. In this respect, environmental issues are the most prominent and controversial examples. The common market has greatly increased traffic, thus putting tremendous pressures on the environment and calling for supranational, Europe-wide regulation. Last but not least, the growing density of regulations resulting from economic integration engenders its own effects, namely, the emergence of novel problems that again call for regulation. In order to illustrate the extent to which and the pace at which demand for regulation has increased over the last few

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years, I would like to cite some figures presented by Richard Münch (1993) in his book, Das Projekt Europa (The Project Europe): the number of regulations (i.e. decrees, guidelines, decisions) passed by the Council of Ministers in 1971 amounted to only 102; it increased to 510 in 1985 and reached 1,234 in 1991. All in all, European economic integration sets in motion numerous processes outside the economic arena. The great number of anticipated issues that demand regulation, the numerous unintended effects of economic integration that need to be dealt with, and the considerable delays that often occur with regard to the recognition of emergent problems may overload the problem-solving capacity of the responsible political actors and thus increase the level of political conflicts within the European Community. Situations of intensified conflict are likely to reactivate nationalistic patterns of interest articulation. This tendency will be amplified by the fact that most intermediary institutions, such as political parties, unions, professional associations, and so forth, have barely been touched by the process of European integration. As Lepsius (1991) and many others (e.g. Münch 1993) have pointed out, intermediary institutions of interest formation and interest articulation are still organized along the lines of the individual nation-states. The almost complete absence of a Europe-wide structure of intermediary organizations is one of the crucial factors responsible for the great difficulties in constructing a supranational idea of solidarity and community. A dense web of voluntary associations and organizations would act, as Durkheim (1977) has already pointed out, as a transmission belt between individuals and society at large, constituting the social bonds that keep society together. Under conditions of increasing tension and conflict resulting from the momentum of economic integration, the absence of such a structure will make repeated relapses into particularistic modes of orientation more likely, which, in turn, will impede the development of a Europe-wide sense of responsibility, essential for the emergence of a common political culture. Particular features of the EC institutional structure Much has been said about the ‘democratic deficit’ of the European Community (e.g. Habermas 1994; Kleger 1995; Lepsius 1991; Reif 1992). And indeed, 71 per cent of the EC members when asked about their opinions in 1992 stated that they do not have sufficient influence on the decision-making process in Brussels (Münch 1993: 136). Many remedies have also been advanced to improve the democratic legitimacy of the EC’s political structures (Dewandre and Lenoble 1994; Kleger 1995; Lepsius 1990, 1991). It is not my intention to supplement this catalogue by adding other measures. Rather, I would like to focus on the ways in which particular characteristics of the European political institutions impede the development of feelings of solidarity and the formation of a sense of community that go beyond national frames of reference. In other words, I want to show that the functional, technocratic rationality, upon which the European political institutions rest, enhances the systemic integration of the European Community at the expense of its social integration. In order to develop my argument, I will elaborate upon two aspects. The first one refers to the institution of the European Commission, its functions and competencies, which are closely linked to the emergence of a transnational bureaucracy. This new type of public administration pursues an extremely functional, technocratic rationality of policy-making and prob-

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lem-handling, and is thus responsible for the low transparency of its actions. The second aspect deals with the institution of the Council of Ministers. Due to the composition of this institution, European issues and problems are largely conveyed to the EC members in the individual nation-states by the respective national actors. This favours particularistic representation of European Community issues to the detriment of a Europe-wide perspective. I shall now take a closer look at the functions and competencies of the EC Commission and the European public administration. As many authors have pointed out (e.g. Bach 1992, 1993), the Commission is the core supranational institution of the European Community. Presently composed of 17 commissioners, conjointly appointed by the governments of the Member States, the primary task of the Commission is to look after Community law and to protect the Community interests. In order to assume these functions, the Commission disposes of an unprecedented number and, above all, a unique combination of competencies. Most importantly, the Commission is the sole organ of the European Community that is vested with the power to initiate Community policy. It possesses the monopoly on proposing and drafting legislation. Moreover, the Commission enjoys complete autonomy regarding staff recruitment and appointment. The Commission’s extended staff is organized in cabinets assigned to each commissioner and approximately twenty head offices, the so-called directorates general. Neither the head personnel nor the bureaucratic and scientific experts of these organizational units are elected. Rather informal and non-transparent criteria govern the appointment of these upper-middle-level and high-level European bureaucrats. The cabinets, directorates general, and nine additional special departments fulfil the major administrative management functions of the Commission. All in all, the Commission not only monopolizes the right to initiate policy, but it also centralizes the essential controlling and executive functions at the European level. In practice, it unites all important politico-administrative functions of the European Community. As far as institutional characteristics are concerned, the Commission and the associated European public administration may be regarded as an almost completely independent political regime of the European Community. With regard to European policy-making, this institutional set-up is highly conducive to bureaucratic action orientation, which is governed by technocratic rationality – as Maurizio Bach (1992, 1993, 1994) has convincingly argued in several publications. Moreover, it gives much leeway to the European bureaucratic actors in defining and shaping European policy through transnational cooperation. These political structures are thus highly effective with regard to the systemic, politico-administrative integration of the European Community. They do not facilitate, however, the formation of a common identity and feelings of Europe-wide solidarity among the EC people because policy-making on the European level is characterized by great independence and lack of transparency. I now turn to the Council of Ministers, the second political institution I would like to examine with respect to its significance for the development of a Europe-wide sense of community. The Council of Ministers is the political institution within the European Community that represents the individual nation-states. It is vested with the power to approve Community policy initiated by the European Commission. It does not have the right to initiate policy proposals, however (Bach 1992, 1993). Put differently, the Council of Ministers is the supreme decision-making body of the European Community, stripped of the right to intervene autonomously in the legislative process. Its

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composition varies with the political issues to be negotiated. At any given time, it is composed of the Member States’ ministers responsible for the issues in question. It is mostly through this body that the people within the EC are informed about the debates and decisions of the European Community. The respective ministers of the individual Member States pass the information to the media people of their own country. Being the official representatives of their nation-states, they also voice the respective country’s interests in the issues to be negotiated in the Council. It is therefore most likely that the information these ministers pass to their national public is dominated by the respective national perspective (Gerhards 1993a). This tendency is intensified by the fact that these ministers do not have any responsibilities vis-à-vis a European public. It is only the national public that may voice dissatisfaction with the achievements of their national representatives in the Council of Ministers. Consequently, the ministers are more responsive to their national public, thus favouring a national perspective in their information policy to the detriment of a transnational perspective. In order for a Europe-wide political culture to emerge, greater emphasis should be given, however, to a transnational perspective when information about European Community matters and policies is provided. As long as the European Community was only a loosely organized supranational entity, the lack of a transnational political culture in which the people of the Member States could at least minimally participate did not matter much. And in fact, European Community surveys show that people of the Member States have not ranked the issue of European integration among the salient topics. Richard Münch (1993: 147) even speaks of a ‘permissive consensus’ that has reigned over the formation of the European Community in the past. According to his view, the people of the EC Member States have so far left the process of European integration to the discretion of their governments in the hope of profiting from it economically and politically. However, the public salience of the European Community has greatly increased with the establishment of the internal market and the Maastricht treaties. The growing public interest in the process of European integration is likely to end the era of the so-called permissive consensus. Matters of European integration will become controversial issues, thus engendering public debates. The referenda on the Maastricht treaties held in Denmark and France have provided ample evidence of the growing political conflicts likely to accompany the future process of European integration. Consequently, political consensus on the European level will in the future depend on the active mobilization of support from the people of the Member States to a much greater extent than it did in the past. Successful mobilization of support would greatly profit from the existence of a transnational, Europe-wide political culture and sense of community. The formation of such a culture presupposes among other things the development of a European public sphere. This is the next topic I should like to elaborate upon. The absence of a European public sphere Compared with the much-discussed ‘democratic deficit’ of the European political institutions, the ‘public-sphere deficit’ of the European Community has received relatively little attention (Gerhards 1993a, 1993b; Kriesi 1993). This is rather surprising when considering the close connection between these two flaws in the European Commu-

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nity: the absence of a European public sphere may be regarded as an important cause of the European Community’s ‘democratic deficit’. I should like to review briefly the essential functions of the public in a democratic political culture and then discuss some of the difficulties in establishing a Europe-wide public sphere. In the context of this discussion, I use the general concept of the public sphere to refer to the political public sphere. In advanced modern nation-states, the public sphere, predominantly media mediated, constitutes the arena in which actors – namely, citizens, interest groups, and political decision-makers – observe each other and society at large (Gerhards 1993a, 1993b). It is predominantly through the public sphere constituted by the media that citizens and interest groups state their preferences, voice their claims, and receive relevant information about major events and ongoing developments in society. Vice versa, it is through the media that political decision-makers find out about the citizens’ demands and preferences and learn about salient issues, problems and conflicts in society at large. The intermediary institution of the public sphere thus assumes the crucial function of interest mediation. As important, this institution helps to build a collective identity. By continuously observing society through the media, citizens have a part in it and come to understand it as their own. They thus develop a sense of belonging and feelings of solidarity. Given the connections to the individuals’ consciousness, this is essential for the social integration in society, as Habermas (1994) has forcefully argued. Against this backdrop, the almost complete absence of a European public sphere may be regarded as one of the major obstacles to the formation of a European sense of community and a corresponding collective political identity – in short, a major impediment to the social integration of the emergent supranational entity of the European Community. Although a Eurobarometer survey conducted in 1991 showed the great importance of the media for people’s formation of opinion about European integration, it is within the national context of the public sphere that information is provided. When asked about the sources of information on European Community matters, 89.7 per cent of the respondents mentioned television, 63.4 per cent cited daily newspapers, and 48.3 per cent named the radio; only 17.1 per cent of the respondents mentioned personal communication, and the figure even drops to 3.7 per cent when it comes to political meetings as a source of information (figures cited in Gerhards 1993a). A number of reasons have been suggested to explain the great difficulties in establishing some form of a European public sphere. Jürgen Gerhards (1993a, 1993b) discusses the obstacles to the development of a transnational public sphere by differentiating two possible models. The first and more ambitious model entails the formation of a European public sphere independent of and overlying the nationally constituted public arenas. The second model involves – what he calls – the Europeanization of the national public spheres. Given the great cultural diversity of the Member States of the European Community – most importantly, the multitude of languages in use and officially recognized by the Community – Jürgen Gerhards argues, as others have done, that a unified European public sphere is not likely to evolve. He maintains that the Europeanization of the national public spheres is more likely to develop, although many obstacles impede this process as well. This latter model would involve, first, the ongoing representation of European issues and themes in the

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respective national media, and second, the evaluation of these issues by employing a transnational perspective instead of framing them in the respective national viewpoint. Gerhards (1993a, 1993b) identifies several factors affecting the low representation of European issues in the respective national media, be it electronic or print media, and the predominance of the national perspective in reporting on European matters. I should like briefly to summarize Gerhards’ arguments because they are most significant with regard to the European Community’s deficit of social bonds, feelings of solidarity and identity. According to Gerhards, the underrepresentation of European themes and topics in the media has primarily to do with the fact that the European decision-making process is strongly marked by bureaucratic action orientation. Given the ways in which the media function and operate, bureaucratic news is no news. Related to the media neglect of bureaucratic issues is the fact that the drafting of legislation, the monopoly of the European Commission, is closed to the public. This factor not only contributes to the extremely low transparency of European policy-making, as has been mentioned before, but it also completely blocks any public discussion of European regulations in the making. From the individual actors’ perspective, this institutional set-up deprives them of chances to partake in the European integration process. Consequently, it does not provide any incentive for identifying with the European Community and thus for developing a sense of belonging and feelings of solidarity. The public debate of European political issues is further hindered by the fact that the European Commission’s public presentation of legislation follows the principle of cooperativeness. Hence no controversies and no conflicts become publicly manifest. Under these circumstances, low media attention is predetermined. Moreover, the commissioners are not compelled to seek media attention in order to reach the people with their messages because they are not elected, but rather conjointly appointed by the governments of the Member States. Finally, the lack of controversial debates about issues of European integration is also due to the absence of an institutionalized as well as a non-institutionalized opposition in the European Community. Without explicating the causes of this situation, it intensifies the media tendency to regard matters of European integration as nonissues. The predominance of the national perspective in the media coverage of European issues has much to do with the European Community’s organizational set-up regarding media information. As Gerhards (1993a, 1993b) maintains, it is mostly the members of the Council of Ministers – that is, the Member States’ ministers – that pass European Community information to the representatives of the respective national media. Put differently, the media news conferences are set up in such a way that the nationals stay among themselves. This favours a nationally oriented information policy. Moreover, the EC Member States’ media correspondents in Brussels predominantly interact with fellow media people of their own country or, at least, of the samelanguage culture. Because of the few interactions across nationalities, a transnational perspective on European Community matters is unlikely to develop among media people reporting from Brussels. Accordingly, people in the various Member States seldom have the chance to learn about European Community issues that transcend the national horizon. Under these circumstances, the formation of a sense of responsibility for the European Community as a whole, a prerequisite for the development of a common political culture, has little chance. However, the more

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Europe grows together economically and politically, the more the European Community has to rely on a transnational political culture. OPPORTUNITIES FOR THE FORMATION OFAEUROPEAN POLITICALCULTURE While there are plenty of obstacles impeding the process of social integration on the European level, there are nonetheless some possible measures to be considered that may further the development of feelings of solidarity and belonging to the emerging supranational entity of the European Union. Against the background of the obstacles to European social integration discussed in the first part of this chapter, I highlight here two aspects essential to the formation of a European political culture. I consider the development of European political identities and loyalities among the people of the various Member States to be a cornerstone of the process of social integration within the European Union. The two aspects I focus on are: the constitution of a European public sphere; and the development of institutions that increase people’s chances of participation in the process of European integration. The constitution of a European public sphere: the Europeanization of the national public spheres Referring to arguments advanced by Gerhards (1993a, 1993b) and Kriesi (1993) I have maintained that the constitution of a European public sphere is most likely to involve the Europeanization of the national public spheres. As discussed in the respective section, this entails the stronger representation of European themes in national public arenas on the one hand, and the greater emphasis on supranational perspectives in dealing with European Community affairs on the other. Two types of effort are likely to contribute to the constitution of such a public space. The first type of effort starts from a general sociological assumption. It states that mutual observation constitutes a basic social operation enabling actors involved in this operation to learn about their respective world views, intentions, and goals. Actors assimilate this information and integrate it into their action orientations. Applying this general assumption to the case in question, I infer that Member States within the European Union may observe their fellow members and thus learn about the respective ways in which European affairs are perceived, interpreted and acted upon. In this perspective, mutual observation of the Member States of the European Union represents a distinct form of public communication among these actors. Given that public communication in advanced modern societies is predominantly media mediated, mutual observation among the Member States of the European Union is most likely to be transported by the mass media, that is, by the public sphere. The institutionalization of this process may thus be conceived of as a means of developing the Europeanization of the national public spheres. Referring to Switzerland and its great cultural diversity, Kriesi (1993) has advanced some ideas about the ways in which the Europeanization of the national public spheres might be brought about.

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Drawing an analogy to the nationalization of the Swiss regional public sphere (constituted by the various language groups), Kriesi maintains that similar mechanisms of horizontal and vertical coordination and integration may contribute to the Europeanization of the national public spheres within the realm of the European Union. Among the various mechanisms of horizontal integration, I shall focus on the following two. The first mechanism refers to the mutual transfer of the public discourse prevalent in the individual Member States with regard to salient issues of European integration. This mechanism constitutes a means by which the diversity of perspectives is noted and acknowledged. Such a process of mutual recognition could help overcome the underrepresentation of European themes in the mass media of the individual Member States and thus contribute to the development of a supranational perspective when dealing with European Community affairs. The second mechanism implies the existence of a mass communication elite that specializes in processing, interpreting and synthesizing information about European issues disseminated in the mass media of the fellow Member States. This mechanism is likely to break the predominance of the exclusively national perspective in dealing with problems of the European integration. With regard to mechanisms of vertical integration, Kriesi emphasizes the significance of common points of reference that help focus the attention of the various national publics. The simultaneous preoccupation with a common political theme in the various Member States of the European Union is likely to contribute to the Europeanization of the national publics. Given that the supranationalization of European politics has been advancing at a rather swift pace over the last years, the political decision-making process in Brussels is likely to constitute the major common point of reference of the various national publics in the near future. The increasing relevance of supranational politics initiated in Brussels may also affect the orientations and performance of new social movements. The development of transnational social movements within the European Union constitutes the second type of effort that may help develop the Europeanization of the national public spheres. By choosing European politics as a common point of reference, new social movements may help overcome the underrepresentation of European themes in the national publics and break the predominance of purely national perspectives in dealing with European Community affairs. It is well known, however, that decentralization with regard to patterns of mobilization and organizational structures is a predominant feature of new social movements. Nonetheless, Kriesi (1993) argues that various mechanisms of horizontal and vertical coordination, such as interorganizational and interpersonal networks, common national and/or international campaigns, and so on, may be activated in order to voice concerns about European politics and gain influence on the political decision-making process in Brussels. Given the absence of political instruments of direct democracy (e.g. initiatives) within the European Union, Kriesi suspects that the political forms chosen by new social movements at the supranational level to voice their concerns will predominantly include conventional lobbying activities on one side and direct political actions on the other. Although this tendency for delegation of political activities on the supranational level results in a greater distance between the regular members of social movements and the lobbyists and activists, the stronger presence of transnational social movements would greatly help develop a European political culture and thus Europe-wide feelings of belonging and solidarity.

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Institutionalizing political instruments of direct democracy I have argued that the ‘public-sphere deficit’ of the European Community and the ‘democratic deficit’ of the European political institutions are closely connected. At present, people of the various Member States not only have little opportunity for learning about the ways in which European Community affairs are perceived and interpreted in other Member States, but they also are deprived of directly voicing their Europe-wide concerns. The provision of instruments of direct democracy on the European level would therefore increase people’s chances of participation in the process of European integration and make them feel part of this new political structure. The exercise of direct democratic rights would help establish stronger bonds between the individual and the European Union as a supranational organization. The process of social integration that would be engendered by people’s greater chances of participation in European Community affairs may be regarded as a necessary complement to the status of citizen of the Community created by the 1991 Maastricht treaty. Interpreting this aspect of the Maastricht treaty, Soysal (1994: 147) maintains that ‘citizenship in one EC Member State confers rights in all of the others, thereby breaking the link between the status attached to citizenship and national territory’. By providing European Community citizens with the entitlement to the same status and treatment as the nationals of the other Member States, a direct relationship is established between the individual in any of the Member States and the European Union as a supranational organization. The provision of these rights thus constitutes the European Union as a public, social space beyond the national territory. However, in order for people to feel part of this new supranational social space, people’s direct chances of participation in the political and social arrangements of the European Community should be enhanced. It is my contention that the provision of rights of direct democracy on the European level would contribute to the social integration of the European Community. Below I elaborate upon some arguments that support my claim (Buchmann 1993). These arguments apply to institutions of direct democracy in general; they are not limited to particular forms of direct democratic rights. 1. From the perspective of democratic theory, citizens should be granted equality and freedom (i.e. principle of autonomy) in determining their own destiny (Held 1987). Political institutions of direct democracy are more efficient in meeting these standards than any forms of representative democracy (Kriesi 1991). The main argument is that direct democratic procedures offer highly differentiated forms of political participation in the decision-making process. This holds good with respect to substantive issues as well as timing. For example, direct democratic instruments enable citizens to set issues on the public agenda and subject them to a popular vote (Frey and Bohnet 1993). They provide a means for securing citizens’ direct access to the political arena and for voicing their concerns about social, political, cultural and technological developments (Buchmann 1995). Moreover, unlike elections, which only take place at regular time intervals, direct democratic instruments allow citizens to articulate their preferences independent of any prefixed timetable. The opportunities provided by political instruments of direct democracy

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would certainly increase people’s feeling of being part of this new political structure and, simultaneously, help satisfy the extraordinarily high legitimacy demands with which the European political institutions are confronted. 2. Theories of political socialization attribute great importance to the educational effects of political participation (Offe and Preuss 1991; Pateman 1970). Political rights of direct democracy provide incentives for citizens to participate in public life. Compared to representative forms of democracy, the multiple opportunities of stating one’s preferences enhance citizens’ willingness to engage in public affairs. Furthermore, the public discourse likely to be engendered raises citizens’ consciousness about the issues in question. This argument underscores the great significance of institutionalized procedures of political participation in enhancing citizens’ political competence (Kriesi 1991; Offe and Preuss 1991). Extensive rights of democratic participation also support a political culture in which democratic procedures are taken for granted. Citizens respect democratic standards in their own political behaviour. 3. From the standpoint of the legitimacy of political institutions, elaborate rights to participate in the decision-making process incorporate people into the political system because the rules make them part of the decisions (Frey and Bohnet 1993). People are therefore also more likely to regard the political institutions as legitimate. This certainly enhances their political and social integration. 4. From the perspective of social change, extensive rights of political participation offer the possibility of setting novel issues on the political agenda. The public discourse engendered around these issues may thus give an impulse to societal institutions to reconsider and re-evaluate their beliefs and activities. In this respect, direct democratic instruments may assume the function of instituting learning processes within society, eventually contributing to social innovation. The four arguments presented above provide theoretically driven ideas of why such institutions of direct democracy would enhance the process of social integration of the European Community. While these ideas have been widely discussed in the literature, the elaboration of arguments about appropriate (new) forms of direct democratic institutions within the European Community has not been pursued as much. It is also beyond the scope of this chapter to discuss this issue in detail. Given the scope of the future European Community and the diversity of its Member States, it seems clear, however, that new forms of direct democratic participation must be created and combined with new efficient institutions of transnational decision-making procedures. These future institutions should also make use of new social and technological developments. In this respect, new communication possibilities provided by telecommunication and information technology are particularly relevant (Barber 1984). CONCLUSIONS It was my intention to draw attention to the disparate dynamics of systemic and social integration increasingly affecting the European Community. I pinpointed some of the

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causes of the growing temporal discrepancies in the differing paces of integration and put forward some ideas about the ways in which the deficit of social integration within the European Community might be reduced. I argued that, as Europe grows close economically and politically, the absence of a Europe-wide sense of community and solidarity will be felt more strongly. It is likely to increase the level of tension and conflict within the European Community, thus making the future process of European integration more difficult. Efforts should therefore be undertaken to think, first, about means to overcome existing barriers to the formation of a European political culture and, second, about means to increase the EC people’s chances of participation in the process of European integration. I proposed the constitution of a European public sphere which is likely to entail the Europeanization of the national public spheres and the institutionalization of direct democratic rights. While I provided the general arguments for these two propositions, future efforts should be devoted to the elaboration of ideas about the particular ways in which these measures could be institutionalized within the European Community. REFERENCES Bach, Maurizio (1992) ‘Eine leise Revolution durch Verwaltungsverfahren: Bürokratische Integrationsprozesse in der Europäischen Gemeinschaft’, Zeitschrift für Soziologie, 21 (1), 16–30. —— (1993) ‘Vom Zweckverband zum technokratischen Regime: Politische Legitimation und institutionelle Verselbständigung in der Europäischen Gemeinschaft’, in H.A. Winkler and H. Kaelble (eds), Nationalismus, Nationalitäten, Supranationalität: Europa nach 1945, Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta, 288–308. —— (1994) ‘Technocratic regime building: bureaucratic integration in the European Community’, in M. Haller and R. Richter (eds), Toward a European Nation? Political Trends in Europe East and West, Center and Periphery, Armonk, NY: Sharpe, 83–95. Barber, Benjamin (1984) Strong Democracy: Participatory Politics for a New Age, Los Angeles: University of California Press. Bieling, Hans-Jürgen (1995) ‘Maastricht, neoliberale Hegemonie, deutsche Machtpolitik’, Widerspruch, 29, 39–49. Bornschier, Volker (1994) ‘The rise of the European Community: grasping towards hegemony? Or therapy against national decline?’, in M. Haller and R. Richter (eds), Toward a European Nation? Political Trends in Europe East and West, Center and Periphery, Armonk, NY: Sharpe, 55–82. Buchmann, Marlis (1993) ‘The relevance of the Swiss experience for a European constitution: a sociological perspective’, paper presented at the Workshop on Democratic Rules for a Future Europe, COST A7, Lucerne, 4–6 November. —— (1995) ‘The impact of resistance to biotechnology in Switzerland: a sociological view of the recent referendum’, in M. Bauer (ed.), Resistance to New Technology, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 207–24. Dewandre, N. and Lenoble, J. (eds) (1994) Projekt Europa. Postnationale Identität: Grundlage für eine europäische Demokratie, Berlin: Schelzky & Jeepoc. Durkheim, Emile (1977) Ueber die Teilung der sozialen Arbeit, Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp. Frey, Bruno S. and Bohnet, Iris (1993) ‘Democracy by competition: referenda and federalism in Switzerland’, Publius: The Journal of Federalism, 23, 71–81. Gerhards, Jürgen (1993a) ‘Westeuropäische Integration und die Schwierigkeiten der Entstehung einer europäischen Oeffentlichkeit’, Zeitschrift für Soziologie, 22 (1), 96–110.

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—— (1993b) ‘Europäische Oeffentlichkeit durch Massenmedien?’, in B. Schäfers (ed.), Lebensverhältnisse und soziale Konflikte im neuen Europa. Verhandlungen des 26. Deutschen Soziologentages in Düsseldorf 1992, Frankfurt am Main: Campus, 558–67. Habermas, Jürgen ( 1981) Theorie des kommunikativen Handelns, Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp. —— (1994) ‘Staatsbürgerschaft und nationale Identität’, in N. Dewandre and J. Lenoble (eds), Projekt Europa. Postnationale Identität: Grundlage für eine europäische Demokratie, Berlin: Schelzky & Jeepoc. Held, David (1987) Models of Democracy, Cambridge: Polity Press. Kleger, Heinz (1995) ‘Europäischer Verfassungspatriotismus und europäische demokratische Identität’, Widerspruch, 29, 29–38. Kohler-Koch, B. (ed.) (1992) Staat und Demokratie in Europa, Opladen: Westdeutscher Verlag. Kriesi, Hanspeter (1991) Die demokratische Frage, Bern: Schweizerischer Wissenschaftsrat. —— (1993) ‘Oeffentlichkeit und soziale Bewegungen in der Schweiz – ein Musterfall?’, in B. Schäfers (ed.), Lebensverhältnisse und soziale Konflikte im neuen Europa. Verhandlungen des 26. Deutschen Soziologentages in Düsseldorf 1992, Frankfurt am Main: Campus, 576–85. Lepsius, Rainer (1990) ‘Ethnos und Demos’, in id., Interessen, Ideen und Institutionen, Opladen: Westdeutscher Verlag. —— (1991) ‘Nationalstaat oder Nationalitätenstaat für die Weiterentwicklung der Europäischen Gemeinschaft’, in R. Wildenmann (ed.), Staatswerdung Europas?, Baden-Baden: Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft. —— (1992) ‘Zwischen Nationalstaatlichkeit und westeuropäischer Integration’, in B. KohlerKoch (ed.), Staat und Demokratie in Europa, Opladen: Westdeutscher Verlag. Münch, Richard (1993) Das Projekt Europa: Zwischen Nationalstaat, regionaler Autonomie und Weltgesellschaft, Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp. Offe, Claus and Preuss, Ulrich K. (1991) ‘Democratic institutions and moral resources’, in D. Held (ed.), Political Theory Today, Cambridge: Polity Press, 143–71. Pateman, Carol (1970) Participation and Democratic Theory, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Reif, Karlheinz (1992) ‘Wahlen, Wähler und Demokratie in der EG: Die drei Dimensionen des demokratischen Defizits’, Aus Politik und Zeitgeschichte, 19, 43–52. Soysal, Nuhoglu Yasemin (1994) Limits of Citizenship: Migrants and Postnational Membership in Europe, Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. Wildenmann, R. (ed.) (1991) Staatswerdung Europas?, Baden-Baden: Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft.

4

Gender inequalities in European societies today Sara Arber

Gender inequalities vary in their nature and significance at different stages of the life course. A life-course approach emphasizes the interlinkage between phases of the life course, rather than seeing them in isolation (Arber and Evandrou 1993; Harevan and Adams 1982). Gender inequalities are particularly pronounced in the middle years and these impact on gender inequalities in later life. This chapter examines the intersection between gender inequalities in the labour market and gender inequalities within marriage as the central factors perpetuating women’s disadvantaged position in European societies. This focus is not intended to minimize the importance of other bases of inequality, such as class, ethnicity, race or parental status, and how they intersect with gender inequalities at different stages of the life course. The chapter primarily presents data on gender inequalities in Britain, and draws where appropriate on research evidence from other European societies. A full understanding of gender inequalities across the life course requires the merging of the micro-perspective, of gender roles and relationships, with the macroperspective, which takes account of wider societal processes, such as women’s increased participation in the labour market, the progressively earlier age of exit from paid employment and improving health of the population. The latter two trends have meant that women and men spend many more active years not in paid work after labour market exit than in the past (Kohli et al. 1991). It is important to consider how trends in the public sphere of paid employment and state policies, such as pensions policy, relate to gender relationships in the private sphere. Women do not have the same access to citizenship as men, particularly in relation to ‘civil’ and ‘social’ rights (Walby 1994). Civil rights include the rights to bodily integrity, not to be beaten by a partner or carer, and the right to work at the occupation of the individual’s choice. The rights of social citizenship are bound up with both being a worker, and the role of the state in ‘the provision of an infrastructure which enables people to be guaranteed a minimum provision of necessities’ (1994: 389). This chapter will consider how gender inequalities are associated with differential access to civil and social citizenship, focusing on the middle years and later life. Since, historically, citizenship has been linked to participation in the public sphere, it is important to examine how labour-market participation influences women’s access to the rights of social and civil citizenship during these two phases of the life course. In both the middle years and in later life, gender inequalities relating to the labour market are inextricably linked to gender inequalities within marriage (Arber and Ginn 1995a). It is critical to integrate an understanding of gender relations in the public

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sphere of paid employment and state policies with gender inequalities in the private sphere of the household. Gender inequalities in the labour market have been the subject of much more attention from sociologists than gender inequalities in marriage. Two cross-national European reviews on women in the labour market (Rubery and Fagan 1994; Rubery et al. 1994) will be drawn on extensively in the next section. GENDER INEQUALITIES IN MID-LIFE: THE LABOUR MARKET It is ironic that the amount of sociological research on different aspects of gender inequalities in the labour market is inversely proportional to the magnitude of the gender inequalities. There is a vast research literature on women’s participation in the labour market, but much less on the gender gap in access to labour market rights and benefits: for example, access to a company car and membership in financially advantageous occupational pension schemes. The gender gap in employment participation rates is becoming narrower in European societies (Hakim 1993a; Brannen et al. 1994; Rubery et al. 1994). In some societies, such as Finland, there is very little gender difference in participation rates (Arber and Lahelma 1993). In Denmark there is only a 12 per cent gender gap in activity rates, whereas it is over 30 per cent in Ireland, Italy, Spain and Portugal (Rubery et al. 1994: table 1.1). A comparison of participation rates masks the fact that a substantial proportion of women work part-time in many countries, especially in the UK and the Netherlands, and the pattern of employment across the life cycle varies between countries. Kempeneers and Lelievre (1991) outline a number of life-cycle employment patterns, for example, in Denmark and East Germany the majority of women return to employment within two years of each birth, whereas in ‘other northern countries’ (the UK, the Netherlands, West Germany, Luxembourg and Ireland) the interruptions are longer than in France and Belgium, and more often involve a switch to part-time work. The ‘southern countries’ of Italy, Spain, Portugal and Greece have a bipolar pattern in which a much lower proportion of women have entered paid employment, but those who do either work continuously or do not re-enter after childbirth. Motherhood, rather than marriage, has the major effect in depressing women’s employment participation and hours of work, but this effect is greater in the UK, the Netherlands and West Germany, than in Denmark, Finland and East Germany. Analyses of labour market participation increasingly need to differentiate among women and among mothers. There is less gender gap in participation rates for younger highly educated women working in professional and managerial occupations (Glover and Arber 1995; Rubery et al. 1994). Higher education leads to higher participation rates and a more continuous pattern of activity over the life cycle, reducing the adverse effects of motherhood on labour-market activity, and resulting in a labour-market profile which is becoming increasingly different from that of other women. However, there is little research on the magnitude of inequalities between highly educated women and men of a comparable occupational and educational level. Greater inequalities among women are resulting in increased polarization between couples and families, with a widening gap between the incomes of dual-earner and non-earner families.

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There have been extensive debates about whether increased employment participation of women has been associated with changes in the degree of sex segregation (Hakim 1979, 1993b; Crompton and Sanderson 1990; Rubery and Fagan 1994). The Scandinavian societies, which exhibit high levels of women’s participation, also have high gender segregation in employment, with women concentrated in the public sector, especially the caring professions. Sex segregation is associated with other gender inequalities, especially in earnings between occupational groups. But even among women and men in the same occupations, there are substantial gender differences in earnings (Arber and Ginn 1995a; Rubery et al. 1994). In Britain, there has been a narrowing of the gender earnings differential in fulltime pay to 81 per cent of men’s hourly earnings in 1993. The gender differential in weekly earnings is greater, because men work longer hours on average than full-time women; full-time women increased their weekly earnings as a percentage of men’s to 73 per cent in Britain in 1993 (Department of Employment 1993; Dale and Joshi 1992). There is less gender inequality in earnings in other European societies than in Britain (Rubery and Fagan 1994). Gender inequalities in earnings are mainly due to the gendersegregated structure of the labour market, and the ways in which women’s jobs are often defined as less skilled than similar jobs undertaken by men. Gender differences in earnings also understate gender inequality in occupational benefits and other forms of remuneration from employment, since men are more likely than women to receive a range of employment benefits, such as company cars, generous employer-paid pension schemes, paid time off and private health care (SCELI 1989). Women are also less likely than men to obtain pay premia for working extra, unsocial hours or flexible hours (Rubery et al. 1994). Rubery and Fagan (1994: 144) argue that gender pay ratios are an underestimate of the real gender gap in the overall remuneration package for three reasons: 1. additional benefits tend to be provided to higher paid groups, among which women are underrepresented; 2. additional benefits are often not provided to part-time and temporary workers, who are disproportionately women; and 3. there are large differences between sectors in the provision of additional benefits, with very low levels provided in textiles, retailing, hotel, catering and agriculture. Women are less likely than men to be in occupations covered by forms of collective agreement, which give rights to many additional benefits, including overtime pay, pay for unsocial hours, redundancy pay, and so on. Workers in the public sector are more likely to be protected by such rights, and women fare much better in the public than the private sector in this regard. There is little sociological research on this form of invisible earnings, so it is hard to map the extent of men’s advantage over women. Official statistical agencies do not routinely collect information on such invisible sources of remuneration from employment, hence reliable national figures are unavailable, but the information compiled by Rubery and Fagan (1994) and from smaller-scale, more sociological surveys, such as the British Social Change and Economic Life Initiative (SCELI 1989), indicates that this is a major source of gender disadvantage. Countries with a high level of regulation of both overtime and part-time work exhibit less gender differentiation in working time and in the rights and benefits of employment: for example, Denmark and

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France in contrast to the UK, which lacks such employment regulation. However, the current situation of cuts in public sector employment and movements towards deregulation are likely to increase gender inequalities in future. The position of women in the public world of paid employment and the private domain of the family is inextricably linked. Current policies emphasize the need for a more flexible workforce. Flexibility has been the norm in many women’s jobs and is likely to increase for all jobs in the future. Rubery et al. (1994: 259) project that ‘Flexibility requirements within work may act both to reinforce gender divisions in the household and to make it more difficult to plan domestic and work lives of both sexes.’ The increasing deregulation of the labour market may have adverse effects where social rights are based on employment: Rubery et al. (1994: 296) suggest that ‘Equality policies may require a move towards benefits based for everyone more on citizenship and less on employment or household status.’ The next section argues that gender inequalities within the family are greater than those in the labour market and seem more resistant to change. A vicious circle is created which connects women’s lack of economic power within marriage and their disadvantaged position in the labour market (Arber and Ginn 1995a). Women’s employment opportunities, and hence earnings, are constrained by having to shoulder the bulk of responsibility for domestic work. Where women earn less or have less potential income than their husband, this will tend to perpetuate their relative powerlessness in marriage; the ideology that women’s labour-market contribution is less valuable and more easily dispensable than that of their husband is reinforced. This, in turn, leads to the expectation that women will perform the bulk of domestic labour, constraining their opportunities in the labour market and rights to social citizenship. GENDER INEQUALITIES WITHIN MARRIAGE Since the early 1970s there has been extensive sociological research on gender inequalities within the family. The dominant concern has been the division of domestic labour and childcare, demonstrating that women shoulder the burden of the majority of childcare and domestic work, even when they work full time (Edgell 1980; Martin and Roberts 1984; Pahl 1984; Jowell et al. 1988; Brannen et al. 1994). This work has mainly focused on younger rather than older married couples (Arber and Ginn 1991a). In contrast to the wealth of comparative European data on labour market participation of women, there is a lack of cross-national data on the domestic division of labour. However, Kempeneers and Lelievre (1991) show that there is more equality in the Netherlands, although even here 46 per cent of husbands do no domestic chores, contrasting with over 70 per cent in the UK, West Germany, Portugal and Spain. Rubery et al. (1994: 107) conclude: regardless of the level of support for equal roles the amount of work done by men is universally negligible throughout the EU . . . Even in societies where men are more in favour of egalitarian roles, they do very little domestic work. It is women, rather than the household collectivity, which accommodates a dual earner strategy, and they do this by increasing the length of their overall working day (paid and unpaid work).

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A research concern since the 1980s has been gender inequalities in resource allocation and distribution within the household. Studies of intra-household inequality have highlighted the traditional invisibility of women’s poverty within households and their lack of access to valued resources (Pahl 1989, 1990; Brannen and Wilson 1987; Arber 1993; Vogler and Pahl 1994). For example, Charles and Kerr (1986) demonstrate the nature and extent of gender inequalities in food consumption, with women in lower-class households being the most disadvantaged. Although women’s complete economic dependency within marriage is now a minority experience (Sorensen and McLanahan 1987), most women working part time are not earning sufficient to achieve ‘genuine economic independence in terms of the balance of economic power within households and of equality in household financial arrangements’ (Lister 1992: 20). Lister argues that lack of an independent income is linked to inequality in decision-making, and that ‘women’s increased participation in the labour market has opened up only very limited avenues to economic independence’ (ibid. 10), because of British women’s low pay, part-time work and lack of access to occupational welfare and its accompanying fiscal advantages. The key determinant of power in the household is likely to be the relative size of each partner’s income rather than the absolute amount of a woman’s independent income. Until women have higher earnings than their partners, it is unlikely that cultural expectations about appropriate gender roles relating to the domestic division of labour will be challenged. Major progress towards equality in the home is unlikely to occur without greater equality of the economic contributions of both partners within marriage. To date, there has been little cross-national research on the extent of women’s economic dependency within marriage, but for a number of countries there is evidence that women rarely have a higher or equivalent income to their husband (Sorensen and McLanahan 1987; Sorensen 1994; Joshi et al. 1995; Ward et al. 1996). In Britain, the possibility of earnings equality between marital partners exists only for the two-thirds of working-age couples where both partners are employed. Among 94 per cent of these couples, the wife’s earnings do not exceed those of her partner, so that the husband’s employment is likely to take precedence. In such households, wives’ own careers may be defined as secondary because in terms of earnings they are secondary, thus perpetuating the vicious cycle referred to above (Arber and Ginn 1995a; Arber 1999). Couples can be considered in terms of the degree of equality in independent income between partners. Using the British General Household Survey,2 the wife’s personal income as a proportion of the couple’s total income from all sources is examined (including earnings, state benefits, child benefit, maintenance payments and income from savings). Equal income is defined as where the wife’s income is 45