The Institutional Ingredients of Polycrisis Management: Unpacking European Council’s Handling of the Energy Crisis

Detalhes bibliográficos
Autor(a) principal: Smeets, Sandrino
Data de Publicação: 2023
Outros Autores: Beach, Derek
Tipo de documento: Artigo
Idioma: eng
Título da fonte: Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos)
Texto Completo: https://doi.org/10.17645/pag.v11i4.7345
Resumo: This article analyses how the European Council and the institutional infrastructure that supports it have been managing the early stages of the energy crisis. This was the time when the European Council, as the “control room” of EU crisis management, was unable to come up with any solutions to high energy prices. It makes a methodological and empirical contribution to the debate on how the European Council system manages (poly)crises. Methodologically, we introduce the method of embedded process tracing to study EU crisis management from within. Embedded process tracing combines mainstream causal process tracing techniques with elements from interpretivist approaches, to deal with context dependency, case heterogeneity, and empirical density. Empirically, we offer a process-management analysis of the first nine months of the energy crisis. We delineate the roles of various actors and institutions: the president of the European Council, the Council Secretariat, the Commission president, and the Commission Services. We unpack the crucial ingredients of polycrisis management: how to get and keep an issue on the agenda, how to shape and steer European-Council-level debates and conclusions, and how to ensure a proper follow-up by the Commission and the Council. Finally, we re-assess the image of the malfunctioning control room and show the causal relevance of the European Council’s early performance.
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spelling The Institutional Ingredients of Polycrisis Management: Unpacking European Council’s Handling of the Energy Crisisenergy crisis; EU institutions; European Council; polycrisis; process managementThis article analyses how the European Council and the institutional infrastructure that supports it have been managing the early stages of the energy crisis. This was the time when the European Council, as the “control room” of EU crisis management, was unable to come up with any solutions to high energy prices. It makes a methodological and empirical contribution to the debate on how the European Council system manages (poly)crises. Methodologically, we introduce the method of embedded process tracing to study EU crisis management from within. Embedded process tracing combines mainstream causal process tracing techniques with elements from interpretivist approaches, to deal with context dependency, case heterogeneity, and empirical density. Empirically, we offer a process-management analysis of the first nine months of the energy crisis. We delineate the roles of various actors and institutions: the president of the European Council, the Council Secretariat, the Commission president, and the Commission Services. We unpack the crucial ingredients of polycrisis management: how to get and keep an issue on the agenda, how to shape and steer European-Council-level debates and conclusions, and how to ensure a proper follow-up by the Commission and the Council. Finally, we re-assess the image of the malfunctioning control room and show the causal relevance of the European Council’s early performance.Cogitatio Press2023-12-29info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersioninfo:eu-repo/semantics/articleapplication/pdfhttps://doi.org/10.17645/pag.v11i4.7345https://doi.org/10.17645/pag.v11i4.7345Politics and Governance; Vol 11, No 4 (2023): Governing the EU Polycrisis: Institutional Change After the Pandemic and the War in Ukraine; 275-2852183-246310.17645/pag.i374reponame:Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos)instname:Agência para a Sociedade do Conhecimento (UMIC) - FCT - Sociedade da Informaçãoinstacron:RCAAPenghttps://www.cogitatiopress.com/politicsandgovernance/article/view/7345https://www.cogitatiopress.com/politicsandgovernance/article/view/7345/3506https://www.cogitatiopress.com/politicsandgovernance/article/downloadSuppFile/7345/3487Copyright (c) 2023 Sandrino Smeets, Derek Beachinfo:eu-repo/semantics/openAccessSmeets, SandrinoBeach, Derek2024-01-11T15:50:36Zoai:ojs.cogitatiopress.com:article/7345Portal AgregadorONGhttps://www.rcaap.pt/oai/openaireopendoar:71602024-03-20T01:30:02.376490Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos) - Agência para a Sociedade do Conhecimento (UMIC) - FCT - Sociedade da Informaçãofalse
dc.title.none.fl_str_mv The Institutional Ingredients of Polycrisis Management: Unpacking European Council’s Handling of the Energy Crisis
title The Institutional Ingredients of Polycrisis Management: Unpacking European Council’s Handling of the Energy Crisis
spellingShingle The Institutional Ingredients of Polycrisis Management: Unpacking European Council’s Handling of the Energy Crisis
Smeets, Sandrino
energy crisis; EU institutions; European Council; polycrisis; process management
title_short The Institutional Ingredients of Polycrisis Management: Unpacking European Council’s Handling of the Energy Crisis
title_full The Institutional Ingredients of Polycrisis Management: Unpacking European Council’s Handling of the Energy Crisis
title_fullStr The Institutional Ingredients of Polycrisis Management: Unpacking European Council’s Handling of the Energy Crisis
title_full_unstemmed The Institutional Ingredients of Polycrisis Management: Unpacking European Council’s Handling of the Energy Crisis
title_sort The Institutional Ingredients of Polycrisis Management: Unpacking European Council’s Handling of the Energy Crisis
author Smeets, Sandrino
author_facet Smeets, Sandrino
Beach, Derek
author_role author
author2 Beach, Derek
author2_role author
dc.contributor.author.fl_str_mv Smeets, Sandrino
Beach, Derek
dc.subject.por.fl_str_mv energy crisis; EU institutions; European Council; polycrisis; process management
topic energy crisis; EU institutions; European Council; polycrisis; process management
description This article analyses how the European Council and the institutional infrastructure that supports it have been managing the early stages of the energy crisis. This was the time when the European Council, as the “control room” of EU crisis management, was unable to come up with any solutions to high energy prices. It makes a methodological and empirical contribution to the debate on how the European Council system manages (poly)crises. Methodologically, we introduce the method of embedded process tracing to study EU crisis management from within. Embedded process tracing combines mainstream causal process tracing techniques with elements from interpretivist approaches, to deal with context dependency, case heterogeneity, and empirical density. Empirically, we offer a process-management analysis of the first nine months of the energy crisis. We delineate the roles of various actors and institutions: the president of the European Council, the Council Secretariat, the Commission president, and the Commission Services. We unpack the crucial ingredients of polycrisis management: how to get and keep an issue on the agenda, how to shape and steer European-Council-level debates and conclusions, and how to ensure a proper follow-up by the Commission and the Council. Finally, we re-assess the image of the malfunctioning control room and show the causal relevance of the European Council’s early performance.
publishDate 2023
dc.date.none.fl_str_mv 2023-12-29
dc.type.status.fl_str_mv info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion
dc.type.driver.fl_str_mv info:eu-repo/semantics/article
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status_str publishedVersion
dc.identifier.uri.fl_str_mv https://doi.org/10.17645/pag.v11i4.7345
https://doi.org/10.17645/pag.v11i4.7345
url https://doi.org/10.17645/pag.v11i4.7345
dc.language.iso.fl_str_mv eng
language eng
dc.relation.none.fl_str_mv https://www.cogitatiopress.com/politicsandgovernance/article/view/7345
https://www.cogitatiopress.com/politicsandgovernance/article/view/7345/3506
https://www.cogitatiopress.com/politicsandgovernance/article/downloadSuppFile/7345/3487
dc.rights.driver.fl_str_mv Copyright (c) 2023 Sandrino Smeets, Derek Beach
info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess
rights_invalid_str_mv Copyright (c) 2023 Sandrino Smeets, Derek Beach
eu_rights_str_mv openAccess
dc.format.none.fl_str_mv application/pdf
dc.publisher.none.fl_str_mv Cogitatio Press
publisher.none.fl_str_mv Cogitatio Press
dc.source.none.fl_str_mv Politics and Governance; Vol 11, No 4 (2023): Governing the EU Polycrisis: Institutional Change After the Pandemic and the War in Ukraine; 275-285
2183-2463
10.17645/pag.i374
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