When Do Policy Innovations Spread? Lessons for Advocates of Lesson-Drawing

Abstract

In recent years, the European Union (EU) has begun a gradual shift from traditional regulatory policymaking toward more flexible methods of coordination. For instance, while directives setting minimum regulations once dominated EU employment policy, since 1997, the Open Method of Coordination (OMC) has come to the forefront, emphasizing benchmarking, monitoring, and exchange of best practices. Similar "soft coordination" strategies have begun in many other areas of EU policymaking, including economic policy, tax competition policy, social inclusion and pensions policy, and environmental policy. High expectations combined with thin evidence regarding the consequences of a shift toward cooperative governance have led to a polarized debate. To specify the circumstances in which OMC-type efforts succeed and fail, this Note reviews empirical evidence from the literatures on diffusion and policy transfer to answer four questions: Who copies? What is imitated? Which relationships facilitate imitation? How does learning shape the policy process? This research suggests that the OMC holds substantial promise to advance EU integration in a positive direction, as it brings disadvantaged actors to the focus of national debates and seems to have the greatest effects on the least developed member states.

Keywords: European Union, open method, policy transfer, coordination