Coordination by the Core Executives of the Länder. An Analytical Framework

Despite the functional separation in the German federal system, the Länder have a say in federal legislation via the Bundesrat. Finding a concerted position among the 16 subnational units (or a majority of them) is subject to intensive coordination between the Länder- bureaucrats and politicians. The German multi-level system creates the need to coordinate policy in an intrastate as well as an interstate arena. The lines of conflict apparent in the federal system create three channels of coordination, namely a federal, aparty political and a sectoral channel. This is the starting point for the development of an analytical framework describing the complex system of coordination between the German Länder as well as towards the federal level. Taking on a New Institutionalism perspective and being empirically informed by expert interviews on the structures and activities of the coordinating bureaucrats, this paper argues that bureaucrats are using these arenas and channels of coordination in order to promote the preferences of their ministries and governments. Their actions are assumed to be intentional, depending on the problem to be solved. Thereby, this framework will contribute to identifying the built-in potentials for conflict but also for problem-solving. Secondly, it can explain which preferences prevail under which circumstances.