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Macro-regional Strategies: Agents of Europeanization and Rescaling?

European Union
Governance
Institutions
Public Policy
Regionalism
Tobias Chilla
Friedrich-Alexander Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg
Tobias Chilla
Friedrich-Alexander Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg
Franziska Sielker
Dominic Stead
Delft University of Technology

Abstract

Macro-regional strategies have become an influential part of large-scale European regional cooperation since its appearance with the Baltic Sea Region Strategy and shortly later the Danube Strategy and now the Alpine Strategy. This new instrument influences policy making within the different macro-regions, but also on the EU level. This new type of EU cooperation leads to further processes of Europeanization, a concept which has been interpreted and analysed in a multiplicity of ways in academic debates. Whichever interpretation and analytical approach is used, Europeanization almost always has implications for policy rescaling in some shape or form. This can include the rescaling of policymaking agendas, processes, networks or powers, or alternatively the rescaling of policy ideas, narratives, norms or justifications. In many cases, these processes have a territorial dimension. This paper reflects on the development of European macro-regional strategies and the implications they have for Europeanization and policy rescaling from a territorial perspective. Analytically based upon examples from the Baltic, Alpine and Danube macro-region and drawing upon Clark’s and Jones’ concept of Europeanisation, the paper distinguishes different forms of spatial rescaling. It concludes by developing different concepts of rescaling as an analytical approach to regional policies.