Parties, Interests and Territoriality in the European Union and Beyond

Decentralisation waves across democracies have led to a renaissance of the regional level across polities both within and outside of the European Union (Hooghe et al., 2010). This has meant that a number of questions previously addressed at the state level are now being explored at various territorial scales, mostly below but sometimes beyond the state level. These questions deal with governance issues, accountability and responsibility questions and broader challenges regarding the identification, aggregation and articulation of territorial interests be it through party structures and competition or through the territorialisation of interest representation, all of which can result in policy and identity variations. These questions are at stake not only in Western European regions but also in those located in central and Eastern European countries and in Latin American countries.