Kevin Featherstone

Theresa May has delivered her long-awaited speech about Brexit in Florence. Was that it, asks Kevin Featherstone (LSE European Institute)? May's speech reveals just how constrained she is by her warring Cabinet, and will lead to little progress in Brussels. Listening to Theresa May's speech in Florence, I was left wondering whether she had planned to say more but was stopped from doing ...

The domestic impact of the EU entails a mix of policy instruments emanating from ‘Brussels’. Some are ‘hard’ laws, such as EU directives or policy rules set by treaties. Others involve policy coordination with ‘soft’ instruments of sharing best practice and/or the Commission urging preferred solutions. Domestic actors must distinguish between these instruments to determine their constraints. They must also judge how ‘hard’ law instruments might be used by the Commission to promote domestic reforms drawn from ‘soft’ agendas. To politicians and the public, what ‘Europe’ expects in terms of domestic policy and practice can be a matter of some confusion.

This study seeks to use the Greek experience as a test case. There are two major types of tests applied here. The first is of the extent to which EU membership has facilitated domestic economic and social reform. This is now commonly termed a test of the impact of ‘Europeanization’. The conceptual framework for this test is the focus of this chapter. A second test — of the structures of the domestic system processing the external stimuli in a manner that produces limited, ‘path-dependent’ change — is discussed in the following chapter.

Civil wars necessitate recruitment and propaganda to execute the conflict and gain supporters. The strategies deployed in these respects display how the conflict is conceived and who it embraces. This chapter explores the local operations of the conflict and considers how they were structured by the wider national context. In doing so, it locates the Muslims of Western Thrace in the strategies of both sides of the civil war and outlines how the Muslims responded to them.

1: Politicians, Patronage, and the Bureaucratic Tradition: the Problems of Control and Coordination Within the Greek Government 2: The Leadership Factor: the Person and the Post 3: Primus solus: Constantinos Karamanlis as PM (1974-1980) 4: At the Centre of a Galaxy: Andreas Papandreou as Prime Minister (1981-1989 and 1993-1996) 5: Institutionalisation and Micro-management: Constantinos Mitsotakis as Prime Minister (1990-1993) 6: Innovation Circumscribed: Costas Simitis as Prime Minister (1996-2004) 7: In the Shadows of Uncertainty: Costas Karamanlis as Prime Minister (2004-2009) 8: 'Plus ca change': Change and Continuity in the Greek Core Executive 9: Governing in Context: International Comparisons and Reform Implications Appendix: List of Interviewees

With the failure to delay or block the EMU initiative, Major was left to bridge the unbridgeable, caught between a divided party and European credibility. Party divisions prevented any radical shift of policy. More constructive rhetoric did not disguise essential policy continuity. Major's instincts were for pragmatism, but any scope for building alternative coalitions (e.g. with the German–Dutch bloc) were not exploited, despite compatibilities in policy belief (on monetary policy and on free markets). Thus, the end game became dominated by the technical design of an opt‐out from EMU and a weakening stage 2. The ‘victory’ on the opt‐out was somewhat hollow: not least because Britain's partners had all but given up on her. The problems of reconciling Britain's interests were graphically portrayed by its exit from the ERM in September 1992. The irony of Major's leadership was that, despite him giving priority to party unity, the Conservative Party was left in almost t...

[The multi-level governance of the European Union (EU) makes the adoption and implementation of its laws and policies vulnerable to the variation in the ability of member state institutions to deliver on their obligations. Studies of EU law compliance have established the relevance of institutional capacity to member state performance. This paper contrasts institutional capacity with an alternative structuralist explanation: the autonomy of state institutions from wider social pressures (such as corruption, clientelism). This follows the emphasis on impartiality in the ‘quality of government’ literature. The paper explores the relative significance of ‘capacity’ and ‘autonomy’ for compliance, but also extends the focus to other areas in which governments fulfil EU obligations. The latter cover core government functions of regulation and distribution, allowing a broader assessment of both propositions. The empirical results, tested against alternative indicators, suggest that ‘autonomy’ (the sociology of the state) matters more than institutional capacity for both EU law compliance and the implementation of EU policies. To this extent, there are important implications for debates on the conditions impacting ‘impartiality’, but also for those on the inclusivity and deepening of the EU integration process.

This week’s dramatic decision to close down ERT answers a question Greece’s political leaders – in and out of government – have lacked the will to confront for a generation. At one level, the move is gesture politics: a sudden, unilateral act intended to impress the Troika, after the sale of DEPA was messed up. The audacity of the move provoked the predictable protests – attacking the media gets headlines around the world. But the protests have a valid point about such a ‘shock and awe’ announcement: it comes without proper consultation, no parliamentary approval and with no fully-worked out plan.

As WWII entered its closing stages, the power struggle for control of Western Thrace assumed a renewed urgency, both internationally and locally. With the advance of the Red Army, the Fascist Bulgarian regime at home collapsed. Subsequent Bulgarian attempts to re-write the history of Sofia’s entanglement with the Axis forces and maintain access to the Aegean Sea met with stiff opposition by both Greece and Turkey. Behind their reaction – and those of their allies in London – laid fears that Bulgaria’s ambitions could facilitate Soviet expansionism and disturb regional security. In Athens, the approaching end of the war encouraged territorial revisionism against Bulgaria through the deployment of the ‘Pomak card’. The claim of the Greek government to southern Bulgaria, however, lacked credibility and was eventually swept away by the wider geo-political bargain of the postWar settlement.

The announcement from the Minister of Education, George Babiniotis, that the government is suspending the new law on the universities sends entirely the wrong signal on the programme of reform. The Minister says that the law will not be applied at present given the financial pressures across the education sector, following well-known difficulties in school provision. While the latter are very regrettable and a cause for concern about the policy planning process, the new announcement panders to those within the university sector that depend on inertia and have little regard for how universities might contribute to Greece’s progress. Those engaged in violent protests and blockades – actions that have scarred practically every campus in Greece – can proclaim a victory.

A week ago, Greece had some of its best headlines in the international media since before the crisis began. The quick and decisive actions against Chrysi Avghi showed the strength of the democratic spirit. This was a fight-back against a Neo-Nazi force at a time when the extreme right was making inroads into the stagnant politics of other European societies. I felt proud of Greece when explaining these actions to my friends in London.

Chapter 8 Facing Up to the Gordian Knot: The Political Economy of Pension Reform Kevin Featherstone and Platon Tinios When (Alexander) captured Gordium.... he saw the famous chariot which was fastened to its yoke by the bark of the famous cornel tree, and he heard the legend... that ...

This is a report of the hearing that took place on Monday 25th January 2016, from 16.30-19.00hrs. This was the fifth session in the ‘LSE Commission on the future of Britain in Europe’ series. The hearing began with three keynote presentations: • Joaquin Almunia (Former VP of the European Commission; Commissioner for EMU, 2004-10; Commissioner for Competition, 2010-14), ‘What Brexit might mean from an economic perspective for the rest of the EU?’ • Dominique Moisi (Professor, Sciences-Po; Senior Adviser, IFRI; Visiting Professor, KCL), ‘The implications of Brexit for Europe’s common foreign and security policy’. • Sara Hagemann (LSE), ‘The Effects of Brexit on EU decision-making’. A broad range of experts and practitioners were invited to participate in the discussion. These included guests with senior experience of political office; former diplomats; highlevel figures in banking, finance and trade; leaders of policy think-tanks; senior journalists; and, consultants and academics. Fo...

International attention has focussed recently on the reform ‘failures’ of Greece in the context of its European Union membership. Systemic constraints are increasingly recognised. The present paper argues that attention ought also to be given to the inner workings of government at the centre and their undermining of reform capacity. It explores the nature of the Greek core executive across five premierships and argues the supposed supremacy of the PM is something of a fallacy. In reality, the structure is one of a ‘solitary centre’ amidst a ‘segmented government’. As such, the closest parallels are with central, rather than southern, Europe. In developing its empirical analysis, the paper makes a methodological contribution to the examination of core executive relations and resources.

In 1923, the American Geographical Society (AGS), seeking to convey the context of recent events to its readers, declared that ‘The debatable ground of Thrace has long been a political storm belt’ (AGS 1923: 127). Indeed it had and for a variety of reasons. Before examining the events of the 1940s, it is therefore necessary to examine the longer-term setting and inheritance of the region. The demography of Western Thrace had been subject to major changes and this was to prove a significant factor structuring the 1940s experience of its various ethnic groups. Further, the historical inheritance of such groups had shaped their distinct identities. Indeed, as this chapter will outline, previous events had shown not a sense of shared nationhood, but rather the juxtaposition of competing historical narratives (and irredent- isms) within Western Thrace. More particularly, the Lausanne Treaty (1923) had intentionally ‘minoritised’ the Muslim population and this affected its identity and the discourse surrounding it. Thereafter, the establishment of the Republic of Turkey had challenged the minority socially and politically by counter-posing a new nationalism, based on a secular modernity, with traditional Islam. This created local political rifts amongst the Thracian Muslims that remained unresolved by the 1940s and these undermined its own political cohesion. At the same time, the minority was marginalised, but not excluded, from the politics of its host state, Greece.

In recent years, significant attention has focused on the reform ‘failures’ of Greece in the context of its European Union membership and the implementation of its bailout commitments. Systemic public-policy constraints are increasingly recognized, but our understanding of how the senior echelons of the Greek government are able to coordinate the policy process remains rather incomplete. This chapter examines the evolution of the Greek core executive since the transition to democracy in 1974 and offers an appraisal of the efforts of successive Greek prime ministers to manage government business. The main argument put forward is that the extensive formal powers afforded to the prime minister by the Greek Constitution have not materialized in an effective system of governance at the top of the government. In reality, the structure is one of a ‘solitary centre’ amidst a ‘segmented government’ in which the prime minister lacks the necessary resources to effectively coordinate and contro...