1
The politics of EU enlargement
Theoretical and comparative perspectives1
Frank Schimmelfennig and Ulrich Sedelmeier
The study of enlargement: political relevance, theoretical neglect and methodological shortcomings
The enlargement of the European Union (EU) is a key political process, both for the EU and for international relations in Europe. While enlargement was a sporadic event for much of the EU's history, the end of the Cold War dramatically increased its salience and established it as a permanent item on the EU's agenda. Three members of the European Free Trade Area (EFTA) joined in ! 995 (Austria, Sweden, Finland). Eight Central and Eastern European countries (CEECs) - the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Poland, Latvia, Lithuania, Slovenia, Slovakia - plus Cyprus and Malta acceded in May 2004. Bulgaria and Romania are currently engaged in accession negotiations and had 2007 confirmed as a plausible date for membership. The Commission has cautiously recommended opening accession negotiations with Turkey. The EU has also acknowledged the membership perspective of the countries of the western Balkans and the Commission issued a positive opinion on Croatia's application.
The EU's transformation from an exclusively West European organization into the centre of gravity of pan-European institution-building makes it a dominant locus of domestic policy-making and transnational relations for the entire region. 'Europe' is increasingly defined in terms of the EU: the 'Europeanization' or 'Europeanness' of individual countries has come to be measured by the intensity of institutional relations with the EU and by the adoption of its organizational norms and rules (see, e.g., Katzenstein 1997b: 262; Schimmelfennig and Sedelmeier 2005).
EU enlargement has far-reaching implications not only for the political shape of Europe but also for the EU's institutional set-up and its major policies. In the case of eastern enlargement, this was reflected in the tough intra-EU negotiations over the budget, the agricultural and regional policies, and the representation of members in EU institutions.
In light of its political relevance, it is striking that EU enlargement has been a largely neglected issue in the theory of regional integration (see also Friis and Murphy 1999; Wallace 2000). The classical approaches to the study of integration such as neo-functionalism and transactionalism mentioned the geographical
4   Frank Schimmelfenmg and Ulrich Sedelmeier
growth of international communities only in passing (see Deutsch 1970: 4, 43-4; Haas 1968: 313-17; Schmitter 1969: 165). This is not surprising: analysing the establishment and stabilization of regional organizations logically precedes studying their territorial expansion. Moreover, the heyday of regional integration theory had come to an end before the EU's first enlargement in 1973.2 In addition, the subsequent move towards the analysis of substantive policies and the adoption of theoretical frameworks from comparative politics (such as neo-corporatism and network analysis) did little to further research on such a polity-building issue as enlargement (see Friis and Murphy 1999: 213). It is more surprising that the levival of regional integration studies in the early 1990s and the theoretical debate between 'intergovernmentalism' and 'supranationalism' still focused exclusively upon such issues of 'deepening' as the Single European Act, Economic and Monetary Union (EMU), or legal integration.
The increased salience of enlargement since the end of the Cold War resulted in a sizeable body of literature. While much of this literature consists of descriptive studies of single cases - such as single enlargement rounds, single countries, or single policy areas - the EFTA and eastern enlargement have also triggered theory-oriented work. These analyses have started to address a number of weaknesses that have characterized the study of enlargement, namely (1) an insularity of the study of EU enlargement which divorced it from the study of other international organizations; (2) the lack of comparative research designs; (3) an underspecification of dependent variables and a neglect of important dimensions of enlargement: and (4) an underspecification of explanatory factors or independent variables, and a subsequent neglect of exploring alternative explanations. Yet more work in this direction is necessary to make the insights of these studies more generalizable and thus to contribute to our cumulative understanding of enlargement.
The goal of this volume is to bring together in a systematic form the insights from recent theoretically informed studies of EU enlargement. These studies provide examples of comparativist and statistical analyses of EU enlargement and explore under-researched aspects of the enlargement process. More generally, they contribute to the debate between rationalist and constructivist analyses in international relations (IR) theory.
This introductory chapter makes three main contributions to structuring the study of EU enlargement. First, we provide a conceptualization of enlargement that relates EU enlargement to the study of international organizations more broadly. We thus define EU enlargement as a process of gradual and formal horizontal institutionalization. We then distinguish four main dimensions of a thus-defined enlargement, draw out the key research questions in each of them, and propose comparative research strategies to address them. Our second goal is theory development. We suggest that, rather than striving for some kind of 'enlargement theory1, it is more fruitful to link up the study of enlargement (as institutionalization) with the study of institutions in IR and European integration studies. Drawing on two basic approaches to the analysis of international organizations - rationalist and socioloeical or ronstnicfivist insntmionalism - we
The politics ofEU enlargement 5
derive core hypotheses on the conditions of enlargement. Finally, we demonstrate the usefulness of these theoretical approaches in structuring the debate in an overview of the state oi research on EU enlargement.
Enlargement: definition and research focus Definition
Even though this is a book on the enlargement of the EU, our conceptual and theoretical focus is more general. To encourage comparative analysis, our definitions, research foci, and hypotheses can also be applied to the enlargement of other regional organizations. We propose to define the enlargement of an organization as a process of gradual andformal horizontal institutionalization of organizational rules and norms.
Institutionalization means the process by which the actions and interactions of social actors come to be normatively patterned. The difference between 'horizontal' and 'vertical' institutionalization corresponds to the common usage of 'widening' and 'deepening'. Horizontal institutionalization takes place when institutions spread beyond the incumbent actors, that is, when the group of actors whose actions and relations are governed by the organization's norms becomes larger.
Organizational membership and organizational norms are formally defined. It is therefore reasonable to concentrate on formal and purposive acts of horizontal institutionalization such as the conclusion of association agreements or the signing and coming into effect of accession treaties. However, organizational norms also spread informally ('diffuse') beyond the boundaries of the organization, both to aspiring members and to states that have no intention to join. Such diffusion might result from unilateral adaptation in order to mitigate negative externalities of regional integration itself, or from a convergence of practices when non-members consider institutional templates of the organization as viable responses to broader systemic challenges. We suggest focusing on purposive alignment with organizational rules, either more narrowly with a view to accession, or more broadly when changes in institutional practices are a direct response to regional integration.
Horizontal institutionalization is a matter of degree, and enlargement is best conceptualized as a gradual process that begins before, and continues alter, the admission of new members to the organization. Even in the absence of full membership, outside actors might follow certain organizational norms and rules. Non-members align with organizational rules as a result of the organization's accession conditionality, or because these rules are embodied in formal agreements that create an institutional relationship short of full membership, such as association agreements or agreements to participate in selected policies of the organization (e.g., the European Economic Area (EEA) agreement or the Swiss treaties with the EU). Conversely, new members of the organization may negotiate post-accession transition periods before applying some of its norms, or they might begin to participate in some of the organization's policies at different times - as in
6   Frank Schimmcljennig and Ulrich Sedehneier
What are the consequences of such a definition of enlargement? First, by defining enlargement as institutionalization, we establish an explicit link to the study of institutions and open the analysis of enlargement to theories about the establishment and effects of institutions. Second, it widens the field of enlargement studies beyond the narrow focus on decisions about formal membership. Such a wider focus includes, for example, horizontal institutionalization short of membership, the expansion of the organization's substantive policies, and the impact of horizontal institutionalization in the applicants, the member states, and the organization itself.
Research focus: dimensions of enlargement, dependent variables, and comparative strategies
We can distinguish four main dimensions or aspects of enlargement, which generate separate dependent variables for the study of enlargement. The literature on EU enlargement has focused primarily on three dimensions of enlargement. These dimensions concern the politia of EU enlargement: they analyse the process leading to enlargement, or to decisions on formal acts of horizontal institutionalization. These dimensions could be labelled respectively as (1) applicants' enlargement politics, (2) member state enlargement politics, and (3) EU enlargement politics. We suggest that, in the last case, it is useful to distinguish between the macro- or polity dimension and the substantive or policy dimension. While these three dimensions of the politics of EU enlargement are the main focus of this volume, a further dimension started to receive more attention only recently: (4) the impact of enlargement, i.e., the effects of these formal acts of horizontal institutionalization.
In this subsection, we identify the main research questions in each of these main dimensions of enlargement in order to encourage a clearer specification of dependent variables, which should facilitate debate and make research results more comparable. Moreover, we observe that, to the extent that theoretical studies exist, they have been primarily single case studies. Wre thus suggest how in each dimension a broadening of the empirical focus can lead to a more comparative research design towards more cross-sectional and longitudinal studies.3 Cross-sectional studies compare the politics of different applicants and member states, the EU and other regional organizations, diverse policy areas, and the impact of enlargement in different domestic and international settings. Longitudinal studies take the comparison further to the study of applicant and member-state politics over time, the analysis of different enlargement rounds, and short-term and long-term impacts. Table 1.1 maps the state of the literature on the basis of these suggestions about dependent variables and comparative strategies.4
(I) Applicant enlargement politics
The basic question with regard to this dimension is why and under which conditions non-members seek accession to a regional organization. Since horizontal
'the politia qfEU enlargement 7 table 1.1 Dependent variables and comparative strategies in the enlargement literature
Single case
Cross-sectional comparison
(Cross-sectional and) longitudinal comparison
Applicants' politics
Member-state politics
EU macro-politics
EU
substantive politics
Impact of enlargement
Falkner 2000
Bieler 2000; Fioretos 1997; Ingebritsen 1998; Smith 1999; Mattli and Plumper: Gstöhl
Hyde-Price 2000; Tewes 1998; Collins 2002
Friis 1998a, 1998b; Schimmelfennig ch. 7: Sedelmeier ch. 6; Moravcsik and Vachudova; Skälnes
Haggard etat. 1993; Papadimitriou 2002; Torreblanca 2001; Sedehneier ch. 11
Börzel 1999; Schimmelfennig and Sedehneier 2005
Matth 1999; Schimmelfennig ch 8; Bieler
Flerke and Wiener; Schimmelfennig ch. 8
Ruano
institutionalization does not result only from full membership in a regional organization, the broader question is under which conditions outsiders pursue a change in their institutional relationship with the regional organization and what kind of institutional relationship they prefer. Especially with regard to the EFTA enlargement, there is already a sizeable body of theoretically informed literature, which goes beyond single cases and uses cross-sectional comparisons within the same enlargement round. These insights can be improved through longitudinal comparisons across enlargement rounds (Mattli 1999; Bieler ch. 4 this volume: Schimmelfennig ch. 8 this volume) and comparisons with cases of countries that chose not to join (Gstohl ch. 2 this volume) or to apply (Mattli and Plumper ch. 3 this volume).
(2) Member-state enlargement politics
The main question is under which conditions a member state of a regional organization favours or opposes enlargement to a particular applicant country. Theoretical studies of this dimension usually focus on single member states (Collins 2002; Hyde-Price 2000; Tewes 1998). Even descriptive studies that compare more than one member state are extremely rare (Lippert et al. 20011. More systematic insights could be gained from comparisons of more member states and/or across enlargement rounds. Furthermore, while studies of this dimension of enlargement have concentrated mainly on member states, the focus
8   Frank Schimmelfennig and Ulrich Sedebneier
could be broadened to analyse actors within the regional organization other than national governments, such as institutional actors.
(3) EUenlargement politics
Under which conditions does the regional organization admit a new member, or modify its institutional relationship with outside states? There are two analytically-separate dimensions to this question, which relate to the macro-dimension and the substantive dimension of enlargement respectively.
The macro dimension relates to the EU as a polity and concerns the question of candidate selection and patterns of national membership of the organization. The main questions are why the organization prefers to admit one state rather than another and why it offers membership rather than some other form of (or no) institutional relationship. While there is an emerging body of theoretical literature on this dimension, studies have focused on single cases, mainly eastern enlargement (Friis 1998a, 1998b; Moravcsik and Vachudova ch. 9 this volume; Schimmel-fennig 1998, ch. 7 this volume; Sedelmeier forthcoming, ch. 6 this volume; Sjursen 2002; Skalnes ch. 10 this volume). Preston (1997) provides a rare, but still predominantly descriptive, comparative analysis of successive EU enlargements.
There are some cross-sectional comparisons with the same enlargement round of other international organizations, mainly between the eastern enlargements of the EU and NATO. However, most of these studies are fairly descriptive (Croft et al. 1999, Smith and Timmins 2000; Sperling 1999) and only few are theoretical (Fierke and Wiener ch. 5 this volume; Schimmelfennig ch. 8 this volume, 2003). For such cross-sectional and longitudinal comparisons, the basic question concerns variations in the pattern of organizational size and national membership. Why are some states more integrated than others, and why are they members of one organization but not of another? Why do some organizations have a larger membership and expand more quickly than others?
The substantive or policy dimension of EU politics concerns the concrete substance of the organizational rules that are horizontally institutionalized. Theoretical analyses of the macro-dimension have often neglected this dimension (but see Sedelmeier 1998, forthcoming). Studies of the substantive dimension seek to explain the specific outcomes of accession negotiations in distinctive policy areas, but also the nature of pre-accession conditionality or association policies (Friis 1998c; Jileva 2004; Smith 1998; Torreblanca 2001). The key question is to what extent outcomes reflect the preferences of certain actors, such as the applicants, member states, societal interest groups, or institutional actors. Explicitly comparative theoretically oriented studies in this dimension are rare. In the case of eastern enlargement, most cross-sectional comparisons focus on variations in outcomes across different policy areas (Haggard et al. 1993; Papadimitriou 2002; Sedelmeier ch. 11 this volume). However, trade liberalization between the EU and the CEEC candidates could be also analysed in a comparison with negotiations between the USA and Mexico in NAFTA (Phelan 2004). Even rarer are longitudinal studies
The politics of EU enlargement 9
that compare policy outcomes in one issue area across enlargement rounds (Ruano ch. 12 this volume).
(4) Impact of enlargement
Enlargement affects both the organization and the state to which its institutional rules are extended. Frequent questions are how enlargement affects the distribution of power and interests in the organization and its effectiveness and efficiency (see, e.g., Steunenberg 2002); how enlargement influences the organization's identity, norms, and goals; and what is the effect of a widening of membership on the prospects for a deepening of integration within the organization. However, most relevant for the study of horizontal institutionalization is the impact of enlargement on new members and non-members. Here, the main questions are: How does enlargement change the identity, the interests, and the behaviour of governmental and societal actors? Under which conditions do they conform to the norms of the organization?
This dimension has been relatively neglected in theoretical studies of enlargement. The literature on 'Europeanization' has analysed the effects of membership on new members, but mainly in single case studies (Falkner 2000) or comparisons between new and 'old' member states (Bórzel 1999). Only recently have their insights been applied to study the pre-accession effects on candidate countries. Some studies of eastern enlargement have combined insights from theoretical studies of the impact of international organizations, the Europeanization literature, and the literature on the transformations in the CEECs (e.g., Goetz 2001; Grabbe 2001; Jacoby 2004; Kelley 2004; Schimmelfennig and Sedelmeier 2005; Vachudova 2005). Such studies have redressed the picture of a mainly descriptive literature on the effect of the EU on the candidates, which was often limited to single countries and single policy areas. While we emphasize that this is a central dimension of enlargement, which requires more research, the contributions in this volume focus on various dimensions of the politics of EU enlargement.
Theoretical approaches to enlargement: rationalism, constructivism, and hypotheses for enlargement
We propose to embed the analysis of enlargement in the current IR debate between rationalist and sociological or constructivist institutionalism (see, e.g., Katzenstein et al. 1999; on its relevance for EU studies, Christiansen et al. 1999; Aspinwall and Schneider 2001). This debate offers a broad spectrum of assumptions and hypotheses about the conditions of institutionalization and about institutional effects, It spans the two disciplines that have contributed most to the social science analysis of institutions: economics and sociology. Furthermore, linking the study of enlargement to the analysis of institutions in IR and the general social sciences prevents theoretical insularity. Finally, it is our impression that the growing body of theoretically oriented work on enlargement fits in well with this debate. After
10   Frank Schiinmelfennig and Ulnch Sedelmeier
briefly outlining the theoretical foundations of both institutionalist approaches, we specify hypotheses for the dimensions or dependent variables in the study of enlargement.
"Theoreticalfoundations
Rationalism and constructivism do not provide us with fully elaborated and internally consistent competing hypotheses on enlargement that we could rigorously test against each other: first, both rationalism and constructivism are social meta-theories defined by a set of (mainly ontological) assumptions about the social world rather than by specific hypotheses. There is a variety of substantial theories based on either rationalist or constructivist assumptions diat attribute preferences and outcomes to different factors and lead to different and even contradictory expectations about enlargement. Second, the differences between rationalist and sociological theories of institutions are multidimensional and often a matter of degree rather than principle. It is therefore more useful to regard the two insti-tutionalisms as partially competing and partially complementary sources of theoretical inspiration for the study of enlargement (on synthesis between different institutionalisms, see, e.g.,Jupille etal. 2003). In the following, we will nevertheless construct two ideal types of a rationalist and a sociological analysis of enlargement in order to portray the theoretical alternatives as clearly as possible.
At the most fundamental level, rationalist and constructivist institutionalism are based on different social ontologies (individualism and materialism in rationalism and a social and ideational ontology in constructivism) and assume different logics of action - a rationalist logic of consequentiality opposed to a constructivist logic of appropriateness (March and Olsen 1989: 160). These divergent premises are reflected in different perspectives on the causal status and purposes of international organizations which, in turn, lead to competing hypotheses about the rationale, the conditions, and the mechanisms of enlargement.
In rationalist institutionalism, the causal status of institutions generally remains secondary to that of individual, material interests. Institutions are treated as intervening variables between the material interests and the material environment of the actors, on the one hand, and the collective outcomes, on the other. They provide mainly constraints and incentives, not reasons, for action; they alter cost-benefit calculations, not identities and interests. By contrast, in the constructivist perspective, institutions shape actors' identities and interests. Actors do not simply confront institutions as external constraints and incentives towards which they behave expediently. Rather, institutions provide meaning to the rights and obligations entailed in their social roles. Actors conform with institutionally prescribed behaviour out of normative commitment or habit.0
The different conceptions of institutions are reflected in the functions and workings that both theories typically ascribe to international organizations. In the rationalist account, international organizations are instrumental associations designed to help states pursue their interests more efficiently. According to Abbott and Snidal (1998), they are attractive to states because of two functional
The politics of EU enlargement   11
characteristics that reduce transaction costs: centralization and independence. International organizations render collective action more efficient, e.g., by providing stable negotiating- forums, pooling activities, elaborating norms, and acting as a neutral information provider, trustee, allocator, or arbiter. Moreover, states pool and delegate authority to international organizations in order to 'constrain and control one another' (Moravcsik 1998: 9). By removing the interpretation, implementation, and enforcement of agreements from the reach of domestic opposition and from the unilateral control of state governments, international organizations raise the visibility and the costs of non-compliance (ibid.: 73-4).
Rationalist IR theories generally do not accord international organizations the status of purposive and autonomous actors in international politics. Although the economic theory of bureaucracy suggests that international agencies try to maximize their resources and turf, these theories regard the states' concern for autonomy as too strong, and the power of international bureaucracy as too limited, for international organizations to represent anything but the instruments of states. Moreover, rationalist theories conceive international organizations as clubs, that is, voluntary groups 'in the sense that members would not join (or remain in the club) unless a net gain resulted from membership' (Sandler and Tschirhart 1980: 1491).
Whereas rationalist institutionalism emphasizes the instrumental, regulatory, and efficiency-enhancing functions of international organizations, sociological institutionalism sees them as autonomous and powerful actors with constitutive and legitimacy-providing functions. International organizations are 'community representatives' (Abbott and Snidal 1998: 24) as well as community-building agencies. Their origins, goals, and procedures are more strongly determined by the standards of legitimacy and appropriateness of the international community they represent (and which constitute their cultural and institutional environment.) than by the utilitarian demand for efficient problem-solving (see, e.g., Barnett and Finnemore 1999: 703; Katzenstein 1997a: 12; Weber 1994: 4-5, 32). International organizations 'can become autonomous sites of authority . . . because of power flowing from at least two sources: (1) the legitimacy of the rational-legal authority they embody, and (2) control over technical expertise and information' (Barnett and Finnemore 1999: 707). Due to these sources of power, international organizations are able 'to impose definitions of member characteristics and purposes upon the governments of its member states' (McNeely 1995: 33; cf. also Finnemore 1996). For instance, they 'define international tasks [and] new categories of actors . . . create new interests for actors . . . and transfer models of political organizations around the world' (Barnett and Finnemore 1999: 699). On the basis of these theoretical foundations, we present some core rationalist and constructivist hypotheses for the enlargement ol international organizations.
Rationalist hypotheses
Rationalist explanations of enlargement involve two steps: first, the explanation of applicant and member state enlargement preferences and, second, the explanation of organizational collective enlargement decisions at the macro- and policy levels.
12   Frank Schimmefennig and Ulrica Sedelmaer Applicant and member state politics
As in all rationalist theory, expected individual costs and benefits determine the applicants' and the member states' enlargement preferences. States favour the kind and degree of horizontal institutionalization that maximizes their net benefits. More specifically, a member state favours the integration of an outsider state - and an outsider seeks to expand its institutional ties with the organization - under the conditions that it will reap positive net benefits from enlargement, and that these benefits exceed the benefits it would secure from an alternative form of horizontal institutionalization. This general hypothesis, however, begs the question of what the relevant costs and benefits are. In this respect, rationalist hypotheses vary to a great extent. First, we can distinguish three categories of costs and benefits thought to be most relevant for the enlargement preferences of applicants and members. These are transaction (or management), policy, and autonomy costs and benefits.
"transaction costs rise for the member states because additional members require additional organizational infrastructure and make communication within the organization more cumbersome and costly. Additional members usually also increase the heterogeneity of the membership, and 'the costs of centralized decisions are likely to rise where more and more persons of differing tastes participate' (Sandler et al. 1978: 69). Applicants have to establish delegations at the headquarters of the organization and incur costs of communication, coordination, and supervision in the relations between these delegations and capitals. These costs are balanced by benefits such as the provision of organizational services to the member states and faster communication and coordination between incumbents and new member states.
For the member states, policy costs come m the form of crowding because, in an enlarged organization, they have to share collective goods with the new members. For the applicants, policy costs involve membership contributions and the adaptation of domestic policies (see Mattli and Plumper ch. 3 this volume). Conversely, the incumbent members obtain policy benefits from the contributions of new members to the club goods, and applicants can expect to benefit from being able to participate in the club goods.
Autonomy costs arise because horizontal institutionalization implies foregoing unilateral policy options both for the member states and for the applicants. For member states, which have already lost policy-making autonomy in the integrated issue areas, autonomy costs mainly consist in having to accord new members equal decision-making rights. In general, under the EU's qualified majority voting rule, the individual member states' degree of control over outcomes decreases with enlargement (see, e.g., Kerremans 1998). In return, member states may gain better control over external political developments in the applicant states. For the latter, the greatest cost is the loss of policy-making autonomy as a result of membership. This loss, however, can be balanced by both the right to pardcipate in organizational decision-making and the protection of state autonomy provided by the organization against other states or domestic society.
Second, rationalist IR theories differ with regard to the kind of cost-benefit
The politics ofEU enlargement 13
calculations that states typically make (see, e.g., Baldwin 1993; Hasenclever et al. 1997: chs 3-4). Neo-liberal instilutionalisls assume that states care mainly about their own absolute gains and losses. Whereas enlargement must result in net welfare benefits in order to find support, autonomy benefits and costs are secondary. By contiast, realists assume that state actors are concerned mainly with external autonomy and power. In international cooperation, they worry about the distribution of benefits aiiiong the participating states, because the relative gains and losses vis-avis other states will affect their future international power position and security. Correspondingly, a member state favours enlargement, and a non-member state bids to join an international organization, if this is a necessary and efficient means to balance the superior power or threat of a third state (or coalition of states) or to increase its own power (see,,e.g., Walt 1987; Waltz 1979: 117-27). A third strand of rationalist institutionalism assumes that states are indeed most concerned about their autonomy, but not so much vis-a-vis other states as in relation to their own soaeties (Vaubel 1986; Wolf 1999). Focusing on applicant states, Mattli (1999) integrates both external and internal autonomy concerns: state leaders will be willing to bear the autonomy costs of integration only in order to retain political power. Assuming that a government's re-election chances will depend mainly on economic performance, 'a country seeks to integrate its economy only when there is a significant positive cost of maintaining its present governance structure in terms of foregone growth (as measured by a continuing performance gap between it and a more integrated rival governance structure)' (Mattli 1999: 81; see also Mattli 2000).
The third difference concerns the material conditions that determine a state's cost-benefit calculations. Rationalist approaches to enlargement have identified various sources ofenlargement preferences. Among these are general systemic conditions, such as changes in the world economy, in technology, or the security environment - for instance, the denationalization of the economy creates incentives for joining an international economic organization. Then there are organization-specific, systemic conditions, such as the degree of integration of the organization - for example, the deepening of economic integration in the organization will create negative externalities for outsiders (diversion of trade and investment) and trigger demand for membership. Alternatively, a high degree of integration may deter states that value autonomy highly. Also involved are fas. positional characteristics of states, such as the extent of their economic dependence on a regional organization or their geographical position - for instance, the more trade dependent a state is on the members of an economic union, the stronger its demand for membership. Finally there are subsystemic conditions and domestic structure, such as the relative strength of economic sectors or factors - for instance, the stronger the capital- or export-oriented sectors, the greater the demand for integration.
EU macro and substantive politics
According to club theory, the most pertinent rationalist approach to the optimal size of organizations is that the organization expands its institutions and membership if for both the member states and the applicant states, the marginal benefits of enlargement exceed the
14   Frank Schimmelfennig and Ulrich Sedehneier
marginal costs. In the club-theoretical perspective, enlargement will continue until marginal costs equal marginal benefits. This equilibrium indicates the optimal size of the organization (Buchanan 1965: 5; Padoan 1997: 118). However, die outcomes of organizational eidargement politics also depend on (1) constellations of bargaining power and (2) formal decision-making rules.
It is not necessary that enlargement as such is beneficial to each member. Enlargement can also result from unequal bargaining power among the incumbents.6 Member states that expect net losses from enlargement will agree to enlargement if" their bargaining power is sufficient to obtain full compensation through side-payments by die winners (which, in turn, requires that the necessary concessions do not exceed the winners' gains from enlargement). Otherwise, the losers will consent to enlargement if the winners are able to threaten them credibly with exclusion (and if the losses of exclusion for the losers exceed the losses of enlargement).
The other factor to take into account is formal decision-making rules. In general, enlargement requires the consensus of all member states. In the EU, three further extensions have to be taken into account. First, accession and association treaties have to be ratified by national parliaments and accession treaties must or can be subjected to a referendum in the applicant countries as well as in some of the member states. Second, association and accession require the consent of the European Parliament (EP) under the assent procedure.' Finally, EU policies that are affected by enlargement (such as agriculture, trade, or regional policies) are governed by different policy rules and decision-making procedures. These rules and procedures privilege individual governments and interest groups in the distributional politics of enlargement (see Wennerlund 2000).
Constructivist hypotheses
In contrast to rationalist hypotheses, sociological explanations of enlargement usually start not with actor preferences but at the systemic, 'organizational' level. However, to the extent that they allow for ideational conflict, the differentiation between the state level and the EU level can be upheld. According to constructivist institutionalism, enlargement politics will generally be shaped by ideational, cultural factors. The most relevant of these factors is 'community' or 'cultural match' (see, e.g., Checkel 1999; Cortcll and Davis 2000), that is, the degree to which the actors inside and outside the organization share a collective identity and fundamental beliefs. Studying enlargement in a constructivist perspective, then, consists primarily in the analysis of social identities, values, and norms, not in the material, distributional consequences of enlargement for individual actors.
Applicant and member-state politics
Applicants and members 'construct' each other and their relationship on the basis of the ideas that define the community represented by the international organization. Whether applicant and member states regard enlargement as desirable
The politics ofEU enlargement   15
depends on the degree of community they perceive to have with each other. The general hypotheses about applicant and member-state politics are highly similar: The more an external state identifies with the international community* that the organization represents and the more it shares the values and norms that define the purpose and the policies of the organization, the stronger the institutional ties it seeks with this organization and the more the member states are willing to pursue horizontal institutionalization with this state.
With regard to the EU, applicant and member-state politics are about whether an applicant state is 'European', subscribes to the integrationist project of an 'ever closer union', adheres to the liberal-democratic political value foundations of the EU, or shares the norms underlying specific EU policies (see Gstohl ch. 2 this volume). Depending on the extent of the domestic consensus on the applicant state's identity and policy norms, applicant politics will be more or less controversial and the resulting enlargement preferences will be more or less stable and strong.
On average, in the constructivist perspective, we would expect greater conflict within applicant states on the enlargement issue than within the member states. First, for an applicant state, the decision to join a regional organization, and in particular the EU, constitutes a major political reorientation, whereas, tor the member states, the decision to enlarge an existing organization is more a matter of policy continuity. Second, member states can be assumed to share the constitutive values and norms of their community organization and to have been exposed, for a certain time, to socialization within the organization.
EU macro- and substantive politics
Correspondingly, and in contrast to rationalist institutionalism, we would expect a low degree of variation among preferences and conflict among the member-state actors. As sociological institutionalism often assumes strong institutional and cultural effects ('socialization' or 'Europeanizarion') at the systemic level, member states will have largely homogeneous enlargement preferences. If we relax this assumption, we expect to see more variation in preferences.
First, if there is tension among the community values and norms, then there will not be a single, unambiguous standard shaping the enlargement preferences of the incumbents. The debate about the priority between deepening or widening in the EU is a case in point. Second, identification with, and internalization of, the community values and norms may vary not only among the external states but also among the community actors. Whereas we can expect, for instance, the organizational actors (such as the European Commission) to hold preferences that are strongly influenced by the organizational norms, member-state governments may be subject to partly competing influences from national and international identities as well as cultural and institutional environments. Finally, the resonance of particular organizational norms might vary across different groups ol policymakers, depending on their functional and organizational positions. This potential tension is particularly important for the policy dimension of enlargement. While more general organizational norms and constitutive values might have a stronger
16   Frank Scliimmelfennig and Ulrich Sedelmeier
impact on the macro-politics of enlargement, distinctive substantive policies might be shaped to a larger extent by the particular norms (or policy paradigms) underpinning the policy area in question (Sedelmeier forthcoming, ch. 11 this volume; Ruano ch. 12 this volume).
Even in the case of normative conflict within the organization, however, the decision-making process will not be a bargaining process but a process of arguing (see, e.g., Risse 2000). If, for instance, it is unclear or contested which community norm applies in a given situation, whether organizational norms override conflicting national norms, or to what degree an external state shares the fundamental beliefs and adheres to the fundamental practices of the community, the actors engage in discourse. They challenge the validity claims of the other actors' preferences and definitions of the situation, put forward arguments in favour of their positions, and seek a consensus based on the better argument. Although it cannot always be determined theoretically what the best and convincing argument will he in a given situation, it should be one that is based on the collective identity, the constitutive beliefs and practices of the community, and the norms and rules of the organization. More fundamentally, arguing and discourse have the potential to modify old, or construct new, identities and norms. Incumbents and outsiders continuously seek to define and redefine the boundaries of the community, between 'us' and 'them', and to interpret and reinterpret the organizational norms. As a result, we will observe change in the definition or extension of the international community and in its enlargement practices.
Eventually, the outcome of organizational politics will again depend on the degree of community and cultural or normative match. The organization expands (its institutions) to outside states to the extent that these states share its collective identity, values, and norms. The higher the degree of community and the better the cultural or normative match, the faster and the deeper will be the process of horizontal institutionalization. Enlargement will continue until the (cultural) borders of the international community and the (formal, institutional) borders of the international organization match. More generally, the differentiated pattern of institutional relationships between the organization and the states in its environment will be congruent with their differentiated degree of cultural and normative agreement.
The state of research: focus and controversies in EFTA and eastern enlargement
Table 1.1 (above) reflects that theory-oriented research on enlargement has concentrated on the two major processes of the 1990s: the 1995 enlargement to include three former EFTA members and the ongoing process of eastern enlargement. Only veiy few authors examine earlier enlargement rounds and compare them with subsequent enlargements (Ruano ch. 12 this volume).
Analyses of EFTA and eastern enlargement reveal quite different patterns. Fable 1.1 shows that the dominant research locus in the two cases has been on different dimensions of enlargement. While research on EFTA enlargement has concentrated on applicant politics, studies of eastern enlargement have predomi-
The politics ofEU enlargement 17
nantly analysed EU (macro-)politics. In addition, we observe different patterns in the theoretical debates between competing explanations in the two cases (see table 1.2). In the case of EFTA enlargement, rationalist explanations dominate and the controversies are mainly among factors that all fit within a rationalist framework. By contrast, sociological factors (values and norms) have figured more prominently in accounts of eastern enlargement.
In this section, we review, and place into context, the previously rather disjointed theoretical literature on EU enlargement. We do not intend to present a comprehensive overview of enlargement research, but aim to indicate major tendencies and controversies and to locate the contributions to this volume within the literature. Our review demonstrates that the rationalist/constructivist debate is a useful way to structure and organize these controversies. However, we do not intend systematically to test the hypotheses that wc derived in the previous section in the cases of EFTA and eastern enlargement. Rather, we point out where controversies in the study of enlargement reflect this debate. We reiterate that we do not conceive of the debate as mutually exclusive explanations. Many of the contributions combine rationalist and constructivist insights. At the same time, our overview demonstrates that debates on some aspects of individual enlargement rounds can plausibly be conducted exclusively in a rationalist, and on others in a constructivist framework.
Table 1.2 Theoretical positions in the politics of EFTA and eastern enlargement
	Rationalist	Comlrudwut
Applicants'	Bieler 2000; Fioretos 1997;	Gstöhl (national identity)
policies	Ingebritsen 1998; Mattli 1999; Smith 1999; Bieler (structure of production process); Mattli and Plumper (domestic reform incentives); Moravcsik and Vachudova (national interest and bargaining power)	
Member-state	Collins 2002	Hyde-Price 2000; Tewes 1998
politics		
EU macro-	Friis 1998a, 1998b;	
politics	Moravcsik and Vachudova (national interest and bargaining	
	power); Skälnes (geopolitics)	Friis 1998c; Fierke and Wiener (Western Cold War promises in the CSCE Helsinki declaration): Sedelmeier ch. 6 (EU identity construction vis-á-vis CEECs); Schimmelfennig chs 7, 8 (democratic community)
EU substantive	Haggard etat. 1993;	Sedelmeier ch. 11 (policy
politics	Ruano (institutional structures)	paradigms)
18   Frank Schimmelfennig and Ulndi Sedelmeier EFT'A enlargement
Systemic factors underpinning applicant enlargement politics
The main puzzle that studies of the EFTA enlargement identify concerns the applicants' enlargement politics (but see Friis 1998a). Thus, the key question pursued is: why at the beginning of the 1990s did the EFTA countries, after a long period of deliberate non-membership, develop an interest in closer ties with, and membership in, the EU?
There is a broad agreement in the literature that three major developments at the systemic level that fit well with a rationalist framework can account for the timing of the EFTA countries' interest in EU membership. The end of the Cold War removed an obstacle to EU membership, since the majority of the EFTA countries (except for Iceland and Norway) were neutral and non-aligned (Ingebrksen 1998: 10; Mattli 1999: 88). Changes in the world economy, namely the oil crisis and globalization, as well as the negative externalities resulting from the deepening of EU integration, created positive incentives for a stronger institutional relationship.
Ingebritsen (1997: 174) argues that, as a result of the oil shock, the Scandinavian countries had embarked upon a transformation of their economic model so that 'Scandinavian political economies shared more in common with European institutions and policies than in the previous accession period (the 1970s).' When the EU launched its internal market programme, the EFTA economies performed worse than the EU-6 in terms of economic growth and experienced a dramatic increase in outward investment. On the one hand, therefore, the internal market provided a strong pull, as it offered the prospect of increasing competitiveness, while on the other hand the threat of a relocation of investment had a push effect (see, e.g., Mattli 1999: 82, 89; Fioretos 1997: 312-16; Bieler 2000: 41-3, 73-4). The pressure to join the internal market grew due to a 'domino effect' after Austria applied for membership in 1989 (Baldwin 1995: 33).
In contrast to the broad agreement about the underlying systemic factors, there is a more controversial debate about how these systemic factors translated into domestic politics in individual countries. There are two distinctive questions to this debate, which an exclusive focus on the systemic level fails to answer. The first is about how these systemic factors translated into alliances of actors at the domestic level that successfully pushed for EU membership. The second goes further towards clarifying the conditions under which outsiders join by also considering cases that did not result in accession.
Composition and structure of domestic alliances leading to accession
With regard to the first debate, Fioretos (1997) argues that export-oriented Swedish firms successfully pushed the Swedish government to pursue EU membership by threatening to relocate their investment. By contrast, Smith (1999) places more emphasis on government choice than on societal pressure as well as on the political
The politics ofEU enlargement 19
power of economic ideas. He argues that the economic downturn persuaded the Finnish and Swedish governments of the need for a radical change in economic policy, which in turn required a fundamental change in state-society relations. EU membership was thus a means to play a 'two-level game' to overcome domestic corporatist arrangements, to which the EEA provided a strategic route: while the EEA did not require popular approval (except in Switzerland), the fait accompli of EEA membership created strong incentives for full membership.
Finally, Bieler's neo-Gramscian analysis of Sweden and Austria echoes to some extent the more constructivist notion of economic ideas as underpinning a neo-liberal 'hegemonic project' (Bieler 2000, ch. 4 this volume). Otherwise, however, Bieler argues that domestic actors react to material constraints and incentives. In contrast to both Fioretos and Smith, he does not see either governments or societal groups as pushing or pushed, but observes partly cross-cutting alliances between the social forces of business and labour as well as certain state institutions. The cleavage in these alliances relates to whether they are oriented at domestic or transnational production processes.
Variations in domestic approval of membership
The second debate concerns competing explanations for variations in the success of different applicants' governments to obtain approval for their applications or accession treaties in national referenda. Drawing on aggregate data on economic performance, Mattli attributes the negative outcome of the Norwegian referendum to the fact that, for the second time after 1972, the economic performance gap with the EU had disappeared between application and ratification (1999: 85-6). Other studies argue that these variations depended mainly on domestic structures in the applicant countries.
In her analysis of the Nordic countries, Ingebritsen (1998) attributes the variation in outcomes to different leading sectors in the Scandinavian economies. Whereas Sweden and, to a lower degree, Finland are capital-intensive manufacturing exporters (which makes them sensitive to changes in their export markets and to the threat of disinvestment), Norway's income is dominated by the petroleum sector, which not only makes this country less dependent on the Euro pean market but also allows it to protect its agriculture and fisheries at higher levels than the EU. This finding is corroborated by Moses and Jenssen (1998), whose analysis of the referenda at the county level shows that (subnational) regions that depend on sheltered sectors were less likely to support membership than those dependent on manufacture and trade.
Materialist and rationalist explanations, however, cannot account for the Swiss case. Observers attribute the Swiss 'no' to the EEA to socio-political characteristics such as multinationality or to voters' concerns about neutrality, sovereignty, and direct democracy (Arndt 1998: 268; Mattli 1999: 93-4) or simply to the Swiss government's poor management of the application process (Dupont et al. 1999). Gstohl (ch. 2 this volume) makes a more general argument that constructivist approaches arc necessary complements to an analysis of material cost and benefits,
20   Frank Sclwnmelfenmg and Ulnch Sedelmeier
in order to understand how particular national identity constructions result in 'reluctance' towards EU membership. She emphasizes the importance in such identity constructions of geo-historical factors {foreign policy traditions and experiences of foreign rule), socio political institutions, and societal cleavages.
Thus, the story of EFTA membership applications can plausibly be told in rationalist terms. Changes in their security and economic environment led the EFTA governments to recalculate the costs and benefits of EU membership on the basis of their material interests in power and welfare. By contrast, identity-related factors that could have been an obstacle to EU membership seem to have mattered less. However, the apparent unimportance of conflicting national identity constructions seems to have been primarily the case for governmental elites. By contrast, for electorates in national referenda, presumed characteristics of national identity and political culture (corporatism, neutrality) seem to have mattered more than material cost-benefit calculations.
Eastern enlargement
Applicant politics and member-state politics
In contrast to EFTA enlargement, work on eastern enlargement has focused on EU politics. The CEECs' desire to join the EU appears largely uncontroversial, as it conforms with both constructivist and rationalist expectations. The argument that EU membership as part of the CEECs' foreign policy object to 'return to Europe' is motivated by their desire to cast off an 'eastern' identity and to be recognized by the European international community as 'one of us' (see, e.g., Kolankiewicz 1993; Neumann 1993) fits well with constructivist arguments. Indeed, Schimmelfennig (ch. 8 this volume) suggests that the extent to which different CEECs adhere to liberal democratic norms is the most consistent indicator of their membership applications, not just to the EU, but also to other European organizations that are based on these values.
Likewise, materia] cost-benefit calculations would lead us to expect a strong CEEC interest in EU membership (Moravcsik and Vachudova ch. 9 this volume). The CEECs can expect to benefit not only from full economic integration in terms of market access and incentives for foreign direct investment, but also in terms of budgetary receipts and a voice in EU decision-making. Mattli and Plumper (ch. 3 this volume) offer a formal rationalist model that explains how the extent of democratization in the CEECs - used by Schimmelfennig (ch. 8 this volume) as a 'constructivist' indicator for the degree of community between the organizations and the applicants - can also be conceived as a 'rationalist' indicator for the domestic incentives and costs of membership. They argue that the main result of EU membership is to redress economic distortions and to maximize aggregate welfare. Democratic regimes are more likely to pursue such policies than non-democratic regimes. In the latter, domestic interest groups can more easily resist changes in the status quo, which guarantees their rents at the expense of aggregate welfare (see also, e.g., Vachudova 2001, 2005).
"Tliepolitics ofEU enlargement   21
There are also only few theoretical studies of member-state politics. Again, this appears to reflect that the member governments' preferences (see, e.g., Grabbe and Hughes 1998: 4-6) conform well with rationalist expectations about cost-benefit calculations. Material conditions, in particular geographical proximity (both as a proxy for interdependence and geopolitical. interests) and socio-economic structure (affecting gains/losses from competition for market access, investment, and budgetary receipts), go a long way towards explaining variations in the member governments' preferences about the speed of eastern enlargement and the selection of candidates (Schimmelfennig ch. 7 this volume; Sedelmeier 1994). However, the analyses of the German case by Tewes (1998) and Hyde-Price (2000) suggest that there is also a more sociological explanation of German governments' support for enlargement as the result of complex role conflicts in German foreign policy.
EU macro-politics
Theoretical studies of eastern enlargement have focused predominantly, and often exclusively, on the macro-dimension of EU politics. The key question that these studies address is why the EU decided to enlarge. Moravcsik and Vachudova (ch. 9 this volume) provide a rationalist explanation for the decision to enlarge and the outcome of accession negotiations. The preferences of the member states appear to reflect differences in domestic socio-economic structures that lead to an uneven distribution of economic opportunities or competition, as well as rivalry for receipts from the EU budget. While the uneven distribution of costs and benefits from enlargement led to opposition from some member states, Moravcsik and Vachudova argue that these costs were not sufficiently large for them to block enlargement (see p. 205). The strongly asymmetrical bargaining power between the incumbents and the CEECs allowed the reluctant EU members to minimize the expected costs to the detriment of the new members. Skalnes (ch. 10 this volume) draws on insights from realism to explain the EU's decision to enlarge with the long-term security interest of EU members. The wars following the breakup of Yugoslavia and the Kosovo conflict raised concerns about stability in their neighbourhood and thus led respectively to the decision to enlarge and to include all CEEC applicants in accession negotiations.
However, the bulk of analyses of eastern enlargement are underpinned by what is perhaps a surprisingly strong consensus that a rationalist, materialist framework is insufficient. Counterfactuals suggest that the decision to enlarge presents puzzles for rationalist approaches that focus on the distribution of egoistic, material preferences and bargaining power (Schimmelfennig ch. 7 this volume; Sedelmeier 1998: 2). The CEECs did not possess the bargaining power to make the reluctant majority of member states accept their bid to join the EU, since economic interdependence between the member states and the applicants is highly asymmetrical in favour of the EU. In turn, the proponents of eastern enlargement in the EU (Britain, Denmark, Germany) were in a clear minority and could not credibly threaten the more reluctant governments with any attractive unilateral or
22   Frank Schimmelfennig and Ulrich Sedelmeier
coalitional alternative outside the EU framework (such as some form of Northern-Central European integration). In game-theoretical language, then, the situation was that of a 'suasion game' (Martin 1993: 104) in which the CEECs and the proponents of enlargement had the dominant strategy to agree with whatever the 'brakemen' saw as being in their best interest. Finally, association, the initial outcome of the enlargement process, corresponds with the 'Nash solution' to this game because it protects the potential losers against the costs of trade and budgetary competition and, for the others, it is at least more beneficial than the status quo. The change from association to enlargement camiot be explained by this bargaining structure.
Thus, the debate about the EU politics of eastern enlargement has been dominated by studies that go beyond material factors. Some analyses primarily criticize an intergovernmental bargaining model of eastern enlargement (Fnis 1998a, 1998b, 1998c; Friis and Murphy 1999; 2000), but much of their argument can still be accommodated within a rationalist framework. This concerns, for example, the emphasis on the high degree of uncertainty characterizing the EU's negotiation processes, which limits the ability of actors to pin down their interests and preferences ahead of the negotiations and allows for agenda-setting through supranational actors (see also Smith 1998); the complexity of the negotiations themselves; the precedence created by past practices; and the spillover from other negotiations. Other authors start more explicitly from ideational premises and emphasize the role of norms and identity in the enlargement process (Fierke and Wiener ch. 5 this volume; Schimmelfennig 2003, ch. 7 this volume; Sedelmeier forthcoming, ch. 6 this volume; Sjursen 2002). Although we should not overstate the differences, we note that there are nuances in this broadly constructivist work, concerning primarily (1) the nature of the norms that are relevant in the enlargement process and (2) how these norms matter.
With regard to the nature of norms and identity salient in the EU's eastern enlargement, Schimmelfennig (1998, ch. 7 this volume, ch. 8 this volume, 2003) emphasizes primarily the constitutive liberal values and norms of the European international community, which are at the basis of the membership norms contained in the EU treaties. Indeed, his statistical event-historical analysis in this volume presents evidence that the more a state adheres to these liberal norms, the higher the likelihood that it will be admitted to the EU (as well as to other West European regional organizations - the Council of Europe and NATO). Friis (1998c) argues that the EU's pan-European identity was a key factor in the Luxembourg European Council's decision to start formal accession negotiations with all CEEC candidates at the same time. Fierke and Wiener (ch. 5 this volume) emphasize primarily the importance of speech acts, namely the 1975 declaration of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE), for the enlargement of NATO and the EU. In their argument, this speech act entailed a 'promise' to encourage the spread of Western democratic norms across the division of Europe which became part of the institutional identity for both organizations. Sedelmeier (1998, ch. 6 this volume, forthcoming) focuses more explicitly on the discursive creation of a particular identity by the EU towards the CEECs, which
The politics of EU enlargement 23
asserted, throughout the Cold War and after its end, a 'special responsibility' of the EU for the reintegration of the peoples that had been involuntarily excluded from the integration project. Similarly, Sjursen (2002) argues that a 'kinship-based moral duty' led the EU to enlarge to the CEECs.
While not all of these accounts are very explicit about how these norms matter, the enlargement literature reflects the debate between rationalist arguments about the constraining effect of norms on actors' strategies and constructivist arguments about their constitutive effects on actors' identities. The rationalist view underpins the argument by Schimmelfennig (ch. 7 this volume, 2003) that the EU's normative institutional environment enabled actors that favoured enlargement for selfish reasons to use references to institutional norms instrumentally. Such 'rhetorical action' increased their bargaining power, as it allowed them to shame reluctant member states that were concerned about their reputation as community members into acquiescing in enlargement. By contrast, Fierke and Wiener's argument, that at the end of the Cold War previous 'promises' were turned into a 'threat' (ch. 5 this volume), is based on the assumption that speech acts create iiiler-subjective meanings that have a much deeper impact on identity constructions. Finally, Sedelmeier (1998, ch. 6 this volume) argues that the effect of norms is uneven across different groups of actors inside the EU. Those actors who identified most closely with the EU's identity towards the CEECs acted as principled policy advocates. For other actors, however, die collectively asserted 'responsibility' and the commitment that it entailed acted primarily as a constraint on open opposition to enlargement, which in turn enabled the policy advocates to move policy incrementally towards enlargement.
EU substantive politics
Most studies of EU enlargement politics focus almost exclusively on macro-politics, with few suggestions about the implications of their insights for substantive politics. Their failure to link their explanatory factors to substandve policies limits their contribution to explaining the conditions under which such substantive outcomes reflect the preferences of certain actors.
At the same time, the few theoretical studies of the substantive dimension focus mainly on the early phase of the association policy (see, e.g., Papadimitriou 2002; Torreblanca 2001) and offer little guidance on how to link these two dimensions of enlargement. For example, the comparative analysis of various areas of EU policy towards the CEECs by Haggard et al. (1993) argues convincingly that domestic politics, rather than theories that focus on state power or international institutions, best account for substantive policy outcomes. However, the EU's eventual decision to enlarge is then difficult to explain on the basis of domestic interest group preferences alone.
Sedelmeier (1998, 2001, forthcoming) suggests that one way to link macro- and substantive politics in eastern enlargement is to focus on the role of policy advocates in the EU. He argues that the receptiveness of a group of policy-makers inside the Commission to EU identity towards the CEECs did not only make them
F
24   Frank Schvnmclfennig and Ulrich Sedelmeier
push for enlargement as such at the macro-level, but also led them to advocate the preferences in substantive policies. In chapter 11 of this volume, Sedelmeier argues that the success of such advocacy did not depend only on interest group pressure, but also on the structure of the policy process and on policy paradigms - the sets of ideas underpinning EU policy in the various policy areas. The combination of these factors then determines under which conditions EU policy might accommodate the preferences of the candidate countries. Ruano (ch. 12 this volume) also emphasizes the importance of the institutional structure in the specific context of accession negotiations. She argues that the fragmentation of the EU policy process insulated decisions on agricultural policy from wider reform pressures of enlargement, which allowed the agricultural policy community to prevent radical changes and to shift the adjustment burden to new members.
Conclusion: rationalism, constructivism and research on EU enlargement
For a long time, the theoretical study of enlargement has been the domain of economics. Club theory has conceived of the EU as an economic association and has focused on the economic costs and benefits of membership and expansion. The general value added of the political science analysis of enlargement consists in the improved understanding of enlargement as a political process driven by more and other factors than just economic interests (see also Gstohl ch. 2 ; Mattli and Plumper ch. 3 this volume). For all their different theoretical perspectives, most contributions to this volume agree on this point. Rationalist institutionalism emphasizes the political economy of enlargement, including the autonomy concerns and re-election constraints of governments, asymmetrical interdependence, and the differential power of interest groups (Mattli and Plumper ch. 3, Moravcsik and Vachudova ch. 9, Bieler ch. 4, Ruano ch. 12, this volume). Constructivist institutionalism brings in ideational factors such as national identity in applicant politics (Gstohl ch. 2 this volume), collective identity in EU macro-politics (Fierke and Wiener ch. 5, Schimmelfennig chs 7 and 8, Sedelmeier ch. 6, this volume), and policy paradigms that provide the glue for sectoral policy communities in substantive policies (Sedelmeier ch. 11, Ruano ch. 12, this volume).
Obviously, both rationalist and constructivist factors play a role in enlargement decision-making. The stronger emphasis on rationalist factors in the analysis of EFTA enlargement, and on constructivist factors in eastern enlargement, is to a large extent explicable by the different characteristics of both enlargement rounds and by what researchers regard as unproblematic and puzzling. In the case of EFTA enlargement, neither the democratic credentials nor the economic capacities of the candidates were an issue; the puzzle was the timing of applications and the variance in referendum outcomes. In the case of eastern enlargement, it was the other way round (but see Moravcsik and Vachudova ch. 9, Skalnes ch. 10, this volume).
At the same time, the specific foci and puzzles guiding the research on each enlargement round limit the comparability of results and cast doubt on their generalizability. For instance, if applicant states are indeed motivated mainly by
The politics of EU enlargement 25
material self-interest, how far 'down' into their own societies and how far 'up' on the EU level do material factors 'travel' and affect enlargement outcomes? Moreover, if EU macro-decisions do indeed reflect collective identity, membership norms, and legitimacy concerns, is it 'ideas all the way down' to member-state politics and substantive policies? Finally, does the impact of enlargement on the EU, its member states, and the applicants result in a (constructivist) process of social learning and internalization or in a (rationalist) process creating new behavioural opportunities and constraints at the domestic and EU levels? In sum, the state of research on enlargement demonstrates the limits of single-case studies (even if they are theory-oriented) and the need for a widening of enlargement research - to more comparative analysis and to the integration of under-researched dimensions such as member-state politics, substantive policies, and enlargement impact.
Notes
1 This chapter adapts an article that was originally published in journal of European Public Policy, 9(4) (2004): 500-28.
2 For simplicity, we use the term EU throughout.
3 To be sure, we do not suggest that only large-n studies are useful. Qualitative studies of single cases can be just as valuable for comparative insights if they are able to test generaiizable propositions.
4 This table does not give a comprehensive bibliography of the enlargement literature. We focus on recent theory oriented work and its general distribution across various research foci. Bold print denotes contributions to this volume.
5 On the different conceptions of institutions, see, e.g., Scott (1995).
fi Moravcsik (1998: 62) defines a state's bargaining power as 'inversely proportional to the relative value that it places on an agreement compared to the outcome of its best alternative policy1.
7 However, the EP is usually not seen as a major player in enlargement politics. Garrett and Tsebelis concede that, under the assent procedure, it is 'reasonable to conceive of decision making in terms of the Luxembourg compromise period' (1996: 283). According to Bailer and Schneider (2000), the EP is constrained in the use of its veto against accession agreements because of its integrationist stance.
References
Abbott, K. W., and Snidal, D. (1998) 'Why States Act Through Formal International
Organizations', Journal of Conflict Resolution, 42: 3-32. Arndt, S. W. (1998) 'Alpine Contrasts: Swiss and Austrian Responses to the EU', in B.
Eichengreen andj. Frieden (eds) Forging an Integrated Europe. Ann Arbor, MI: University
of Michigan Press, 246-72. Aspinwall, M., and Schneider, G. (2001) 'Institutional Research on the European Union:
Mapping the Field', in G. Schneider and M. Aspinwall (eds), The Rules of Integration:
Institutionalist Approaches to the Study of Europe. Manchester: Manchester University Press,
1-18.
Bailer, S., and Schneider, G. (2000) 'The Power of Legislative Hot Air: Informal Rules and the Enlargement Debate in the European Parliament'. Journal of Legislative Studies, 6: 19-44.
26   Frank Schimmelfennig and Ulrich Sedehneier
Baldwin, D. A. (ed.) (1993) Neorealism and Neoliberalism: The Contemporary Debate. New York:
Columbia University Press. Baldwin, R. E. (1995) 'A Domino Theory of Regionalism', in R. E. Baldwin, P. Haaparanta
andj. Kiander (eds), Expanding Membership ofthe Ew opean Union. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 25-48. Barnett, M. N., and Fmnemore, M. (1999) 'The Politics, Power, and Pathologies of
International Organizations', International Organizatioji 53: 699-732. Bieler, A. (2000) Globalization and Enlargement of the European Union: Austrian and Swedish Social
Forces in the Struggle over Membership. London: Routledge. Börzel, T.  (1999)  'Towards Convergence in Europe? Institutional Adaptation to
Europe anization in Germany and Spain', Journal of Common Market Studies, 37: 573-96. Buchanan,J. M. (1965) 'An Economic Theory of Clubs', Economical 32: 1-14. CheckelJ. T. (1999) 'Norms, Institutions, and National Identity in Contemporary Europe',
International Studies Quarterly, 43: 83-114. Christiansen, T., Jorgensen, R. E., and Wiener, A. (1999) 'The Social Construction of
Europe'. Journal of European Public Policy, 6: 528-44. Collins, S. (2002) German Policy-Making and Eastern Enlargement of the European Umon During the
Kohl Era: Managing the Agenda? Manchester: Manchester University Press. Cortell, A. P.,  and Davis, J. W.  (2000)  'Understanding the Domestic Impact of
International Norms: A Research Agenda', International Studies Review, 2: 65-87. Crott, S., Redmond, J., Rees, W., and Webber, M. (1999) The Enlargement of Europe.
Manchester; Manchester University Press. Deutsch, K. W. (1970) Political Community at the International Level: Problems of Definition and
Measurement. Garden City, NY: Archon Books. Dupont, C, Sciarmi, P., and Lutterbeck, D. (1999) 'Catching the EC Train: Austria and
Switzerland in Comparative Perspective', European Journal of International Relations. 5:
189-224.
Falkner, G. (2000) ;How Pervasive are Euro-Politics? Effects of EU Membership on a New
Member State', Journal of Common Market Studies, 38: 223-50. Finnemore, M. (1996) National Interests in International Society. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University
Press.
Fioretos, K. O. (1997) 'The Anatomy of Autonomy: Interdependence, Domestic Balances of Power, and European Integration', Review of International Studies, 23: 293-320.
Friis, L. (1998a) 'And Then They Were 15: The EU's EFT A- Enlargement Negotiations', Cooperation and Conflict, 33: 81-107.
Friis. I.. (1998b) '"The End of the Beginning" of Eastern Enlargement - Luxembourg Summit and Agenda-setting', European Integration Online Papers, 2(7).
Friis, L. (1998c) 'Approaching the "Third Half of EU Grand Bargaining - the Post-negotiation Phase of the "Europe Agreement" Game', Journal of European Public Policy, 5: 322-38.
Friis, L., and Murphy, A. (1999) 'The European Union and Central and Eastern Europe:
Governance and Boundaries', Journal of Common Market Studies, 37: 211-32. Friis, L., and Murphy, A. (2000) "'Turbo-Charged Negotiations'1." The EU and the Stability
Pact for South-Eastern Europe', Journal of European Public Polity, 7: 767-86. Garrett, G., and Tsebelis, G. (1996) 'An Institutional Critique of lntergovernmentalism'.
International Organization, 50: 269-99. Goetz,   K.   (2001)   'Making   Sense   of Post   Communist   Central Administration:
Modernization, Eur ope anization or Latinization?', Journal of European Public Policy, 8:
1032-51.
The politics ofEU enlargement 27
Grabbe, H. (2001) 'How.Does Europeamzation Affect GEE Governance? Conditionally, Diffusion and Diversity', Journal of European Public Policy, 8: 1013-31.
Grabbe, H., and Hughes, K. (1998) Enlarging the EUEashoards. London: Pinter.
Haas, E. B. (1968) The Uniting of Europe: Political, Social, and Economic Forces 1950-1957, 2nd edn. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press
Haggard, S., Levy, M. A., Moravcsik, A., and Nicolaidis, K. (1993) "Integrating the Two Halves of Europe: Theories of Interests, Bargaining, and Institutions', in R. O. Keohane. J. S. Nye and S. Hoffmann (eds), After the Cold War: International Institutions and State Strategies in Europe, 1989-1991, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 173-95.
Hasenclever, A., Mayer, P., and Rittberger, V. (1997) Theories of International Regimes. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Hyde-Price, A. (2000) Germany and European Order: Enlarging NATO and the EU. Manchester: Manchester University Press.
Ingebritsen, C. (1997) 'Pulling in Different Directions: The Europeanization ol Scandinavian Political Economies', in P. J. Katzenstein (ed.), Tamed Powei: Germany in Europe. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 167-94.
Ingebritsen, C. (1998) The Nordic States and European Unity. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University-Press.
Jacoby, W. (2004) Ordering from the Menu in Central Europe: The Enlargement of the EU and.
NATO. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Jileva, E. (2004) 'Do Norms Matter? l"he Principle of Solidarity and the EU's Eastern
Enlargement', Journal of International Relations and Development, 7: 3-23. Jupille, J., Caporaso,     and Checkel, J. T. (2003) Integrating Institutions: Rationalism,
Constructivism and the Study of the European Union', Comparative Political Studies, 36:
7-41.
Katzenstein* P.J. (1997a) 'United Germany in an Integrating Europe', in P.J. Katzenstein (ed.) Tamed Power: Germany in Europe, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1-48.
Katzenstein, P.J. (1997b) 'The Smaller European States, Germany and Europe', in P.J. Katzenstein (ed.). Tamed Power: Germany in Europe. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 251-304.
Katzenstein, P. J., Keohane, R. O-, and Krasner, S. D. (eds) (1999) Exploration and Contestation
in the Study of World Politics. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Kclley, J. (2004) Ethnic Politics in Europe: The Power of Norms and Incentives. Princeton, NJ:
Princeton LIniversity Press. Kerremans, B. (1998) 'The Political and Institutional Consequences of Widening: Capacity
and Control in an Enlarged Council', in P. H. Laurent and M. Maresceau (eds), The State of
the European Union, vol. 4: Deepeningand Widening. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner, 87-109. Kolankiewicz, G. (1993) 'The Other Europe: Different Roads to Modernity in Eastern and
Central Europe', in S. Garcia (ed.), European Identity and the Search for Legitimacy. London:
Pinter, 106-30.
Lippert, B., Hughes, K., Grabbe, K, and Becker, P. (2001) Britain, Germany and EU
Enlargement: Partitas or Competitors ?London: RIIA. McNeely, C. L. (1995) Constructing the Nation-State: International Organhation and Pi'esaiptivc
Action. Westport, CT; Greenwood Press. March, J. G., and 01sen,J. P. (1989) Rediscovering Institutions: The Organizational Basis of Politics.
New York: Free Press.
Martin, L. L. (1993) 'The Rational State Choice of Multilateralism', in J. G. Ruggie (ed.), Multilateralism Matters: The Theory and Practice of an International Form. New York: Columbia University Press, 91-121.
28   Frank Schimmelfennig and Ulrich Sedelmeier
Mattli, W. (1999) The Logic of Regional Integration. Europe and Beyond. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Mattli, W. (2000) 'Sovereignty Bargains in Regional Integration', International Studies Review, 2: 149-80.
Moravcsik, A. (1998) The Choice for Europe: Social Purpose and State Power from Messina to
Maastricht. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press. Moses, J. W., andjenssen, A. T. (1998) 'Nordic Accession: An Analysis of the EU
Referendums', in B. Eichengreen and J. Frieden (eds), Forging an Integrated Europe. Ann
Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 211-46. Neumann, I. B. (1993) 'Russia as Central Europe's Constituting Other', East European
Politics and Societies, 7: 349-09. Padoan, P. P. (1997) 'Regional Arrangements as Clubs: ITie European Case1, in E. 1_).
Mansfield and H. V. Milner (eds), The Political Economy of He.giona.lism. New York:
Columbia University Press, 107-33. Papadimitriou, D. (2002) Negotiating the Neiv Europe: The European Union and Eastern Europe.
Aldershot: Ashgate.
Phelan, W. (2004) 'What the Politics of NAFTA Tell Us About the European Union'.
Paper presented at the annual meeting of APSA, 2-5 September. Preston, C. (1997) Enlargement and Integration in the European Union. London: Routledge. Risse, T. (2000) "'Let's Argue!" Communicative Action in World Polities', International
Organization, 54: 1-39.
Sandler, T. M., and Tschirhart, J. T. (1980) 'The Economic Theory of Clubs: An
Evaluative Survey', Journal of 'Economic Literature, 18: 1481-521. Sandler, T. M., Loehr, W., and CauleyJ. T. (1978) The Political Economy of Public Goods and
International Cooperation. Denver, CO: University of Denver Press. Schimmelfennig, F. (3998) 'Liberal Norms and the Eastern Enlargement of the European
Union:   A   Case   for   Sociological   Institutionalism',   Österreichische   Zeitschrift ßir
Politikwissenschafi, 27: 459-72. Schimmelfennig, F. (2003) The EU, NATO and the Integration of Europe: Rules and Rhetoric.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Schimmelfennig, F., and Sedelmeier, U. (eds) (2005) The Europeanization of Central and Eastern
Europe. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press. Schmitter,   P.   C.   (1969)   'Three  Neo-Functional   Hypotheses  about International
Integration'. International Organization, 23: 161-6. Scott, W. R. (1995) Institutions and Organizations, Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Sedelmeier, U. (1994) 'The European Union's Association Policy Towards Central Eastern
Europe: Political and Economic Rationales in Conflict', Sussex European Institute Working
Paper, No. 7.
Sedelmeier, U. (1998) 'The European Union's Association Policy towards the Countries
of Central and Eastern Europe: Collective EU Identity and Policy Paradigms in a
Composite Policy". PhD dissertation, University of Sussex. Sedelmeier, U, (2001) 'Accommodation Beyond Self-interest? Identity, Policy Paradigms,
and the Limits of a Rationalist Approach to EU Policy towards Central Europe', Politique
Europeenne, no. 3: 13-37. Sedelmeier, U. (forthcoming) Constructing the Path to Eastern Enlargement Manchester:
Manchester University Press. Sjursen, H. (2002) 'Why Expand? The Question of Legitimacy and Justification in the EU's
Enlargement Policy', Journal of Common Market Studies, 40: 491-513.
The politics of EU enlargement 29
Smith, E. (1999) lRe-regulation and Integration: The Nordic States and the European
Economic Aiea'. PhD dissertation, University of Sussex. Smith, K. E. (1998) The Making of EU Foreign Policy: The Case of Eastern Europe. London:
Macinillan.
Smith, M. A., and Tinunins, G. (2000) Building a Bigge?- Europe: EU andJiA TO Enlargement in
Comparative Perspective. Aldershot: Ashgate. Sperling,J. (ed.) (1999) Two Tiers or Two Speeds"!*TheEuropean Security Order andtheEnlargement
of die European Union and NA TO. Manchester: Manchester University Press. Steunenberg, B. (ed.) (2002) Widening the European Union. The Politics of Institutional Change and
Reform. London: Routledge. Tewes, H. (1998) 'Between Deepening and Widening: Role Conflict in Germany's
Enlargement Policy1, West European Politics, 21: 117-33. Torreblanca, J. I. (2001) The Reuniting of Europe: Promises, Negotiations and Compromise.
Aldershot: Ashgate.
Vachudova. M. A. (2001) 'The Leverage of Internationa] Institutions on Demoerati?mg States: Eastern Europe and the European Union', European University Institute Working Paper, RSC 2001/33.
Vachudova, M. A.  (2005) Europe  Undivided: Democracy, Leverage ami Integration ajter
Communiwn. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Vaubei, R. (1986) 'A Public Choice Approach to International Organization', Public Choice,
51: 39-57.
Wallace, H. (2000) 'ELI Enlargement: A Neglected Subject', in M. G. Cowles and M. Smith (eds), 7 he State of the European Union, vol. 5: Risk, Rejoiins, Resistance, and Revival. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 149-63.
Walt, S. M. (1987) The Origins of Alliances. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.
Waltz, K. N. (1979) Theoiy of International Politics. New York: Random House.
Weber, S. (1994) 'Origins of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development'. International Organization, 48: 1-38.
Wennerlund, K. (2000) 'International Bargaining amid Institutions: Institutional Attributes and the Distributive Consequences of Europeans Joining Europe'. Paper presented at the workshop 'Governance by Enlargement', Darmstadt University of Technolog)'.
Wolf, K. D. (1999) 'The New Raison d'Etat as a Problem for Democracy in World Society", European Journal of International Relations, 5: 333-63.