To what extent French Regional authorities EU representations are relevant?

Résumé du document

Regional and local authorities are nowadays completely part of the European Union policy-making process. They are now almost 200 regional organisations in Brussels (Greenwood, 2011) and they emerged massively in the mid-1980s during the rise of the Single European Act (SEA) and the establishment of the second biggest redistributive policy in the EU budget; the Regional policy. Indeed since the Treaty of Rome in 1957, the European integration and governance always considered territorial interests and economic, social and territorial cohesion in the EU. In order to, counterbalance the centre-periphery phenomenon in terms of wealth and economic power, the EU attempts to fund corrective policies, infrastructure, social inclusion measures, training in order to make the single market coherent. As matter of fact, the European Commission especially is pushing forward even implicitly territorial interests and their representations in Brussels and it bargained during accession talks the creation of sub-national authorities in order to monitor structural funds (Kada, 2010).

Since the EU governance, its policies and its decision-making can be very tough to glimpse, French regional (and local) authorities established in the early 1990s “regional representations” or ‘para-embassies' (Pasquier, 2013). Two main motives also for the creation of those representations; the emergence of a multilevel governance in the EU (Hoodge and Marks, 2001), and create a flexible but constant link between Brussels and regionals capitals.

This paper will try to answer to the following question, how can we define the role of the French regions and their representations in Brussels? This essay will try to test briefly both the accuracy and the relevance of regional representations. Firstly, we are going to describe how regional representations are functioning. After looking at several profiles of regionals bureaux, we are going to scrutinize their interactions with the main EU bodies of their influence; the Committee of Regions. The third part of this essay will focus on their actions repertoire in the ‘European bubble' i.e. in the EU governance and the decision-making in Brussels. And last but not least, we will try to set up in a prospective way, how institutional and policy changes, as well as at the EU and at the regional level would transform their modes of actions and strategies.

Extraits

[...] Since some French MEPs are not very involved in Brussels, they would simply not care. How regional representations are working with the French national representation? There are some contacts, common meetings but they do not have the same role in the decision-making. National representations are more institutionalised and regions in Brussels are using them because of their presences in the COREPER I and II at the Council. Other main work for a regional representation in Brussels is eventually the participation inside a territorial platform, group or network. [...]

[...] Right now, the budget difficulties of French regional authorities is not allowing any investments in their Brussels offices. The paradigm shift of the Regional policy might not be a good news for strengthen good relationship between Brussels and French regions. European structural funds are no longer ‘cash crop' for French regions. Financing main infrastructures (like high speed railways, motorways) are nowadays, way more difficult than it used to be. The great enlargement, the fact that the EU budget did not follow it (Mesclier, 2007), adding to the public expenditure crises, explain it. [...]

[...] Indeed, one director of a representation told me during an interview [ ] have one step in the Cabinet of the President, one step in Brussels and one step with International and European services in regions”. So even if the results are the same, methods can differ for the link between Regions authorities and their emanation and representations towards European institutions. Those different methods also can be a sign of the internal subsidiarity between several local authorities. Indeed, if departments and regions are members of a representation, it is because they did not clarify their roles or competences for elaborating a European strategy. [...]

[...] For instance, in 2012 a policy officer told me “even if my region is concerning by the shale gas issue, I'm looking at this topic very closely. It is not just for my interests but it is way to anticipate if there is going to be further regulations that might affect my regions”. Innovation and Research policy with the program “Horizon 2020” might also being a new way for funding Higher Education, innovation clusters which are competences of French regions. Conclusion So; are French regional representations little “embassies” of a region or more information offices? [...]

[...] Concretely, French regionals representations are acting like ‘interface' between their territories and EU institutions. Interface because they are space for interactions between several political levels. It is therefore, a space where influence and informations are merging. Those informations are very broad. To the destination of French regions, we can find reports and synthesis on EU policies, informations about new funds, a new project, a call for best practices, an experimenting project for a region, all call for participants etc. To the destination of EU institutions or partners, there are answers to public consultations of the Commission, informations and data reporting from a project, statistics, and lobbying for preserving public aid ratios, promoting the region on broad subjects etc. [...]