This article assesses the role of administrative capacity in explaining the performance of eight Central and Eastern European countries in managing Cohesion policy over the 2004-2008 period. Drawing on a conceptual framework from the Europeanization literature, it explores whether pre-accession...

This article re-assesses the multi-level governance debate and specifically the 'renationalization thesis', with respect to EU cohesion policy. It focuses on two of the principles of decision-making under the structural funds: concentration (decisions on where the money is spent) and programming...

This article traces the emergence of a new “experimentalist governance architecture” in EU Cohesion policy and assesses its effectiveness. Following trends in other EU policy areas, the core features of the architecture are the joint setting of objectives between EU institutions and the...

Historically, cooperation across borders was an area of activity dominated by central government actors. However, in the EU some of the earliest institutionalised forms of territorial cooperation are based on bottom-up initiatives involving border municipalities. Current territorial cooperation...

Economic historians and geographers have recognised a ‘dualism’ in the economic development of the UK – a divide between the northern and southern parts of the country - dating back over several centuries. The ‘regional problem’ in the UK has become increasingly difficult to define and...

The following paper examines the arguments about enlargement and cohesion with a summary of one of the preparatory studies undertaken for the Second Cohesion Report, as well as references to some of the Commission’s own research. The paper then outlines some of the options for the future of EU...