Download 2202/C/04

2002/C/04
From Luxembourg to Lisbon
and Beyond
Making the Employment Strategy Work
Edited by
Edward Best
Danielle Bossaert
The European Commission contributes to EIPA’s activities
and publications through the European Union budget.
© 2002, European Institute of Public Administration /
Institut européen d’administration publique
Maastricht, the Netherlands / Pays-Bas
http://www.eipa.nl
Table of Contents
Page
List of Contributors
Preface
Acknowledgements
vii
ix
xiii
Introduction: Making the Employment Strategy Work
Edward Best and Danielle Bossaert
Five Years of the European Employment Strategy:
Achievements, Prospects and Limits of the Open Method
of Coordination
Gunnar Lund
The Open Method of Coordination: An Effective Instrument
for Social and Economic Management in a System of
Multi-Level Governance?
Anne Van Lancker
1
17
23
The European Employment Strategy and the Open Method
of Coordination: Mixed Results and Multiple Challenges
Philippe Pochet
31
The Future of the European Employment Strategy:
The Dutch Experience
Theo Langejan
49
The Social Partners and the European Employment
Strategy: The View of UNICE
Wilfried Beirnaert
55
Trade Union Reflections on the European Employment Strategy
David Foden
Fruitful or Fashionable? Can Benchmarking Improve the Employment
Performance of National Labour Markets?
Leonello Tronti
2
61
67
Peer Review in the European Employment Strategy:
A Preliminary Evaluation of the Results So Far
Monika Natter
87
Improving the Delivery of Employment Services:
A Core Concern of the European Employment Strategy
Ronald van Bekkum
101
The Luxembourg Process and the Structural Funds:
Two Tracks of One Employment Strategy?
Ines Hartwig
111
The Employment Strategy and the Enlargement of the Union
Hélène Clark-Dageville
3
121
Preface
It is a timely and important matter to reflect on the European Employment Strategy, all the more
so because social Europe is still limping far behind economic and monetary Europe.
The difficulties were clear when the Employment Strategy was created. When the internal
market was being completed and the preparatory process initiated for Economic and Monetary
Union in 1992, it already seemed to some that the social dimension was missing in Europe. The
European project remained incomplete. Once the Maastricht Treaty was ratified, all European
policies were subordinated to the pursuit of budget stability, the precondition for those Member
States which wished to qualify for the third phase of EMU. It is strange to note that, in this
period, Labour Ministers spent their time not on employment policies or on European
harmonisation of labour law, but on the negative effects of monetary policies for employment,
while the Finance Ministers, in their meetings, applied themselves to the subject of employment.
A world upside down!
Indeed the social chapter which was concocted at Maastricht in 1992 was not very ambitious,
mainly, although not only, because of the UK’s “opting-out”. The 1997 Amsterdam Treaty, in
contrast, included a social chapter which was a bit more ambitious, largely thanks to the efforts of
the Government of Sweden, which had joined the Union in 1995 – a new Title specifically on
employment. A key role was then played by the new French Government of Lionel Jospin which
pushed things along by insisting, at the time of the Amsterdam European Council, that Europe
should be given a genuine employment strategy and by proposing that the first-ever European
Employment Summit should be organised during the Luxembourg Presidency. The problem,
however, was that the Amsterdam Conclusions contained no substantive provisions in this
respect, only an agreement to proceed in applying the employment provisions without waiting for
ratification of the Treaty. The major challenge when preparing the Extraordinary European
Council on Employment in Luxembourg in 1997 was thus to “give body” to the new Employment
Title in the Amsterdam Treaty. This was an especially laborious exercise since one had in the first
place to make an inventory of the ideas which were on the table before envisaging common
guidelines and – the most important thing for the Luxembourg Presidency – to define an
operational strategy to combat unemployment.
We had been forced to recognise that those governments which supported the idea of an
employment summit wanted to be given in Europe arguments with which to argue better the
national policy that they were already putting together. Once again, Europe would serve as no
more than an external projection of national policy manoeuvring – something which had to be
avoided at all costs. Furthermore, we had had to recognise that the concrete proposals concerning
employment which were submitted to the Luxembourg Presidency by the Member States were
characterised by a remarkable timidity.
Our idea was thus to introduce some order into the proposals which were made, and to
develop a new approach by adding a methodology inspired by the so-called convergence strategy.
The aim was to have the same “convergence stress” in social affairs as in economic affairs,
accompanied by specific and verifiable objectives.
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In the end the Luxembourg Government’s proposal was adopted, by which the European
Council would provide the European Union every year with concrete, quantified and verifiable
guidelines concerning employment, to be implemented by national employment action
programmes, which would be articulated around four broad pillars. In all these actions, it was
very important for us to be associated not only with national governments but also with the social
partners as well as the regional and local collectivities.
The “Luxembourg process” has certainly been successful in shaping the ways in which the
EU functions. At Lisbon in 2000, it in turn inspired the “open method of coordination” which has
been adopted, in different forms, in a variety of new policy areas.
How much has it achieved in terms of employment? Ten million jobs have been created since
1997 and more than four million people who were unemployed have found work again.
Nevertheless, even if the Luxembourg process has undeniably had some success in helping create
jobs through this “convergence stress”, much remains to be done. At the level of the European
Council, the employment guidelines of the Community and the employment policies in the
Member States are no longer really discussed in a focussed way, the Heads of State or
Government preferring to leave this work to the different formations of the Council of Ministers.
In this way the Summits each December where the Employment Strategy of the European Union
should traditionally be on the top of the agenda have become little meetings, which is deeply
regrettable.
Another weakness of the present system is that the social partners, who are reluctant to put
into effect the employment guidelines, are not really accountable to anyone at all, unlike the
national governments. For this reason, the Luxembourg Government has insisted to the Spanish
Presidency at the time of the Barcelona European Council that the social partners should be better
associated to the Luxembourg strategy. One could imagine that all the Member States should
agree the national action programme for employment in a tripartite structure, bringing together
around the table government, employers and trade unions.
On top of all this, enlargement is inevitably going to lead to serious new challenges which
must be foreseen as the Employment Strategy is developed with a view to the future.
This book is a valuable and timely contribution to a debate which must remain high on the
European agenda in the coming years. It shows the successes which have been achieved since the
Luxembourg Summit in November 1997. It also has the merit of addressing those aspects of the
European Employment Strategy which need to be perfected – not only in the light of the
experience which has been acquired in the course of the last five years, but also in terms of the
responses which have to be found to deal with the new challenges with which our societies are
now confronted.
Jean-Claude Juncker
Prime Minister, Minister of Finance and former Minister of Labour of the Grand Duchy of
Luxembourg
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