Europeanisation, Territoriality and Political Time

In English In European governance, elements from different administrative and political cultures coalesce into one more complex framework. To capture some of the complexity, two central dimensions are addressed: territoriality and political time, understood as horizon, resource, and process. When investigating European governance the question of the institutional organization is important, since it relates to problems of political space and territorial governmental capacity. In European politics, decision-makers have to face a rising level of uncertainty in combination with a more complex issue structure. They have to take account of an increasing number of various - and sometimes competing - temporal preferences and time tables at the national as well as the international level, making national synchronization of politics difficult. European politics is conducted simultaneously in many fora, without it being possible to determine with certainty what are national preparatory processes and what are EU-level negotiations. Changing notions of territoriality and political time challenge our traditional understanding of power and political leadership.