Title: Mass production of law. routinization in the transposition of European directives: a sociological- institutionalist account
Abstract: Abstract This paper assesses the claim that there is a problem with delayed transposition of directives within the EU, using a new dataset on the transposition of directives in the fields of utilities and food safety regulation in the Netherlands, Germany, the UK, Spain and Greece. This dataset overcomes most of the problems that have plagued previous data. In 65 per cent of the cases transposition was delayed, and the average delay was seven months. There is thus indeed a problem with delayed transposition. In order to explain this problem, a sociological institutionalist approach is used. The findings point to the importance of administrative routinization. Whether or not transposition is accomplished with little delay depends on whether there are administrative departments with the explicit task to specialize in transposition, and whether they have had the time and resources to develop routines or standard operating procedures for doing so. Keywords: Europeanizationpolicy learningroutinessociological institutionalismstandard operating procedurestransposition Acknowledgements This paper is an outcome of a larger project on ‘Analysing European Union policies: the transposition of directives’, undertaken by researchers from the University of Leyden, the Free University of Amsterdam, the Radboud University of Nijmegen and Utrecht University, all in the Netherlands. We would like to thank the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research NWO-MAGW for financial support (project numbers 403-01-502 and 403-01-504). Thanks go also to the other participants in this research group for the inspiring discussions we have had, and which contributed to the ideas developed in this paper. They are: Antoaneta Dimitrova, Markus Haverland, Michael Kaeding, Ellen Mastenbroek, Mark Rhinard, Bernard Steunenberg (all Leyden University), Kees van Kersbergen (Free University of Amsterdam), and Marleen Romeijn (Radboud University Nijmegen). Notes 1. This was not a problem of transposition per se, but one of implementation and enforcement of a transposed directive. One directive required member states to notify the Commission of new national technical standards so that it could evaluate their consequences for free trade. The directive was transposed, but actual implementation remained lax. One Dutch standard case –Securitel – came before the European Court of Justice (ECJ) and it ruled that because this standard was not notified, it was void. Societal actors could not be bound by it. In searching its files the government found that over 400 standards had not been notified, and an avalanche of liability suits threatened. This focused legal, public and political attention on the legal responsibilities of the Dutch government towards the Union, and the serious (financial) consequences of default. 2. This effect does not hold for all member states. 3. The average number of national instruments used for transposing one directive in our database was 1.73.