Gange, Ieva and Waarden, Frans van. (2005) "Between Structure and Incident. A Sociological-Institutionalist Approach to the Riddle of Transposition Delays of European Food Safety Directives". In: UNSPECIFIED, Austin, Texas. (Unpublished)
Abstract
[From the Introduction]. The Dutch cannot expand their highway system as they like, because that gets them in conflict with European air quality standards; strictly enforcing the latter could also deal a death blow to the huge Dutch chicken industry; Germany has to change its returnable can system, as it de facto discriminates against foreign beer producers; France can no longer resist liberalizing its energy markets; and the Greek government can no longer demand that baby food can only be sold in pharmacies. Increasingly national policymakers 'hit' against the the constraints 'imposed' on them by the EU. The costs can be high. An, in European eyes, illegal detail of the Dutch corporate tax cost the tax office an annual one billion euros in income; the European habitat directive prevents the Dutch from drilling for natural gas. European directives, that are largely responsible for such constraints, have - in order to become such constraints - to be transposed in national law in the Member-States, on their way from laws-in-the-books to laws-in-social-action. Transposition is a necessary prerequisite for the subsequent stages of administration, enforcement, and sanctioning. That is, transposition is an important form of 'Europeanization', of the influence of 'Europe' on its Member-States.
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