Handbook of European Policies

Interpretive Approaches to the EU

Handbooks of Research on Public Policy series

Edited by Hubert Heinelt, Professor for Public Administration, Public Policy and Urban Research, Institute for Political Science, Technische Universität Darmstadt and Sybille Münch, Professor of Political Science, Stiftung Universität Hildesheim and Visiting Professor, Center for the Study of Democracy, Leuphana University, Lüneburg, Germany

This definitive Handbook addresses the current lack of research into European policymaking and development using an interpretive perspective. Questioning areas that mainstream approaches tend to neglect, contributors target the ways in which ideas, arguments and discourses shape policies in the institutional context of the EU.

‘Until recently European Studies was the taken for granted domain of mainstream political science. Its vocabulary has been that of states, rational actors, institutions, power, principal-agent relationships, and rational games. By introducing an interpretive approach to European Studies this excellent volume significantly broadens the intellectual horizon of the field. The contributors ask important new research questions and introduce new analytical tools (such as frame and discourse analysis) that will set the field’s agenda for years to come.’
– Hendrik Wagenaar, University of Sheffield, UK

‘A welcome addition to the established range of collections on European integration, this Handbook on interpretive EU policy studies sets out to carve out a new niche in the field of European integration studies. As the 20 contributions by leading authors in the field demonstrate most impressively, this is just the tip of the iceberg of much research that is still to come. It will be interesting to watch how interfaces between the root disciplines of interpretivist methodology in international relations theory and European integration theories form, based on this important publication. Definitively worthwhile reading for all interested in approaches to policymaking in the EU, especially in times of crisis.’
– Antje Wiener, University of Hamburg, Germany and University of Cambridge, UK

‘Handbooks introducing EU policies are widely published in various languages but this one offers in-depth explanations grounded in the theoretical approach of post-positivism and interpretivism, which might no longer be unique, but remains an original perspective. . . I believe that this Handbook will have a long lasting impact on public policy analysis, encouraging it to develop or challenge its theoretical approach. '
——欧洲国际审查Studies (ERIS)