Germany and the European union: From 'tamed power' to normalized power?

International Affairs

Volumn 86, Issue 5, 2010, Pages 1051-1073

  Bulmer, Simon ^a   Paterson, William E ^b  

^a UNIVERSITY OF SHEFFIELD   (United Kingdom)

^b The German British Forum ^*  (United Kingdom)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 77957343730     PISSN: 00205850     EISSN: 14682346     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1111/j.1468-2346.2010.00928.x     Document Type: Article

References (99)

1. For instance, Peter Katzenstein, ed., Tamed power: Germany in Europe (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1997)
2. Simon Bulmer, Charlie Jeffery and William E. Paterson, Germany's European diplomacy: shaping the regional milieu (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2000)
3. Sebastian Harnisch and Siegfried Schieder, 'Germany's new European policy: weaker, leaner, meaner', in H. Maull, ed., Germany's uncertain power: foreign policy of the Berlin republic (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006), pp. 95-108
4. Gunther Hellmann, ed., Germany's EU policy on asylum and defence: de-Europeanization by default? (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006); Adrian\ Hyde-Price and Charlie Jeffery, 'Germany in the European Union: constructing normality', Journal of Common Market Studies 39: 4, Nov. 2001, pp. 689-717
5. Heinrich Schneider, Mathias Jopp und Uwe Schmalz, eds, Eine neue deutsche Europapolitik? Rahmenbedingungen - Problemfelder - Optionen (Bonn: Europa Union, 2001).
6. Katzenstein, Tamed power.
7. There have, of course, been important international changes in the 20 years since unification, but our explanation emphasizes domestic and European sources of change.
8. Peter Katzenstein, 'United Germany in an integrating Europe', in Tamed power, p. 2.
9. Katzenstein, 'United Germany', p. 4.
10. Mathias Jopp, 'Deutsche Europapolitik unter veränderten Rahmenbedingungen: Bilanz - Strategien - Optionen', in Schneider, Jopp und Schmalz, Eine neue deutsche Europapolitik?, pp. 813-61.
11. Bulmer et al., Germany's European diplomacy, pp. 92-103.
12. Bulmer et al., Germany's European diplomacy, pp. 83-4.
13. Harnisch and Schieder, 'Germany's new European policy'. See also Sebastian Harnisch, Internationale Politik und Verfassung. Die Domestizierung der deutschen Sicherheits- und Europapolitik (Baden-Baden: Nomos, 2006).
14. The Maastricht ruling emphasized the role of the Federal Constitutional Court and the Bundestag in agreeing to EU institutional change (see below).
15. Hellmann, Germany's EU policy on asylum and defence.
16. Gunther Hellmann, 'Preface', in Hellmann, Germany's EU policy on asylum and defence, p. 9.
17. Beverly Crawford, Power and German foreign policy (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007).
18. Charlie Jeffery and William E. Paterson, 'Germany and European integration: a shifting of tectonic plates', West European Politics 26: 4, 2003, pp. 59-75.
19. Hyde-Price and Jeffery, 'Germany in the European Union', pp. 700-702.
20. Simon Bulmer, 'Germany: from launching the EU constitutional debate to salvaging a treaty', in Maurizio Carbone, ed., National politics and European integration: from the Constitution to the Lisbon Treaty (Cheltenham, UK and Northampton, MA: Edward Elgar, 2010), pp. 51-70.
21. For a review, see Helen Wallace, 'Exercising power and influence in the European Union: the roles of member states', in Simon Bulmer and Christian Lequesne, eds, The member states of the European Union (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005), pp. 38-42.
22. Wallace, 'Exercising power and influence', pp. 29-36.
23. Gerda Falkner, Oliver Treib, Miriam Hartlapp and Simone Leiber, Complying with Europe: EU harmonization and soft law in the member states (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), p. 333.
24. The term 'compound policy' derives from the work of Vivien Schmidt, e.g. her Democracy in Europe: the EU and national polities (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006): see esp. pp. 33-6.
25. James Sperling, 'Gulliver's travail: crafting a new transatlantic bargain', in Simon Bulmer, Charlie Jeffery and Stephen Padgett, eds, Rethinking Germany and Europe: democracy and diplomacy in a semi-sovereign state (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan), pp. 174-5.
26. Simon Bulmer, 'Shaping the rules? The constitutive politics of the EU and German power', in Katzenstein, Tamed power, pp. 49-79
27. See also Simon Bulmer and Charlie Jeffery, 'Does congruence matter? Germany and Britain in the European Union', in Bulmer et al., Rethinking Germany, p. 129.
28. Eurostat data for 2009: GDP at market prices, data sourced from, accessed 30 March http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/tgm/table.do?tab=table&plugin=1&language=en&pcode=tec00001, 2010.
29. Data from European Commission, EU budget 2008 financial report (Luxembourg: Publications Office of the European Union, 2009), p. 108
30. These data are based on one of two methods utilized by the Commission (ORD 2007 - see p. 107 of the report for discussion). The alternative model presents slightly different figures, showing for example that the Netherlands' net contribution was also greater than Germany's in terms of the percentage of GNI. The data are available online at, accessed 19 Aug. http://ec.europa.eu/budget/library/publications/fin_reports/fin_report_08_en.pdf 2010.
31. See Eurostat, External and intra-European Union trade monthly statistics, 12/2009 (Luxembourg: Office for Official Publications of the European Communities, 2009), accessed 19 Aug., p. 96, http://www.eds-destatis.de/downloads/publ/KS-AR-09-012-EN-N.pdf 2010.
32. William E. Paterson, 'Does Germany still have a European vocation?', German Politics 19: 1, March 2010, p. 47.
33. Stefano Guzzini, 'Structural power: the limits of neo-realist analysis', International Organization 47: 3, Summer 1993, pp. 443-78
34. The four faces of power were first applied to Germany's relationship with the EU in Bulmer, 'Shaping the rules?', pp. 72-6.
35. David Marsh, The euro: the politics of the new global currency (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2009), p. 228.
36. Wolfgang Hager, 'Germany as an extraordinary trader', in Wilfred Kohl and Giorgio Basevi, eds, West Germany: a European and global power (Lexington, MA: Lexington Books, 1980), pp. 3-43.
37. On the suspension in 2003, see Marsh, The euro, p. 212.
38. Sebastian Harnisch and Raimund Wolf, 'Germany: the continuity of change', in Emil Kirchner and James Sperling, eds, National security cultures: patterns of global governance (London: Routledge, 2010), pp. 43-65.
39. See e.g. Simon Bulmer, Andreas Maurer and William E. Paterson, 'The European policy-making machinery in the Berlin republic: hindrance or hand-maiden?', German Politics 10: 1, 2001, pp. 177-206
40. For a short German critique, see Martin Große Hüttmann, 'Die Koordination der deutschen Europapolitik', Aus Politik und Zeitgeschichte, no. 10, 2007, pp. 39-45. For an extensive analysis, see Jan Grünhage, Entscheidungsprozesse in der Europapolitik Deutschlands (Baden-Baden: Nomos, 2007).
41. Daniela Kietz and Nicolai von Ondarza, 'Willkommen in der Lissabonner Wirklichkeit', SWP-Aktuell 29 (Berlin: Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik, March 2010), p. 1.
42. Timm Beichelt, 'Over-efficiency in German EU policy coordination', German Politics 16: 4, Dec. 2007, pp. 421-33
43. Beichelt's contribution is based on a period of participant observation in the foreign office.
44. Interview, foreign office, Berlin, 17 Dec. 2007.
45. Interview, federal ministry of the interior, Berlin, 22 Nov. 2007. Reportedly, these reforms were revised in the aftermath of the new government's election in autumn 2009.
46. Große Hüttmann, 'Die Koordination der deutschen Europapolitik', p. 43.
47. Hans-Ulrich Derlien, 'Germany', in Hussein Kassim, B. Guy Peters and Vincent Wright, eds, The national coordination of EU Policy: the domestic level (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), p. 44.
48. See R. Hrbek, Deutsche Föderalismus als Hemmschuh für die europäische Integration? Die Länder und die deutsche Europapolitik', in Schneider et al., Eine neue deutsche Europapolitik?, pp. 267-98
49. Martin Große Hüttmann, 'Wie europafähig ist der deutsche Föderalismus?', Aus Politik und Zeitgeschichte, nos 13-14, 2005, pp. 27-32
50. See also Charlie Jeffery, 'The German Länder: from milieu-shaping to territorial politics', in Kenneth Dyson and Klaus Goetz, eds, Germany, Europe and the politics of constraint (Oxford: Oxford University Press for the British Academy, 2003), pp. 97-108.
51. On the former, see Bulmer et al., Germany s European diplomacy, p. 76; on the latter, see below.
52. For a more detailed review, see Oskar Niedermeyer, 'The party system: structure, policy and Europeanization', in Dyson and Goetz, Germany, Europe and the politics of constraint, pp. 129-46.
53. Charles Lees, '"Dark matter": institutional constraints and the failure of party-based Euroscepticism in Germany', Political Studies 10: 2, June 2002, pp. 244-67.
54. See T. Saalfeld, 'The Bundestag: institutional incrementalism and behavioural reticence', in Dyson and Goetz, Germany, Europe and the politics of constraint, pp. 73-96. See also Timm Beichelt, Deutschland und Europa: Die Europäisierung des politischen Systems (Wiesbaden: VS Verlag, 2009), pp. 248-78.
55. 'Haushaltsausschuss stimmt euroHilfspaket zu', Bundestag website, accessed 20 May, http://www.bundestag.de/dokumente/textarchiv/2010/29843840_kw20_hilfspaket/index.html 2010.
56. Bulmer et al., Germany's European diplomacy, p. 4.
57. Federal Constitutional Court, press release no. 72/2009, 30 June, accessed 1 April 2009, http://www.bundesverfassungsgericht.de/pressemitteilungen/bvg09-072en.html 2010.
58. Peter Becker and Andreas Maurer, 'Deutsche Integrationsbremsen: Folgen und Gefahren des Karlsruher Urteils fur Deutschland und die EU', SWP-Aktuell A41 (Berlin: Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik, 2009).
59. See European Commission, Eurobarometer 72. Öffentliche Meinung in der Europäischen Union, Nationaler Bericht Deutschland, Autumn 2009, accessed 1 April, http://ec.europa.eu/public_opinion/archives/eb/eb72/eb72_de_de_nat.pdf 2010.
60. On the latter, see Gunther Hellmann, 'Lamed power: Germany and European integration', in Hellmann, Germany's EU policy on asylum and defence, p. 174.
61. William E. Paterson, 'European policy making: between associated sovereignty and semi-sovereignty', in S. Green and W. E. Paterson, eds, Governance in contemporary Germany (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), pp. 261-82.
62. 'Nie wieder Zahlmeister Europas!', Bild Zeitung, 25 March 2010, accessed 1 April, http://www.bild.de/BILD/politik/2010/03/25/zahlmeister-europa/an-unserer-kanzlerin-beisst-sich-europa-die-zaehne-aus.html 2010
63. For the comparison with Mrs Thatcher, see Rainer Hank, 'Wie europäisch ist Angela Merkel?', Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, 29 March 2010, accessed 1 April, http://www.faz.net/s/Rub3ADB8A210E754E748F42960CC7349BDF/Doc~E21C09387D8AB4337AFE5CB075FA018CB~ATpl~Ecommon~Scontent.html 2010.
64. Wolfgang Streeck, 'Endgame? The fiscal crisis of the German state', in A. Miskimmon, W. Paterson and J. Sloam, eds, Germany's gathering crisis: the 2005 federal election and the grand coalition (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan), p. 41.
65. Ian Traynor, 'End of the love affair with Europe isolates Merkel', Guardian, 3 June 2010, p. 24.
66. For a fuller treatment, see Simon Bulmer, 'Germany: from launching the EU constitutional debate to salvaging a treaty', in Maurizio Carbone, ed., National politics and European integration: from the constitution to the Lisbon Treaty (Cheltenham, and Northampton, MA: Edward Elgar, 2010), pp. 51-70.
67. Joschka Fischer, 'From confederacy to federation: thoughts on the finality of European integration', speech by Joschka Fischer, Humboldt University Berlin, 12 May 2000, accessed 1 April, http://www.jeanmonnetprogram.org/papers/00/joschka_fischer_en.rtf 2010.
68. As Fischer noted in his autobiography, due to the difficulties in France, he decided to 'go it alone' ('Also entschloss ich mich zum Alleingang'): Joschka Fischer, Die rot-grünen Jahre. Deutsche Außenpolitik - vom Kosovo bis zum 11. Sept. (Cologne: Kiepenheuer & Witsch, 2007), p. 302.
69. Jeffery, 'Regions and the constitution for Europe: German and British impacts', German Politics 13: 4, 2004, pp. 605-24.
70. Eckart Cuntz, 'Ein ausgewogener Kompromiss: Die Ergebnisse des Konvents aus Sicht der Bundesregierung', Integration 26: 4, Nov. 2003, pp. 351-6.
71. Andreas Maurer, 'Pruning, plundering and reconstructing: work on the Constitutional Treaty', in Daniela Kietz and Volker Perthes, eds, The potential of the Council Presidency. An analysis of the German chairmanship of the EU, 2007, Research Paper 1 (Berlin: Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik, 2008), accessed 19 Aug., p. 28, http://www.swp-berlin.org/en/common/get_document.php?asset_id=4656 2010.
72. On the process, see Maurer, 'Pruning, plundering and reconstructing', pp. 25-31. On Merkel's skill, see Josef Janning, 'Bundesrepublik Deutschland', in W. Weidenfeld and W. Wessels, eds, Jahrbuch der Europäischen Integration 2007 (Baden-Baden: Nomos, 2008), pp. 317-24.
73. The role of vision in German EU policy is explored in William E. Paterson, 'Helmut Kohl, "the vision thing" and escaping the semi-sovereignty trap', in C. Clemens and W. E. Paterson, eds, The Kohl chancellorship (London: Frank Cass, 1998), pp. 17-36.
74. See the criticism of the FCC in Elmar Brok and Martin Selmayr, 'Der "Vertrag der Parlamente" als Gefahr für die Demokratie? Zu den offensichtlich unbegründeten Verfassungsklagen gegen den Vertrag von Lissabon', Integration 31: 3, 2008, pp. 217-34.
75. Becker and Maurer, 'Deutsche Integrationsbremsen'.
76. The 'laboratory' terminology was used by Jörg Monar, 'The dynamics of Justice and Home Affairs: laboratories, driving factors and costs', Journal of Common Market Studies 39: 4, Nov. 2001, pp. 747-64.
77. Roland Sturm and Heinrich Pehle, Das neue deutsche Regierungssystem. Die Europäisierung von Institutionen, Entscheidungsprozessen und Politikfeldern in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland, 2nd edn (Wiesbaden: VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften, 2005), p. 338.
78. Monika Bösche, 'Trapped inside the European fortress? Germany and European Union asylum and refugee policy', in Hellmann, Germany's EU policy on asylum and defence, pp. 60-68.
79. For instance, Jörg Monar reported a 40 per cent increase in the number of texts adopted in 2007 compared to the previous year: see J. Monar, 'Justice and Home Affairs', Journal of Common Market Studies 46, annual review, 2008, p. 109.
80. For details, see Daniela Kietz and Andreas Maurer, 'Prüm, Brüssel, Washington: Avantgarde-Gemeinschaften und innere Sicherheitspolitiken der EU', in Martin Möllers and Robert van Ooyen, eds, Europäisierung und Internationalisierung der Polizei, vol.: Europäisierung, 2nd edn (Frankfurt am Main: Verlag für Polizeiwissenschaft, 2009), pp. 111-451.
81. For the venue-shopping argument in the asylum and immigration policy component of JHA policy, see Virginie Guiraudon, 'European integration and migration policy: vertical policy-making as venue-shopping', Journal of Common Market Studies 38: 2, June 2000, pp. 251-71
82. On the specific case of Germany and the Prüm Treaty, see Kietz and Maurer, 'Prüm, Brüssel, Washington', pp. 125-35.
83. See Simon Bulmer, 'Shop till you drop? The German executive as venue-shopper in Justice and Home Affairs', in Petra Bendel, Andreas Ette and Roderick Parkes, eds, The Europeanisation of control (Münster: Lit Verlag, 2010).
84. Martin Wolf, 'The Eurozone crisis is now a nightmare for Germany', Financial Times, 10 March 2010, p. 11.
85. Crawford, Power and German foreign policy, pp. 138-40.
86. Crawford, Power and German foreign policy, pp. 139-40.
87. See Nicholas Busse, 'Unter Aufsicht. Nicht nur im Fall Griechenland: Die Deutsche Europapolitik wartet auf Karlsruhe', Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, 29 April 2010.
88. On the former, see Paterson, 'Does Germany still have a European vocation?'.
89. The eurozone stabilization package was approved by 319 of the 587 Bundestag members present, with 195 abstentions and 73 voting against. The coalition parties voted in favour; the SPD and Greens abstained; Die Linke opposed. See 'Bundestag beschließt den euroRettungsschirm', accessed 3 June, http://www.bundestag.de/dokumente/textarchiv/2010/29882585_kw20_de_bankenrichtlinie/index.html 2010.
90. See Daniela Schwarzer, 'Deutsch-französisches Verhältnis: Frau Hü trifft Monsieur Hott', Spiegel online, 14 June 2010, accessed 5 July, http://www.spiegel.de/politik/ausland/0,1518,700408,00.html 2010.
91. Gunther Hellmann, 'Nationale Normalität als Zukunft. Zur Aussenpolitik der Berliner Republik', Blätter für Deutsche und Internationale Politik 44: 7, 1999, p. 837.
92. Quoted in Joshua Chaffin, 'Why a fearful Germany is refusing to rush to the rescue', Financial Times, 25 May 2010, p. 10.
93. See European Council, 'Statement by the heads of state and government of the euro area', 25 March 2010, accessed 2 April, http://www.consilium.europa.eu/uedocs/cms_data/docs/pressdata/en/ec/113563.pdf 2010.
94. Crawford, Power and German foreign policy, pp. 103-42.
95. The proximity of the 9 May 2010 Land election in North Rhine Westphalia presumably also entered calculations, given its importance to the Merkel-led coalition's retention of a majority in the Bundesrat.
96. Quoted in Timothy Garton Ash, 'You can see why Berlin has cut the motor, but now Europe is stalled', Guardian, 1 April 2010, p. 33.
97. 'Merkels Besuch bei Erdogan: Lächeln ohne Lust', Spiegel online, 29 March 2010, accessed 5 July, http://www.spiegel.de/politik/ausland/0,1518,686273,00.html 2010.
98. She was reported to believe that the FCC's judgment on the Lisbon Treaty had put a stop to further integrative steps. See 'How European is Angela Merkel? Chancellor abandons Germany's post-war EU policy', Spiegel online, 29 March 2010, accessed 2 April, http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/0,1518,686167,00.html 2010.
99. See Joschka Fischer, 'Mrs Europa ist jetzt Frau Germania', Süddeutsche Zeitung, 29 March 2010.