A Mid-Term Assessment of Europe 2020 from the Standpoint of EU Cities and Regions

Publication: Report
Citation: Srebotnjak, Dr. Tanja et al. 2014: A Mid-Term Assessment of Europe 2020 from the Standpoint of EU Cities and Regions. Ecologic Institute, Institute for Managing Sustainability, ICLEI.

This report, written by Ecologic Institute, the Institute for Managing Sustainability, and ICLEI indicates the importance of local and regional authorities (LRAs) to achieve the targets of Europe 2020. Additionally, it includes guidelines and suggestions for a better involvement of the local and regional authorities besides focusing on targets that are more realistic. The report includes desk analysis and broad online consultation to substantiate this document and is available for download.

The report is divided in two main objectives. The first part answers the following questions:

What is the role of the LRA? It is an analysis of the importance of the LRA and how their doing influences the strategy and which discrepancies do occur? Why a top-down planning is not as practicable as the EU was thinking and why a bottom-up approach would revise the Europe 2020. What is the relevance and what are the benefits of a regional target setting rather than one on a national level? Is the current strategy and structure effective to push Europe 2020 forward? What importance do the different levels of government play? What is the funding situation right now and what are the impacts?

And the second part includes broad consultations of local and regional authorities as well as a detailed analysis of stakeholder interviews.

The Europe 2020 strategy, which was adopted by the European Council on 17 June 2010, is the new agenda of the European Union for growth and jobs for the current decade. That way Europe should overcome its structural weaknesses, improve its competitiveness and productivity and support a sustainable social market economy. Therefore, the three main growth-priorities of the agenda are: smart growth, sustainable growth and inclusive growth.

A Mid-term Assessment of Europe 2020 from the Standpoint of EU Cities and Regions

Jun 2013 - Feb 2014

An Indicator for Measuring Regional Progress Towards the Europe 2020 Targets

Year 2014

Language: English
Authorship: Assoc. Prof. Tanja Srebotnjak, PhD

Markus Hametner (Institute for Managing Sustainability)

Asya Dimitrova (Institute for Managing Sustainability)

Cristina Garzillo (ICLEI)

Stefan Kuhn (ICLEI)

Luca Zambelli (ICLEI)
Funding: European Union, Committee of the Regions (CoR), International
Year: 2014
Dimension: 129 pp.
ISBN: 978-92-895-0768-4
DOI: 10.2863/97615
Project: A Mid-term Assessment of Europe 2020 from the Standpoint of EU Cities and Regions
Project ID: 2650-16
Table of contents: Click to show full table of contents

Executive Summary
1 Introduction
2 Methodology
2.1 Broad Consultation
2.2 Stakeholder Interviews
3 Synthesis of Main Study Findings
3.1 Making Europe 2020 a Reality – the Role of LRAs
3.1.1 What is the role of LRAs in the achievement of Europe 2020?
3.1.2 Why is progress not satisfactory?
3.1.3 The value-added of the strategy for LRAs
3.1.4 Conclusions
3.2 The Benefits of Bottom-up Planning and Target-setting for a Revised Europe 2020
3.2.1 Conclusions
3.3 The Scope for Regional Target-setting
3.3.1 How feasible is the allocation of Europe 2020 targets at regional level?
3.3.2 How should individual contributions to the targets be allocated?
3.3.3 Cross-border exchange and cooperation in the context of target setting
3.3.4 Conclusions
3.4 Europe 2020– Can LRAs Learn Together and from One Another?
3.4.1 The value of Europe 2020 for benchmarking and exchange of good practice
3.4.2 Why is Europe 2020 different?
3.4.3 Initiatives and tools for exchange
3.4.4 The role of the Committee of the Regions
3.4.5 Conclusions
3.5 The Territorial Approach to Governance – 3.5 Moving Europe 2020 Forward
3.5.1 Is the current governance structure of Europe 2020 delivering?
3.5.2 “Making it Happen: the European Semester”?
3.5.3 Has Europe 2020 led to increased communication and cooperation between different levels of governance?
3.5.4 How to strengthen communication and cooperation between different levels of government for Europe 2020?
3.5.5 Conclusions
3.6 Financing Europe 2020
3.6.1 The severe impact of the economic crisis on Europe 2020 funding
3.6.2 Has the crisis also helped Europe 2020?
3.6.3 The impacts of fiscal consolidation on Europe 2020
3.6.4 The impact of a reformed Cohesion Policy
3.6.5 Excessive bureaucratic hurdles limit usefulness of funds
3.6.6 Has Europe 2020 helped LRAs to more effectively make use of EU funds?
3.6.7 Better spending and capacity building
3.6.8 Innovative financing tools considered as very important, but lack of capacity is still a problem
3.6.9 Conclusions
3.7 Policy Recommendations
4 Detailed Analysis of Findings from the Broad Consultation of Local and Regional Authorities
4.1 Response Rate and Distribution of Responses
4.2 Analysis of Individual Statements
4.3 Joint Patterns
4.4 Spatial Analysis
4.5 Broader Hypotheses
4.6 Analysis of Additional Comments
4.7 Conclusions from the consultation
5 Detailed Analysis of Stakeholder Interviews
5.1 Do the Europe 2020 Strategy Objectives provide sufficient Guidance?
5.2 Governance and Implementation
5.3 Access to Funding is still an Issue
5.4 Exchange of Experiences as Key Aspect for LRAs
5.5 How has Europe 2020 been affected by the Crisis?
References
Annex 1: Questionnaire used for the broad online Consultation
Annex 2: List of interviewed Stakeholders
Annex 3: Questionnaire used for the Stakeholder Interviews
Keywords: Economics

EU

Multilevel governance, Committee of the Regions, Europe 2020

Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, United Kingdom

Further Links

PublicationReportThe Role of Local and Regional Authorities in the Europe 2020 National Reform Programmes

The Europe 2020 Strategy sets the goal for the European Union to become a smart, sustainable and inclusive community by 2020. The 27 EU Member States must provide the European Commission with National Reform Programmes (NRPs) demonstrating how they are... Read more

Srebotnjak, Tanja; Annemarie van der Westhuysen and Markus Hametner 2011: The Role of Local and Regional Authorities in the Europe 2020 National Reform Programmes.

PublicationReportThe Role of Local and Regional Authorities in the Europe 2020 National Reform Programmes

For the third time, Ecologic Institute conducted a study on the role of local and regional authorities (LRA) in the Europe 2020 National Reform Programmes (NRP) of the EU member states. The new results and their comparison with the 2011 and 2012 studies (for the core... Read more

Srebotnjak, Tanja; Max Grünig; Sydney Baloue et al. 2013: On the role of the local and regional authorities in the Europe 2020 National Reform Programmes: Analysis of the 2013 National Reform Programmes.

PublicationReportThe Role of Local and Regional Authorities in the Europe 2020 National Reform Programmes

This study follows the analysis of the role played by Local and Regional Authorities (LRA) in the first round of National Reform Programme (NRP) submissions in 2011. The 2012 study is based on the same set of questions and evaluation protocol used in 2011. Three... Read more

Srebotnjak, Tanja et al. 2012: Study on the role of local and regional authorities in the Europe 2020 National Reform Programmes – analysis of the 2012 National Reform Programmes. Ecologic Institute, WU/RIMAS, commissioned. ISBN: 978-92-895-0620-5.