Swedish think-tank calls for radical overhaul of EU’s structural policy

The EU should replace its inefficient structural
policy with a new cohesion policy focusing on transnational
measures with a clear European value added, says new
report.

The study questions three key assumptions underlying
the European structural policy, which purports to reduce
the disparities between European regions and countries
through economic and social convergence. The study
contends that: 

• that the regional disparities in EU15 are much
  smaller than they are normally reported to be,
• the structural policy interventions have a very
  limited impact on convergence,
• convergence has a very limited impact on
  cohesion.

The study claims that the structural
policy in its present form is a legacy of the Delors era.
Originally intended to compensate for the losses incurred
by the internal marked, it has become obsolete. The
losses never materialised while the compensations remain,
according to Mr Tarschys. The same applies to the
EU’s cohesion fund that was set up to help some
Member States meet the Maastricht convergence criteria.
With all of those countries having qualified for the
membership of the eurozone, there is no more reason for
the cohesion fund to exist, according to the author of
the study.

The study calls for a thorough policy
review in preparation of the next budgetary period
starting in 2007. It proposes three options for replacing
the current structural and cohesion funds with new
policies:

• Renationalisation

  , letting Member States take care of their own regional
  problems. In fact they already do, so the added burden
  would be marginal.

• Reallocation

  within the EU budget in favour of currently underfunded
  policy areas.

• Radical reform

  of structural policy, discarding the intermediate
  objective of convergence but giving greater emphasis to
  the ultimate goal of cohesion.

Mr Tarschys favours a radical reform
of the EU’s structural policy. Under his proposal,
support would no longer be channelled to projects with
local effects only. The principal criterion of
eligibility would instead be the trans-national
dimension, with EU resources reserved for investments and
activities containing a clear European value added. The
focus should be on culture, education, mass
communication, environment, mobility and exchange. Mr
Tarschys that the EU should no longer be responsible for
economic and social cohesion, which focuses on local
development measures and favours only the poorest
regions.

While recognising that there should be
some measures of solidarity aimed at the EU’s new
Member States, Mr Tarschys underlined that regional
disparities should be tackled by Member State
governments, while the EU should support cultural and
political cohesion.

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