Research project
Explaining European Union Decision-Making: Insights from the Natural and Social Sciences (EUDINS)
How do processes of coalition-formation influence patterns of decision-making in the European Union?
- Contact
- Madeleine Hosli
- Partners
Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study
This part of the EUDINS Theme Group project focuses on coalition-formation in processes of political decision-making. Empirically, insights from the ‘Decision-making in the European Union Before and After Lisbon’ (DEUBAL) project and other data sources will be used to implement models focused on decision-making as they have been presented in the context of the analysis of the European Union (EU). Among these models are studies focusing on how actors form specific coalitions, how such coalitions may be affected by changes in actor preferences or political party affiliations and effects of such changes on decision-outcomes. This individual project will build on earlier research in this tradition, both in terms of coalition-formation more generally and studies focused on the EU, and implement models of coalition-formation in practice.
Approaches and tools to understand decision-making can be found in both the Natural and the Social Sciences, but rarely is knowledge between these traditions exchanged and are synergies utilized. To explore and forecast decision-making processes, we apply tools and methods developed in the Natural Sciences, such as computer modelling and simulations, and apply them to politics. As input we use, for example, information on actor preferences, voting weights, decision thresholds and institutional rules more generally. It is fascinating and promising, for example, to benefit from such synergies in the study of processes of decision-making in the European Union.
Selected Publications
1) Van Roozendaal Peter, Madeleine O. Hosli and Caspar Heetman (2012): Coalition Formation on Major Policy Dimensions: The Council of the European Union 1998 to 2004, Public Choice 153, 3-4: 447-467.
2) Hosli Madeleine O., Mikko Mattila and Marc C. Uriot (2011): Voting in the Council of the European Union after the 2004 Enlargement: A Comparison of Old and New Member States, Journal of Common Market Studies 49, 6: 1249-1270.
3) Hosli Madeleine O. (2005): The Euro: A Concise Introduction to European Monetary Integration. Boulder, Colorado and London: Lynne Rienner.