The majority of studies on European integration focus on the implementation of EU policies and regulations at the national or regional levels or on the influence of national and regional institutions in ED policy-making (Anderson, 1990; Tranholm-Mikkelsen, 1991; Geyer, 1996; Moravcsik, 1993; Marks, 1996; Majone, 1997). A smaller number of studies report on a series of changes appearing at local government level and connect them with a changing environment at the ED level and with the increasing importance of the EU funding programmes (Martin and Pearce, 1993: Goldsmith, 1993; John, 1996: Sutcliffe. 1997). However, the use of a top-down perspective has limited the findings of the previous research. The main objective of this thesis is to expand the knowledge on the phenomenon of ED funding within local governments, adopting a bottom-up approach, where changes appeared at the local government level, which were not included in EU directives, regulations and policy proposals, but represented a consequence of a changing order at the European arena. The research question asked in the study is: "Why do some local governments succeed and others fail in applying for EU funds?" Little empirical research has been conducted in order to understand the ED funding procedures followed by local government organisations, and how those procedures affected the organisations themselves and their employees. The study's objective is to build a theory exploring the process of competing for new types of funding within local government organisations. A theoretical framework is proposed at the beginning of the study which connects the phenomenon of EU funding with the presence of three important constructs: Europeanisation, networking and entrepreneurship. These constructs were explicitly measured in the interview protocol. From the analysis of the data, the constructs emerged as related to the success in ED funding within local governments through a causal relationship.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:bl.uk/oai:ethos.bl.uk:247644 |
| Date | January 2002 |
| Creators | Zerbinati, Stefania |
| Publisher | University of Portsmouth |
| Source Sets | Ethos UK |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
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