Bulletin n. 0/2004 | ||
December 2004 | ||
Jens Henrik Haahr |
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Open co-ordination as advanced liberal government | ||
in Journal of European Public Policy , Volume 11, Number 2 / April , 2004 , 209-230 | ||
This article applies a Foucauldian analytics of government to recent developments in the European Union (EU), focusing particularly on open methods of co-ordination (OMCs) in the EU. It argues that in the perspective of an analytics of government, the open method of co-ordination can fruitfully be understood as 'advanced liberal government', a particular conceptualization of government constituted of 'practices of liberty'. These practices continuously presuppose, depend on and enable their subjects - in the case of the OMC most often the relevant national government agencies. At the same time, however, they shape and reshape them. There is thus a dual nature to the open method which is typical of advanced liberal government: the method enables and opens up new possibilities for its subjects and at the same time restrains these subjects as they are subjected to a certain calculative and disciplinary regime. | ||