Outline of seminar series

An important theoretical and methodological debate on the contribution which ‘sociological approaches' make to European Union (EU) studies is currently underway. Some claim sociology's contribution is its ‘bottom up' approach - its focus on the social bases of European integration (Guiraudon & Favell 2007). Others disagree, proposing that both neo-functionalist and liberal intergovernmentalist analyses were inherently ‘bottom up'. Rather, the central point of difference is that it is ‘inside out', focusing on ‘how actors perceive the scope and configuration of their arena and how they think about their goals, opportunities and strategies therein' (Parsons 2008).

Points of difference emerge too concerning sociology's conception of EU government: some remain state-centric in their research designs, refusing to move beyond intergovernmental depictions of EU decision-making. Others would argue, on the contrary, that political sociology's distinctiveness is its demand for re-evaluations of state-society relations, including re-problematisations of ‘who' governs and ‘what' is the EU (Rumford 2002). Others yet would argue that research agendas on re-constructions of identity constitute the core of anthropological/sociological approaches (Shore 2000).

This Europa Institute seminar series aims to engage and take a lead in these debates to consolidate a ‘political sociological' approach to EU studies. To provide direction and focus, the seminar series critically appraises the ‘distinctiveness' of political sociology in two concrete ways:

• first, regarding the object of study, we ask a sociology of ‘what'?;
• second, regarding methodological tools, we ask ‘how' it should be studied.

With regard to the former, our starting point is to (re-)examine the ‘government of the EU', which we understand not as a particular body, but as made up of a set of institutionalising regulatory practices and interactions, instruments and ideas.

To capture EU government as a particular way of knowing and doing regulation, we view regulation not only as rule-making, but as the production and maintenance of ordered interaction. In these seminars, we will discuss the institutionalisation of these interactions across a range of policy fields and appraise their provisional/enduring quality. Studying the regulatory practices of this ‘government' thus requires analysing actor action and behaviour, including the different ways in which these are construed.

Regarding methods, during the seminars we will discuss intermediary concepts and research techniques which enable researchers to capture ‘how' EU regulatory action works. In particular, we see distinctiveness in method as against rational choice accounts of action. Indeed, the ‘sociological turn' brings with it a variety of theoretical resources, understandings and concepts from which we draw inspiration; e.g.

‘practice' (political theory); ‘identity' (anthropology); ‘process tracing' (constructivism); ‘performativity' and ‘embeddedness' (economic sociology); ‘instrumentation' and ‘association' (sociology of science and technology); ‘public action' and ‘political work' (sociological institutionalism).

References:

Guiraudon, V & Favell, A ‘The Sociology of European Integration', Paper presented at EUSA, Montréal, 2007.

Parsons, C ‘Au-delà du Bourdivin: Distinguishing "Sociological Approaches" to the EU', Paper presented at the European Consortium of Political Research Joint Sessions, Rennes, France, 11-16 April, 2008.

Rumford, C The European Union: A Political Sociology, London: Blackwell Publishing, 2002.

Shore, C, Building Europe, the Cultural Politics of European Integration, London: Routledge, 2000.