Hostname: page-component-76fb5796d-9pm4c Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-29T13:13:18.326Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The changing nature of European equality regimes: explaining convergence and variation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 March 2020

Andrea Krizsan ,
Hege Skjeie  and
Judith Squires
Andrea Krizsan
Affiliation:
Center for Policy Studies, Central European University, Budapest, Hungary
Hege Skjeie
Affiliation:
Department of Political Science, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway
Judith Squires*
Affiliation:
School of Sociology, Politics and International Studies, University of Bristol, 11 Priory Road, BristolBS8 1TU, UK
*
*Corresponding author. Email: judith.squires@bris.ac.uk
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This paper maps the changing nature of European equality regimes in order to establish the extent of variation or convergence across Europe and to evaluate the role of transnational policy paradigms and state-level institutions in shaping the emerging European equality regimes. We identify two significant tendencies in respect to European equality institutional regimes. First, a growing complexity in the institutional arrangements designed to address inequalities, with pre-2000 institutional arrangements increasingly augmented by newer equality institutions that adopt a judicialized approach to dealing with inequalities. Second, a Europe-wide tendency to widen the scope of equality policy thinking from a very small number of privileged inequality grounds (most frequently gender and ethnicity) to a much wider range of inequalities to be addressed by state policies. The overall impact of these two changes has been to create equality regimes characterized by a wide variety of forms and levels of protection for the different inequalities. This suggests that while a transnational policy paradigm has framed the evolving nature of equality regimes across Europe, the implementation of this paradigm is moulded by the power dynamics embedded in national and local equality institutions, creating a fragmented and complex patchwork of equality regimes that defy easy regional classification and complicate overly generalized narratives about the influence of global policy paradigms.

Keywords

equalityEuropepolicy change
Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of International and Comparative Social Policy , Volume 30 , Issue 1: Gender justice and global policy paradigms , February 2014 , pp. 53 - 68
Copyright
Copyright © 2014 Taylor & Francis

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Beveridge, F. (2012). ‘Going soft'? Analysing the contribution of soft and hard measures in EU gender law and policy. In Lombardo, E. & Forest, M. (Eds.), The Europeanisation of gender equality policies. A discursive-sociological approach (pp. 28–48). Basingstoke: Palgrave MacMillan.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Connell, R. W. (2002). Gender. Cambridge: Polity Press.Google Scholar
Crenshaw, K. (1991). Mapping the margins: Intersectionality, identity politics, and violence against women of color. Stanford Law Review, 43, 1241–1299.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
European Commission (EC). (2004). Equality and non-discrimination in an enlarged European Union: Green paper. Luxembourg: Office for Official Publications of the European Communities.Google Scholar
European Commission (EC). (2007). Tackling multiple discrimination: Practices, policies and laws. Directorate-General for Employment, Social Affairs and Equal Opportunities, Unit G4. Luxembourg: Office for Official Publications of the European Communities.Google Scholar
Forest, M., & Lombardo, E. (2012). The Europeanisation of gender equality policies: A discoursive-sociological approach. In Lombardo, E. & Forest, M. (Eds.), The Europeanisation of gender equality policies. A discursive-sociological approach (pp. 1–28). Basingstoke: Palgrave MacMillan.Google Scholar
Fredman, S. (2005). Double trouble: Multiple discrimination and EU Law. European Anti-discrimination Law Review, 2, 13–19.Google Scholar
Kantola, J., & Nousianen, K. (2009). Institutionalising intersectionality in Europe: Introducing the theme. International Feminist Journal of Politics, 11(4), 459–478.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kenny, M., & Mackay, F. (2009). Already doin’ it for ourselves? Skeptical notes on feminism and institutionalism. Politics and Gender, 5(2), 271–280.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Krizsan, A. (2006). Ombudsmen and similar institutions for protection against racial and ethnic discrimination. In The European Centre for Minority Issues and The European Academy Bozen/Bolzano (Ed.), European yearbook of minority issues (Vol 4, 2004/5, pp. 163–185). Leiden: Martinus Nijhoff.Google Scholar
Krizsan, A., & Popa, R. 2010. Europeanization in making policies against domestic violence in Central and Eastern Europe. Social Politics, 17(3), 379–406.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Krizsan, A., Skjeie, H., & Squires, J. (Eds.). (2012). Institutionalising intersectionality: The changing nature of European equality regimes. Basingstoke: Palgrave.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Krook, M. & Mackay, F. (Eds.). (2011). Gender, politics and institutions: Towards a feminist institutionalism. Basingstoke: Palgrave.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lombardo, E. & Forest, M. (Eds.). (2012). The Europeanisation of gender equality policies. A discursive-sociological approach. Basingstoke: Palgrave MacMillan.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lombardo, E., Meier, P., & Verloo, M. (Eds.). (2009). The discursive politics of gender equality. Stretching, bending and policy-making. London: Routledge.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lombardo, E., & Verloo, M. (2009). Institutionalizing intersectionality in the European Union? Policy developments and contestations. International Feminist Journal of Politics, 11(4), 478–496.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lustgarten, L. (1980). Legal control of racial discrimination. London: Macmillan Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
MacEwen, M. (Ed.). (1997). Anti-discrimination law enforcement. A comparative perspective. Aldershot: Ashgate.Google Scholar
McBride, D., & Mazur, A. (2010). The politics of state feminism. Innovation in comparative research. Philadelphia: Temple University Press.Google Scholar
McCrudden, C. (2001). International and European norms regarding national legal remedies for racial equality. In Fredman, S. (Ed.), Discrimination and human rights. The case of racism (pp. 251–307). Oxford: Oxford UP.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Outshoorn, J., & Kantola, J. (2007). Changing state feminism. Basingstoke: Palgrave.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Radaelli, C. (2004). Europeanisation: Solution or problem? European Integration Online Papers, 8(16). Retrieved from http://eiop.or.at/eiop/pdf/2004-016.pdfGoogle Scholar
Sindbjerg, M. (2007). The Europeanisation of equality between genders. Who controls the scope of non-discrimination? Journal of European Public Policy, 14(4), 544–562.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Squires, J. (2007). New politics of gender equality. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Squires, J. (2008). Intersecting inequalities: Reflecting on the subjects and objects of equality. Political Quarterly, 79, 53–61.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stetson, D. M., & Mazur, A. (Eds.). (1995). Comparative state feminism. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Thelen, K. (2004). How institutions evolve: The political economy of skills in Germany, Britain, the United States and Japan. New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Walby, S. (2004). The European union and gender equality: Emergent varieties of gender regime. Social Politics, 11(1), 4–29.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Walby, S. (2009). Globalization and inequalities: Complexity and contested modernities. London: Sage.Google Scholar
Walby, S., Armstrong, Jo, & Strid, S. (2012). Intersectionality and the quality of equality architecture in Britain. Social Politics, 19(4), 446–481.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wilson, C. A. (2000). Policy regimes and policy change. Journal of Public Policy, 20(3), 247–274.CrossRefGoogle Scholar