"Implementation of EU Social Policy in Poland: Is there a Different 'Eastern World of Compliance'?"

Leiber, Simone. (2005) "Implementation of EU Social Policy in Poland: Is there a Different 'Eastern World of Compliance'?". In: UNSPECIFIED, Austin, Texas. (Unpublished)

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Abstract

[From the Introduction]. So far, questions of compliance with EU rules in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) have mainly been addressed from the somewhat broader perspective of the "Europeanization of Central and Eastern Europe" (Schimmelfennig/Sedelmeier 2005b; see also Grabbe 2003; Glenn 2003; for the field of social policy and social dialogue cf. Sissenich 2003).5 Few studies, however, have yet taken into account the more recent developments of the "final spurt" towards 1 May 2004,6 and a systematic comparison between the old and the new member states is rarely, or only implicitly provided. This paper contributes to this discussion by directly comparing the implementation of six selected EU social policy Directives in Poland to implementation (problems) of the same Directives in the EU-15.7 Two questions will be analyzed: (1) How does Poland perform, (2) and which factors impeded implementation compared to the EU 15? Thus, on the one hand the paper aims at enriching the theoretical debate on compliance with supranational rules. On the other hand, by choosing this field, implications of "Social Europe" for Poland shall be discussed as well. Which adaptation requirements have been necessary in Poland compared to the EU-15? Were the existing national standards already close to or even above European standards, or was it necessary to carry out far-reaching changes? When did adaptations take place (e.g. anticipatory or rather at short notice before accession), and what is the role of EU social policy in Poland regarding the prevention of "social dumping" within the EU? In contrast to existing expectations, this paper will show striking similarities between Poland and the EU-15 with regards to the implementation requirements and resulting outcomes in this field. After giving an overview of the state of the art in compliance research "West" (section 2), the paper will analyze the effects of the six Directives in Poland at the stages of accession negotiation, formal transposition, as well as (to a more limited degree) application and enforcement (section 3). The comparison to the EU-15 is drawn within each section summary. Finally, section 4 sums up and discusses the results with an outlook on the European Union after 1 May 2004.

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