Paper Titles & Abstracts

This article argues that empirical findings on regional actions in Sweden indicates a dynamic political trajectory that moves beyond the picture that is painted by the Multilevel Governance literature. Even if we might find evidence on the two types of Multilevel Governance in the Swedish political context, regional activities are conceptualized as moving from a 'thin' (narrow) form of regional action, that is defined as, fragmented, 'ad-hoc', re-active with a narrow set of involved actors towards a 'thick' (broad) form of regional action that is more, coherent, systematic, pro-active with a broader set of involved (politically strategic) actors.The picture is asymmetric, some regions in Sweden act more 'thicker' than others. However the direction of the process of regional activities over time could be viewed as an integral part, and as an important driving force towards an 'ever closer fused Union'. The Macro Fusion Thesis offers a hypothetical three-step model of how we may understand the dynamics of the evolving European polity; Europeanisation of actors, Fusion of national and supra-national resources and instruments, that spur an ongoing ratcheting process with an open 'finalité politique'. Studying European integration processes from a regional action perspective, might provide us with tools to conceptually distinguish the EU as a centre-formation, not as a state per se, but as a particular type of centre. According to Bartolini, in every centre-formation we should be able to conceptually distinguish different forms of interest representation and corresponding conflicting lines, i.e. political structuring. However, interest representation is poorly studied within the Multilevel Governance literature. Studying regional action, as regional interest representation, might provide us with the link to move beyond the confinements of Multilevel Governance, and conceptualize the EU as a centre-formation, that incorporates different types of fused regional centre-formations.