The Open method of coordination in European Education and Training Policy: New forms of integration through soft policy-making

摘要

New forms of governance, such as the Open Method of Coordination have become more and more popular within European policy-making. This paper discusses an example of the Open Method of Coordination (OMC) under-analysed so far by the literature, namely the OMC in Education and Training. The argument presented here is that exactly this policy area has experienced through the use of the OMC significant developments over the last 10 years resulting in a fundamentally changed EU involvement in the education and training policy. Understanding the sometimes contradictory motivation of the different actors when creating the OMC in E&T is essential in order to correctly analyse the consequences at national and European level of its use, which led to a new way of integration.