The long-term effectiveness of EU Cohesion Policy: Assessing the achievements of the ERDF, 1989-2012

One of the major challenges for EU Cohesion Policy is that, after 25 years of implementing the policy, the evidence for its effectiveness is so inconclusive. Academic research and evaluation studies have reached widely differing conclusions on the results of interventions through Structural and Cohesion Funds (Bachtler and Gorzelak, 2007; Polverari and Bachtler, 2014). At the same time, political and public debate on the performance of the policy has increased, most evident in the discussions on the reforms of Cohesion Policy for the 2007-13 and 2014-20 periods and the pressure on EU and national policymakers to improve performance. This give rise to several questions: is it correct that substantial Cohesion Policy resources have been spent without adequate strategic justification? If so, why has this been the case? And will the new reforms make a difference