Introduction: EU Law, Governance and Social Policy

http://eiop.or.at/eiop/pdf/2012-SpecIssue-1_Introduction.pdfInternational audienceA consensual view prevails in the literature over the importance of macro-economic coordination. Only law compares in importance with macro-economic governance. In this issue, the focus is on some instruments only: law (Barbier and Colomb; Hartlapp; Koukiadaki), the open methods of coordination (Hartlapp) and social dialogue (Marginson and Keune). The papers reveal how these different governance instruments involve differing relationships between the European and national levels, in terms of autonomy and dependency.The findings brought about by the papers all concur to a serious qualifying of the principle of subsidiarity as it is still widely considered (and often promoted by national actors and governments): the general reach of the EU legal order thus appears with its far-reaching consequences, including in the area of social dialogue