EU Added Value – Fact-based policy or politicised facts?*

Policy Brief

EU Added Value – Fact-based

policy or politicised facts?

DECEMBER 2018

Adriaan Schout & Davide Bevacqua

“[…] there is EU value added in all existing areas of activity”

(Task force on subsidiarity and proportionality, 2018)

the EU, and the perceived waste involved,

as one of the block’s main issues.

In these

heated debates, EU Added Value (EAV) is an

important communication tool of the EU to

proof to citizens that EU funds are well spent

and that they offer a better deal compared

to national spending. As a precondition for

the legitimacy of the EU budget, EAV helps

to create transparency about the beneﬁts of

EU cooperation.

The Commission’s proposal for the next

Multi-annual Financial Framework (MFF,

2 May 2018)

kicked off the traditionally

heated negotiating process on the EU’s

ﬁnances. Many agree that the MFF needs

drastic reforming. European Added

Value has been put forward as a guiding

1 Sociaal Cultureel Planbureau (2018), Wat willen

Nederlanders van de Europese Unie? Een

verkenning met enquêtes, virtuele dialogen en

focusgroepen (Tweede Kamer: bijlage bij 21501-

20, nr. 1382. https://www.parlementairemonitor.

nl/9353000/1/j9vvij5epmj1ey0/vktlql91rqvv).

2 European Commission (2018a) A modern budget

for a Union that protects, empowers and defends:

The Multiannual Financial Framework for 2021-2027,

Brussels: EC.

Introduction

The EU budget, particularly the Multi-Annual

Financial Framework, is one of the central

and most sensitive political battles in EU

politics. EU budget negotiations comprise

different battles at the same time. Firstly,

individual Member States try to defend

their perceived national interests while the

EU Commission puts great effort in shifting

the focus away from national gains to the

overall interests of the EU and the added

value of acting together. Secondly, citizens

especially in the net-payer countries are

(highly) reluctant to contribute to the EU

budget. A recent study in the Netherlands

shows that citizens perceive the costs of

* This paper is part of three papers on EU Agencies,

EU Added Value and the EU’s Better Regulation

policy that, together, give insight into the state

of the EU’s efforts to strengthen evidence based

policy making in the EU. These papers are:

Schout, A. (2018), EU agencies after 25 years:

a missed opportunity to enhance EU governance,

The Hague: Clingendael Policy Brief, and:

Schout, A., C. Schwieter (2018), Two decades of

Better Regulation in the EU Commission – Towards

evidence-based policymaking? The Hague:

Clingendael Policy Brief. They can be found on

the Clingendael website.

Clingendael Policy Brief

principle for reform. EAV is presented by

the European institutions as “a key test to

justify spending”,

“an essential part of the

evaluation exercise”

and a “key factor that

determines whether the Union should act”

Also in setting priorities for the Commission’s

work programme, EAV is the guiding

principle.

Despite its alleged centrality, EAV is a

controversial term. This policy paper explores

the extent to which EAV lives up to its

expectations as a guiding principle in the

MFF discussions. EAV is the rational answer

to the many vested interests in keeping the

budget as it is. It has acquired a mediating

role between the path dependence of the

MFF (a “historical relic”

) and demands for

a more ambitious budget (French President

Macron

) or for a lower and drastically

reformed budget (Dutch Prime Minister

Rutte

). In addition to ﬂagging EAV as

guiding principle, the Commission also

moderates expectations regarding EAV by

underlining that assessments are not merely

the result of a scientiﬁc and economy-based

process, but are “always the result of a

political process”.

3 European Commission (2010) Letter to the President

of the European Parliament and the President in

ofﬁce of the Council, 26/11/2010, Brussels: EC.

4 European Council (2004) Council progress report

on ﬁnancial perspectives 2007-2013: Doc. 16105/04,

Brussels: European Council.

5 Task Force on Subsidiarity, Proportionality and

“Doing less more efﬁciently” (2018) Active

Subsidiarity: A new way of working, Brussels: EC.

6 Commission Work Programme 2018: An agenda

for a more united, stronger and more democratic

Europe, Strasbourg, 24 October 2017.

7 Sapir, A., Aghion, P., Bertola, G., Hellwig, M., Pisani-

Ferry, J., Vinals, J. & Wallace, H. (2003) An agenda

for a growing Europe: The Sapir report, Oxford:

Oxford University Press.

8 Macron, E. (2018) Informal European Council [press

conference], 23 February.

9 Rutte, M. (2018) Speech by Prime Minister

Mark Rutte on the future of the European Union,

Strasbourg: EP.

10 European Commission (2011a) The added value of

the EU budget, Brussels: EC.

EAV is not only relevant to the MFF

negotiations. It is also a case study of the

use of Better Regulation as meta-policy.

Through Better Regulation principles, the EU

institutions have obliged themselves to base

policy discussions and decisions on “the

best available information”.

This creates

expectations about the factual underpinning

concerning EAV. This study examines the

actual evidence behind the use of EAV, and

whether the available studies are satisfactory

in terms of their number and conclusions.

We will focus on the actual evidence of

‘added value’ in trying to answer to the

question: are the many political references

to EAV in the negotiations supported by fact-

based evidence?

Section 2 below addresses the problems in

deﬁning EAV, discusses some theoretical

and political concepts and brieﬂy presents

the Commission’s Better Regulation agenda.

To explore the extent to which EAV is indeed

evidence-based, Section 3 explores three

cases: the Common Agricultural Policy

(around 39% of the last MFF), Cohesion

Policy (amounting to 34%) and Innovation

Policy (an increasingly ﬁnanced sector,

around 10% of the latest budget). Each

case ends with some general observations

about the performance of Better Regulation

in regard to the particular policy and the

references the Regulatory Scrutiny Board

(RSB) makes to EAV. The main ﬁndings are

presented in the Conclusions. This study

is based on desk research and had to be

limited, for obvious reasons, to three major

policy areas. Given the scarcity of information

on EAV, and to make sure that we would not

overlook relevant studies in these areas, we

furthermore approached a limited number of

11 experts from 4 countries.

11 European Commission (2015) Better Regulation

toolbox, Brussels: EC.

Clingendael Policy Brief

EAV: Concept and political

context

Concepts

The ﬁrst dilemma is the lack of a commonly

accepted deﬁnition

of EAV the result being

that it has turned into a “fashionable buzz-

word”.

This hampers the unambiguous

identiﬁcation of ‘added value’. The most

used deﬁnition comes from the Commission:

EAV is “the value resulting from an EU

intervention which is additional to the value

that would have been otherwise created by

member states alone”.

In other words, one

euro spent at EU level should deliver more

than when spent at the national level. Here,

the Commission focuses on three key criteria

for assessing EAV, namely effectiveness,

efﬁciency and synergy. This makes EAV “the

little sister of the principle of subsidiarity”

with the EU intervening only when EU action

is more efﬁcient than national policy. Other

studies deﬁne EAV more broadly as anything

“which has been enabled or which could

not have been done, without Community

assistance”.

‘Added value’ has different

meanings, such as the beneﬁts of acting at

the EU level vis-à-vis the national level, the

beneﬁts arising from good management

(because quite a number of member states

suffer from under-performing governments),

the opportunity cost of spending in one

policy area rather than another, or as the

positive side effects deriving from EU actions

additional to the achievement of expected

goals. EAV can thus be used at different

levels, i.e. for deﬁning broad policies (macro)

12 As noted in Becker, P. (2012) The European Budget

and the Principles of Solidarity and Added Value,

The International Spectator: Italian Journal of

International Affairs, Rome: IAI.

13 European Parliament (2010) Reﬂection paper on the

concept of European Added Value, Strasbourg: EP.

14 European Commission (2011a) op. cit.

15 European Parliament (2010) Reﬂection paper on the

concept of European Added Value, Strasbourg: EP.

16 Bachtler, J. & Taylor, S. (2004) The Added Value

of the Structural Funds: A regional perspective, IQ

Net Report on the Reform of the Structural Funds,

Glashow: EPRC.

or for choosing between projects (micro).

Importantly, besides scholars having divergent

views, member states too seem to interpret

EAV in different ways depending their

interests.

As a corollary, the European Court

of Auditors called on the European institutions

to agree upon a common deﬁnition as a

prerequisite for making EAV a functional tool

in decision making.

Three theoretical concepts are closely related

to EAV:

– The principle of subsidiarity: this means

that the EU should act only where national

governments are not able to efﬁciently

provide a speciﬁc good. EAV can be a

tool to identify the appropriate level of

government.

– The principle of additionality: according

to this principle EU funds should be

provided on top of national funds (and

not substitute them).

One could say that

when both subsidiarity and additionality

checks are passed, EAV presence is

conﬁrmed.

– European public goods: these are goods

that should be provided through European

action. Public goods are deﬁned as

non-excludable and non-rivalrous

and

have been used by the Fiscal Federalists

identifying, depending on the policy,

the most suitable level of governance.

The concept of public goods is so close

to that of EAV that the two terms are

17 Rubio, E. (2011) The “added value” in the EU

budgetary debates: one concept, four meanings,

Notre Europe, Paris: Institut Jacques Delors.

18 Some examples are provided in Zuuleg, F. (2009)

The rationale for EU action: What are European Public

Goods?, Brussels: EPC.

19 European Court of Auditors (2018) Future of EU

ﬁnances: reforming how the EU budget operates,

Luxembourg: ECA.

20 Zuleeg, F. (2011) The EU Added Value test to justify

EU spending: What impact for regions and local

authorities?, Brussels: EPC.

21 Described e.g. on the Commission’s website:

http://ec.europa.eu/regional_policy/en/policy/how/

principles/.

22 Samuelson, P. A. (1954). The Pure Theory of Public

Expenditure, in: Review of Economics and Statistics,

Massachusetts: MIT Press.

23 Oates, W.E. (1999) An Essay on Fiscal Federalism, in

Journal of Economic Literature, Nashville: EAA.

Clingendael Policy Brief

used as synonyms.

Identifying a public

good is crucial due to the relatively small

size of the EU budget so that political

prioritisation is essential.

Moreover, the

public goods should be distinguished

from club goods (a speciﬁc kind of public

good “from whose beneﬁts individuals

may be excluded”).

If a community

grows larger, a public good (e.g. a sports

facility) can be divided into different

kinds of club goods (football ﬁeld, hockey

ﬁeld) for speciﬁc audiences. In the EU

context, public goods may be confused

with club goods that can be arranged

through ﬂexible integration. For example,

EU-wide research policy can be seen as a

collection of research projects that rather

resemble club goods (e.g. cooperation

between universities in different

countries).

The political context

Evidently, technical analyses rival with

political realities. Policy-makers, stakeholders

and other actors tend to mould EAV

to legitimate their favoured outcomes.

Broadly speaking, fact-based legitimacy

and political legitimacy may not coincide.

Since ‘truth’ is multifaceted, political actors

have the right and duty to select scientiﬁcally

based arguments to defend preferences.

Competition for information brings out

differences in perspectives. However, there

may be hiatuses between evidence and

political choices. EAV literature focuses

on (economic) rationality rather than on

24 As pointed out in Zuleeg, F. (2009) op. cit.

25 Medarova-Bergstrom, K., Volkery, A. & Baldock, D.

(2012) Criteria for maximising the European added

value of EU budget: the case of climate change,

Brussels: IEEP.

26 Majone, G. (2009) Europe as a Would-be World

Power: The EU at Fifty, Cambridge: Cambridge

University Press.

27 Schout, A. (2011) ‘Framework for assessing the

added value of an EU agency’, Journal of Public

Policy, 31(3), 363–384.

28 This idea and an extensive literature review can

be found in Hoppe, R. (1999) Policy analysis,

science and politics: From “speaking truth to

power” to “making sense together”, in Science

and Public Policy, Vol. 26, Issue 3, DOI https://doi.

org/10.3152/147154399781782482. Wildavsky, A.

(1996) Speaking truth to power, New Brunswick and

London: Transaction Publishers.

pragmatic political objectives and the danger

exists that efﬁciency-based EAV evidence has

“little or no impact on big decisions about EU

spending allocations.”

In the EU’s MFF debates, political realities

are evident in juste retour discussions.

The budgetary consequences of Brexit have

sharpened the debates over how to ﬁll the

ﬁnancial gap.

Traditional recipients accuse

the Commission of not being ambitious

enough in claiming a higher EU budget

and argue that cuts will be detrimental for

regional catching-up and for the completion

of the Single Market. On the other hand,

the so-called “frugal four”, namely the

Netherlands, Sweden, Austria and Denmark,

are calling for a smaller EU budget to match

the departure of the UK while welcoming

a more “modernized” budget by increasing

spending in areas such as innovation. EAV

is used in such highly politicised contexts.

Moreover, EAV advocates plead, or are

perceived to plead, for more EU expenditure

on a certain policy and may tend to downplay

the question of whether the budget is the

most appropriate instrument (compared to

e.g. regulation).

The extensive references to

EAV can in part by explained by the increasing

public attention for the EU and the perception

of the EU as expensive. Moreover, references

to EAV are closely connected to arguments

for ‘new’ policies such as border control.

29 Rubio, E. (2017) The added value of EU spending, in

De Feo, A. & Laffan, B. [eds.] (2017) Effectiveness

and added value of the EU budget, European

University Institute, Robert Schuman Centre for

Advanced Studies.

30 High Level Group on Own Resources (2016)

Future ﬁnancing of the EU: Final report and

recommendations of the High Level Group on

Own Resources, Brussels: EC.

31 Remarkably exposed in Darvas, Z. & Wolff, G. (2018)

Rethinking the European Union’s post-Brexit budget

priorities, Brussels: Bruegel.

32 Schout, A. & van Loon, Y. (2017) European Added

Value narrows EU budgetary reform discussions,

The Hague: Clingendael Institute.

33 Stokes, B., Wike, R. & Poushter, J. (2016) Europeans

Face the World Divided. Many question national

inﬂuence and obligations to allies, but share desire

for greater EU role in global affairs, Washington:

Pew Research Center. European Commission (2018b)

Standard Eurobarometer 89, Spring 2018, Brussels: EC.

Clingendael Policy Brief

Procedural context: Better

Regulation

Better Regulation deﬁnes the ways in which

EU policies are prepared on the basis of the

best possible information (evidence-based)

and of consultations (political support).

Better Regulation has evolved over the years,

and nowadays gives central importance

to ex-ante Impact Assessments (Impact

Assessments), to ex-post evaluations (also

in the form of mid-term evaluations) and

to the continuity between them in order

to assure a full-policy cycle evaluation.

A new Impact Assessment should be

based on the ex-post evaluation of the

previous programme.

This is particularly

desirable since most ex-post evaluations

are outsourced so that it has be ensured

that the assessments are incorporated

in follow-up policies.

Better Regulation

guidelines speciﬁcally include considerations

regarding subsidiarity and EAV, and

stress the importance of considering the

appropriate instrument. Impacts should be

assessed both qualitatively and quantitatively

while “strong efforts” should be made to

“go beyond a qualitative description of

the different costs and beneﬁts of the EU

intervention and seek to quantify them”.

However, the timing of Impact Assessments

complicates quantiﬁcation. According to a

recent study, Impact Assessments are used

more as a tool to choose between various

policy options and less, as in the case of the

USA, as a way to examine the ﬁnal policy

choice in detail.

Impact Assessments and

ex-post evaluations (the latter, as a result

of recent reforms, from 2017 onwards) are

34 A detailed analysis of Better Regulation is provided

in Schwieter, C. & Schout, A. (2018), forthcoming.

35 De Marcilly, C. & Touillon, M. (2015) The “Better

Regulation” programme: expertise over politics?,

in European issues, 370, https://www.robert-

schuman.eu/en/doc/questions-d-europe/

qe-370-en.pdf.

36 Smismans, S. (2015) Policy evaluation in the EU:

The challenges of linking ex ante and ex post

appraisal, in European Journal of Risk Regulation.

37 European Commission (2017a) Better Regulation

Guidelines, Brussels: EC.

38 Dudley, S. E. & Wegrich, K. (2016) The role

of transparency in regulatory governance:

Comparing US and EU regulatory systems,

in Journal of Risk Research, 19:9, DOI:

10.1080/13669877.2015.1071868.

subject to the scrutiny of the Regulatory

Scrutiny Board (formerly the Impact

Assessment Board). The Regulatory Scrutiny

Board is presented as an independent body

ensuring that “all initiatives take into account

all available evidence and stakeholder views

before political decision makers consider

what action to take”.

Case studies

Common Agricultural Policy (CAP)

The role of CAP shifted over time through

a series of reforms. Nowadays, it features

two pillars: income support to farmers and

rural development (including incentives to

preserve natural landscapes), amounting

to a total of around EUR 400 billion in the

last MFF.

Our analysis focuses on the ﬁrst

pillar (direct payments to farmers) but some

information on rural development policy is as

far, as available, included as well.

Many studies criticise CAP in relation to its

social role and its contribution to sustainable

development. Despite acknowledging

positive effects in terms of EAV with regard

to the stability of the single market in view

of harmonisation of agricultural policy and

ensuring a level playing ﬁeld in agriculture,

researchers have argued that its core

activities could be better carried out at the

national level.

In 1987, Padoa-Schioppa

et al. concluded that CAP was a European

anomaly given its unique social dimension

of redistributing money.

The famous Sapir

39 Ibidem.

40 CAP factsheet, retrieved from https://ec.europa.eu/

commission/index_en.

41 Here are some remarkable examples: Persson, T.,

Roland, G., Tabellini, G. (1996) The theory of ﬁscal

federalism: What does it mean for Europe? Kiel:

prepared for the conference Quo vadis Europe?;

Tabellini, G. (2002) The assignment of tasks in an

evolving European Union, Brussels: CEPS; Gros, D.,

Micossi, S. (2005) A better budget for the European

Union: More value for money, more money for value,

Brussels: CEPS.

42 Padoa-Schioppa, T. Emerson, M., King, M., Milleron,

J. C., Paelinck, J. H. P., Papademos, L. D., Pastor,

A., Scharpf, F. W. (1987) Efﬁciency, Stability and

Equity: A strategy for the evolution of the economic

system of the European Community, Oxford: Oxford

University Press.

Clingendael Policy Brief

Report therefore suggested decentralising

the distributive function of CAP to the

member states.

Therefore, referring to EAV,

the Sapir Report, the Bertelsmann Stiftung

and others

advocate discontinuation of CAP

in its current form.

Environmental sustainability, in the second

pillar of CAP, is carried out through greening

(more funds to farmers making use of eco-

friendly practices) and cross-compliance

conditions (less funds in case of disrespect

of EU law governing environmental, public

and animal health, animal welfare or land

management). Many studies have criticised

these provisions, considering them to be

inefﬁcient or insufﬁcient. The main issues

criticised are non-relevant objectives and

weak implementation,

ineffectiveness

in making greening friendlier towards the

environment

and poor preservation of

biodiversity.

However, Impact Assessments of the

Commission that were conducted in 2011 and

in 2018 (regarding the MFF of 2014-2020 and

of 2021-2027) draw different conclusions.

These Impact Assessments offer mainly

qualitative assessments and are unclear as

to why the EU level is the most appropriate

43 Sapir, A., Aghion, P., Bertola, G., Hellwig, M., Pisani-

Ferry, J., Vinals, J. & Wallace, H. (2003) An agenda

for a growing Europe: The Sapir report, Oxford:

Oxford University Press. See also: Bertelsmann

Stiftung (2017) How Europe can deliver: Optimising

the division of competences among the EU and its

member states, Gütersloh: Bertelsmann Stiftung.

44 Hoelgaard, I. (2018) A modern Common Agricultural

Policy (CAP) post 2020, mimeo.

45 Alliance Environnement and the Thünen Institute

(2017) Evaluation study of the payment for

agricultural practices beneﬁcial for the climate

and the environment, Brussels: EC.

46 European Court of Auditors (2017) Greening:

a more complex income support scheme, not

yet environmentally effective, Special Report,

Luxembourg: ECA.

47 Pe’er, G., L. Dicks, P. Visconti, R. Arlettaz, A. Báldi,

T.G. Benton, S. Collins, M. Dieterich, R.D. Gregory,

F. Hartig, K. Henle, P.R. Hobson, D. Kleijn, R.K.

Neumann, T. Robijns, J. Schmidt, A. Shwartz,

W.J. Sutherland, A. Turbé, F. Wulf & A.V. Scott

(2014) EU agricultural reform fails on biodiversity, in

Science 344(6188) .

level. The 2011 Impact Assessment claims

that CAP would “ensure a more efﬁcient use

of the budgetary resources of the Member

States vis-à-vis the coexistence of national

policies”

but fails to substantiate this

statement. Similarly, the Commission lists a

number of advantages, such as developing

“a competitive and balanced European

agriculture from an environmental and

territorial point of view”, and “delivering on

key dimensions of sustainability challenges

like climate change, water use, air quality

and biodiversity via the CAP environmental

architecture”

, without offering the required

corroboration.

As regards the preference for the EU budget

as the appropriate instrument and level of

governance, neither Impact Assessment goes

into detail. For example, the 2018 Impact

Assessment simply claims that “most of the

challenges identiﬁed […] have cross-border

and global nature which require a common

action at EU level”.

However, referring to

the transnational nature does not mean the

EU is the most appropriate actor to intervene

or that the EU budget is the required

instrument. Similarly, the Commission’s EAV

study also concludes regarding CAP that

“if Member States were thrown back on

their own ﬁnancial resources, many of them

would not be in a position to help their farm

sectors and rural economies along the path

of sustainable development” and stresses

that the EU budget is key.

Defending

ﬁnancial transfers, the Commission argues

that solidarity is a key component of EAV in

CAP even though the European Parliament

and the Council underlined how “the

distribution of direct income support among

farmers is characterised by the allocation of

disproportionate amounts of payments to a

48 European Commission (2011b) Impact Assessment

Common Agricultural Policy towards 2020, Brussels:

EC.

49 European Commission (2018c) Proposal for a

Regulation of the European Parliament and of the

Council, COM(2018) 392 ﬁnal, Brussels: EC.

50 European Commission (2018d) Impact Assessment

accompanying the document COM(2018) 392 ﬁnal,

SWD(2018) 301 ﬁnal, Brussels: EC.

51 European Commission (2011a) op. cit.

Clingendael Policy Brief

rather small number of large beneﬁciaries”.

‘Solidarity’ in the context of CAP is open to

different interpretations.

A complication in assessing EAV in CAP is

the lack of overall ex-post evaluation.

This

has implications for the Better Regulation

cycle in which it is assumed that new

policy proposals are based on the ex-post

evaluation of the previous programme. The

outcomes of the previous CAP programme

could be helpful specifying sources of EAV

or alternative instruments. Looking at the

role of the Regulatory Scrutiny Board in the

Better Regulation process, we see that its

opinions on the recent Impact Assessments

accompanying the 2

May MFF proposal

for the two CAP pillars to not mention EAV

nor are the statements on EAV in the Impact

Assessments questioned.

Cohesion Policy

Cohesion Policy consists of three funds: the

European Social Fund (ESF set up in 1958)

addressing social challenges such as poverty,

exclusion and education; the European

Regional Development Fund (ERDF created

in 1975) to strengthen regional economic

and social cohesion through investments

in competitiveness; and the Cohesion Fund

(CF) for assisting economic integration of

poorer countries where GDP is below 90%

of the EU-27 average.

Cohesion Policy

embodies the solidarity between richer and

poorer Member States.

The assessment of

Its added value is derived from the alleged

positive role in the promotion of economic

convergence between regions, its macro-

economic anti-cyclical effect,

and in its

interaction with innovation policies.

52 European Parliament, Council of the European

Union (2013) Regulation (EU) No 1307/2013.

53 See also Wolff, G. & Darvas, Z. (2018) op. cit.

54 European Commission (2014a) An introduction to

EU Cohesion Policy 2014-2020, Brussels: EC.

55 European Commission (2017b) Panorama: Cohesion

Policy looks to the future, Brussels: EC.

56 European Commission (2011a) op. cit. and European

Commission (2012) Expert evaluation network

delivering policy analysis on the performance of

Cohesion Policy 2007-2013, Brussels: EC.

The added value identiﬁed include

– Cohesion added value: reduction in

economic and social disparities;

– Political added value: enhanced visibility

of the EU and increased participation of

different actors;

– Operational added value: changes

to institutional arrangements or

implementation methods;

– Learning added value: exchange of

practical experiences, good practices,

know-how.

These categories encompass both qualitative

and quantitative assessments. While

qualitatively scholars support the general

notion of EAV, quantitative assessments

are mixed. Despite an impressive number

of evaluations

, quantitative studies do not

allow the conclusion that Cohesion Policy is

effective in fostering economic convergence

between European regions (i.e. providing

cohesion added value). The review by Wolff

and Darvas

challenges claims of clear

advantages in Cohesion Policy.

It seems

relevant to mention that most studies do

not refer to EAV; literature speciﬁcally on

EAV is scarce.

Moreover, where EAV is

mentioned, doubts exist given a bias due to

lack of attention for possible negative effects

of regional funds.

Some assessments

conclude that the GDP gap between richer

and poorer regional areas is widening over

57 Bachtler, J. & Taylor, S. (2003) The Added Value

of the Structural Funds: A regional perspective,

Glasgow: EPRC.

58 European Commission (2014b) Expert evaluation

network on the performance of Cohesion Policy

2007-2013: Synthesis of National Reports 2013,

Brussels: EC, estimates 821 evaluations for

ERDF programmes and 721 evaluations for ESF

programmes.

59 Wolff, G. & Darvas, Z. (2018) op. cit.

60 E.g. Mairate, A. (2006) The “Added Value” of

European Union Cohesion Policy, in Regional

Studies, 40.2, Routhledge.

61 Bachtler, J. & Polverari, L. (2014) Balance of

Competences, Cohesion Review, Literature review

on EU Cohesion Policy, Glasgow: EPRC.

62 Tarschys, D. (2005) The Enigma of European Added

Value, Stockholm: SIEPS.

Clingendael Policy Brief

time

or that the overall impact of Cohesion

Policy is irrelevant or even negative.

Moreover, the ambiguous relation between

Cohesion Policy funds and the principle

of additionality is seldom addressed.

There is indeed evidence of the funds not

being additional: for instance, the Italian

Mezzogiorno catching up with the northern

regions of the country is almost entirely due

to European funds and replaces a national

plan.

Underlining the risk of crowding out

private or national funds,

Structural Funds

account for up to 80%

of the overall public

spending in mid-EU member states. Another

critical conclusion regarding Cohesion Policy

is related to mismanagement of resources

and to corruption. A report evaluating the

corruption level of the average EU Cohesion

country concluded that the results were

worse than the average for the EU and

Western Europe.

Evidence points to the

63 Rosés, J. R. & Wolf, N. (2018) Regional economic

development in Europe, 1900-2010: A description of

the patterns, in Economic History Working Papers,

London: LSE.

64 Examples are Dall’Erba, S. & Le Gallo, J., (2008)

Regional convergence and the impact of European

structural funds over 1989-1999: A spatial

econometric analysis, in Papers in Regional Science,

87(2), or Hagen T. & Mohl, P. (2008) Which is the

right dose of EU Cohesion Policy for economic

growth, in ZEW Discussion Papers 08-104.

65 Del Bo, C. F. & Sirtori, E. (2015) Additionality and

regional public ﬁnance – Evidence from Italy, in

Environment and Planning C: Government and

Policy, 34, Thousand Oaks: SAGE.

66 Kokko, A., Tingvall, P. G., and Videnord, J. (2015)

The Growth Effects of R&D Spending in the EU:

A Meta-Analysis in Economics: The Open-Access,

Open-Assessment E-Journal, 9 (2015-40): 1—26.

http://dx.doi.org/10.5018/economics-ejournal.

ja.2015-40.

67 Data are available online on the European

Commission website: https://cohesiondata.

ec.europa.eu/Country-Level/-of-cohesion-policy-

funding-in-public-investment-p/7bw6-2dw3.

68 Transparency International (2016) Corruption

Perceptions Index 2015 – Transparency International,

http://www.transparency.org/cpi2015#results-

table.

EU funds increasing the risk of corruption in

Central and Eastern Europe.

The lack of consensus among scholars about

the impact of the policy is partly explained

by the methodological approaches used.

Four major methods are used to assess the

impact of Cohesion Policy (the former two are

more macro; the latter two more micro)

– Macroeconomic models: examples are

HERMIN, QUEST, RHOMOLO or NEMESIS.

They are highly dependent on “model

speciﬁcation, statistical methodologies

and observations”,

they work better at

the national than at the regional level and

assume that funding is fully absorbed and

efﬁciently spent;

– Econometric regression analyses are

regarded as less biased, but are based

on assumptions which can hardly apply

outside of the theoretical context;

– Micro-economic studies: they are more

sector-speciﬁc and in-depth but are not

applicable outside of the speciﬁc context

for which they have been designed;

– Case studies: they can allow an extremely

in-depth analysis but provide qualitative

and often unclear results and lack a

counterfactual comparison.

These methods share additional complications

such as the lack of quality data, especially

on a regional or local scale, the intertwining

of Cohesion Policy with other EU or national

policies, the mixture of economic and political

goals, the varying time lags needed for

Cohesion Policies to take effect, and costs.

69 Fazekas, M., Chvalkovska, J. Skuhrovec, J., Tóth, I. J.

& King, L. P. (2013) Are EU Funds a Corruption

Risk? The Impact of EU Funds on Grand Corruption

in Central and Eastern Europe, The Anticorruption

Frontline. The ANTICORRP Project 2: 68–89.

70 Davies, S. (2017) Does Cohesion policy work? Meta-

review of research on the effectiveness of Cohesion

Policy, Glasgow: EPRC.

71 Busillo, F., Muccigrosso, T., Pellegrini, G., Tarola, O. &

Terribile, F. (2010) Measuring the effects of European

regional policy on economic growth: A regression

discontinuity approach, Rome: UVAL.

72 Fratesi, U. (2016) Impact assessment of EU Cohesion

policy: theoretical and empirical issues, in Piattoni, S.

& Polverari, L. [eds] (2016) Handbook on Cohesion

Policy in the EU, Cheltenham: Edward Elgar

Publishing.

Clingendael Policy Brief

Only the ﬁrst two methods are capable of

providing estimates about the impact of

Cohesion Policy at macro level. According

to Pienkowski and Berkowitz (2015)

macroeconomic models, used extensively

by the Commission, have a tendency to

overestimate Cohesion’s beneﬁts with

respect to econometric analyses.

In effect,

the monetary return estimate of Cohesion

Policy, calculated by the Commission at

€2.74 (return on €1 CF investment in terms

of direct and indirect effects by 2023),

the result of the application of two different

models, i.e. QUEST and RHOMOLO. The

features of these models and the difﬁculties

underlined above make it hard to view

this estimate as objective. Econometric

models offer more balanced and mixed

results,

for instance, EAV studies based

on an econometric regression ﬁnd a lower

monetary return, i.e. around 1.5.

When linking EAV studies in Cohesion Policy

to the Commission´s Better Regulation

agenda, we note a timing problem. The

policy cycle requires Impact Assessments

to be based on previous ex-post evaluations

(conducted at least one year before the

73 Pienkowski, J. & Berkowitz, P. (2015) Econometric

assessments of Cohesion Policy growth effects:

How to make them more relevant for policy makers?

Brussels: EC.

74 European Commission (2016a) Ex post evaluation of

Cohesion Policy programmes 2007-2013, focusing on

the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF)

and the Cohesion Fund (CF), Brussels: EC.

75 See for instance Fratesi, U. & Perucca, G. (2014)

Territorial capital and effectiveness of Cohesion

Policies: an assessment for CEE regions, in

Investigaciones Regionales, 29 (2014), Alcalá:

University of Alcalá, or Becker, S. O., Egger, P.

& von Ehrlich, M. (2018) Effects of EU Regional

Policy: 1989-2013, in Regional Science and Urban

Economics, retrieved in http://doi.org/10.1016/j.

regsciurbeco.2017.12.001.

76 Becker, S. O., Egger, P. H, von Ehrlich, M. (2010)

Going NUTS: The effect of EU Structural Funds on

regional performance, retrieved from https://www.

journals.elsevier.com/journal-of-public-economics/.

Impact Assessment)

and the resulting

recommendations. The latest Impact

Assessment, presented together with the

proposal for the new MFF, was not based on,

at least, a mid-term evaluation of Cohesion

Policy (only a mid-term evaluation for the

whole MFF has been produced

and its

attention to Cohesion Policy and EAV is

marginal). Furthermore, there are examples

of ex-post evaluations not even mentioning

the term EAV. This is somewhat surprising

given the alleged importance of the

concept.

Moreover, EAV is referred to only

once in the RSB’s four Opinions issued in the

context of Cohesion Policy. There, the RSB

asks to better explain the sources of added

value in the European Social Fund.

Innovation Policy

Innovation policy is mainly conducted

through the multiannual Framework

Programmes (FPs), with the last one, Horizon

2020, amounting to around EUR 80 billion.

The aim is to foster research and support

the development of the European Research

Area (ERA – initiated in 2000). R&D policy

is widely regarded as an area with a high

added value, as demonstrated by the

Commission proposal to cut funding for CAP

and regional policy and to shift emphasis to

R&D.

The literature on the matter shows a

general consensus about the higher added

value of R&D compared to that of CAP and

77 Van Golen, T. & van Voorst, S. (2016) Towards a

regulatory cycle? The use of evaluative information

in Impact Assessment and Ex-post Evaluations in

the European Union, in European Journal on Risk

Regulation.

78 European Commission (2016b) Mid-term review/

revision of the multiannual ﬁnancial framework

2014-2020: An EU budget focused on results,

COM(2016)0603 ﬁnal, Brussels: EC.

79 An example is in Ciffolilli, A., Greunz, L., Naldini, A.,

Ward, T. & Wolleb, E. (2014) Expert evaluation

network on the performance of Cohesion Policy

2007-2013, Brussels: EC.

80 Regulatory Scrutiny Board (2016) Opinion: Ex-post

evaluation of the 2007-2013 European Social Fund

programmes, Brussels: EC.

81 European Commission (2018a) op. cit.

Clingendael Policy Brief

Cohesion.

Empirical evidence points to

positive externalities and economies of scale

in certain areas, even though centralisation

has some drawbacks, e.g. related to changes

in national R&D strategies and priorities.

However, initially, attempts to quantify EAV

were rare and the literature was not using

solid indicators to prove added value.

This initial lack of attention may have

been due to the relative low importance

attached to EAV until the Fifth Framework

Programme (1998-2002) when EAV served

as a merely

formal selection criterion not

subject to careful scrutiny. With the FP5, the

Commission stressed the centrality of the

concept and made it a high-end objective,

always to be pursued. However, EAV did

not become more relevant in the policy

selection process: a meta-evaluation was

not able to ﬁnd cases “where it was argued

EAV […] was not being achieved”.

In effect,

making EAV a strategic goal rendered it

even more vague as it condoned every form

of cooperation between countries.

Thus,

EAV in the R&D sector has usually been

described through qualitative assessments,

82 Examples are Gros, D. (2008) How to achieve a

better budget for the European Union? Brussels:

CEPS; ECORYS, Netherlands Bureau for Economic

Policy Analysis & Institute for Economic Research

(2008) A study on EU spending. Final Report,

Rotterdam: EC; Begg, I. (2009) Fiscal Federalism,

Subsidiarity and the EU budget review, Stockholm:

SIEPS.

83 Van der Horst, A., Lejour, A. & Straathof, B. (2006)

Innovation Policy: Europe or the Member States?

The Hague: CPB Netherlands Bureau for Economic

Policy Analysis.

84 Underlined in Bertelsmann Stiftung (2013) The

European Added Value of EU spending: Can the EU

help its Member States to save money?, Gütersloh:

Bertelsmann Stiftung.

85 Yellow Window Management Consultants (2000)

Identifying the constituent elements of the European

Added Value (EAV) of the EU RTD programmes:

conceptual analysis based on practical experience,

Final Report for the DG XII.

86 Technopolis Group (2004) The Impact of the EU

Framework Programmes in the UK, Ofﬁce of Science

and Technology, DTI.

87 Stampfer, M. (2008) European Added Value of

Community Research Activities: Expert Analysis in

support of the Ex Post Evaluation of FP6, Vienna:

WWTF.

related to the transnational nature of some

forms of R&D

and including: creation of

EU-wide networks, increase in geographic

scope, more efﬁcient project coordination,

reduction of redundancy, cross-border spill-

overs and economies of scale.

In recent years, attempts have been made

to deepen the evidence-based legitimacy of

the Framework Programmes. An inﬂuential

quantiﬁcation of the added value of FP7

(2007-2013) reported an impressive

return rate of every euro invested by the

Commission generating up to 11 euro in a

25-year period.

The calculations

used the

NEMESIS macroeconomic model and, as

such, were affected by leverage estimations

and a priori assumptions (see section

above). Despite its value, such a quantitative

assessment may have to be treated with

caution as EAV in R&D is regarded as

“rarely quantiﬁable”

and carrying out

effective calculations has been dubbed

as a “mission impossible”.

Moreover,

the €1-to-€11 assessment of EAV raises

questions concerning opportunity costs and

about whether the EU budget is indeed the

appropriate instrument. For example, would

EAV have been higher if national funds had

been enlarged and used more directly to

88 European Commission (2016c) Ex-post evaluation of

the Seventh Framework Programme, Brussels: EC.

89 Technopolis Group & Empirica Gesellschaft für

Kommunikations- und Technologieforschung

mbH (2014) European Added Value of EU Science,

Technology and Innovation actions and EU-Member

State Partnership in international cooperation,

Luxembourg: Publication Ofﬁce of the EU.

90 Commitment and Coherence, High Level Expert

Group (2015) Ex-post-evaluation of the 7

Framework Programme (2007-2013).

91 Which were based on two yearly reports, namely

Zagamé, P., Fougeyrollas, A. & le Mouël, P. (2012)

Consequences of the 2013 FP7 call for proposals

for the economy and employment in the European

Union, Paris: ERASME and Fougeyrollas, A., Le

Mouël, P. & Zagamé, P., (2012), Consequences of

the 2012 FP7 call for proposals for the economy and

employment in the European Union, Paris: ERASME.

92 European Parliament (2010) Reﬂection paper on the

concept of European Added Value, Luxembourg:

Publication Ofﬁce of the European Union.

93 Yellow Window Management Consultants (2000)

op. cit.

Clingendael Policy Brief

support national economic activities? Could

efﬁciency advantages have been achieved

by steering universities towards cooperation

rather than using the EU budget (e.g. by

stimulating cooperation incentives in national

research budgets, through benchmarking

exercises, and by giving information

about the advantages of cross-border

cooperation)?

Another study

conducting a similar

analysis of the effects of both FP7 and

Horizon 2020 concluded a lower EAV

(approximately 1-to-9) for FP7 and around

1-to-6 for Horizon 2020. The study uses

other assessment methods, such as a

novel bibliometric approach, interviews

and surveys. Subsidiarity is not addressed

by the study, and additionality is proven

through stakeholders interviews

. 83% of

the projects would have not been initiated

without European funds. An earlier study

of the ambitious Esprit research funds

concluded that project proposals that had

not been funded had nevertheless continued

(underlining the value of network building

over granting subsidies

). References to

these two principles can be found in most

of the Commission’s documents although

the factual basis is not always clear. The

Impact Assessment of the recent Europe

2020 states that “action at the EU level is

necessary” without apparent justiﬁcation of

subsidiarity.

There is less consensus about

the different areas of R&D. EAV in Innovation

Policy is unanimously found in case of well-

deﬁned and large-scale projects, whereas

in other areas, such as societal challenges

94 PPMI (2017) Assessment of the Union Added Value

and the economic impact of the EU Framework

Programmes (FP7, Horizon 2020), Luxembourg:

Publication Ofﬁce of the European Union.

95 On the possible over-reliance of the Juncker

Commission on stakeholders interviews, see

Schwieter, C. & Schout, A. (2018), forthcoming.

96 http://www.stuartmacdonald.uk.com/wp-content/

uploads/2014/02/Esprit.pdf.

97 European Commission (2018e) Impact Assessment

SWD(2018) 307 ﬁnal, Brussels: EC.

or education, opinions are mixed and

sometimes negative.

The Better Regulation evaluation cycle

performs better than in Cohesion Policy and

CAP: the latest Impact Assessment released

for Horizon Europe (FP9) was built on a mid-

term evaluation of the previous programme,

differently from CAP and Cohesion Policy,

and the number of Impact Assessments

and evaluation is satisfactory. We noted a

generally greater effort in conducting studies

and producing evidence, which could be

explained by the Commission’s political

interest in the innovation area. Still, the role

of EAV in many of these studies appears

limited in comparison to the funding involved

and the claims of political added value.

Conclusions

To convince change-resistant national

politicians of the need to cooperate at

EU level, and to create transparency of

the beneﬁts of the EU budget, the EU

Commission has put European Added Value

(EAV) central stage in its communications

of new proposals. EAV is presented as a key

analytical decision-making tool in, among

others, the negotiations on the multiannual

EU budget (MFF). The search for EAV is

part of a wider endeavour to ensure that EU

policies are evidence-based. Together with

the Better Regulation methodology, EAV

creates the impression of evidence-based

policy making. The review of the available

material indicates that the concept of EAV

does not (yet) live up to the expectations:

– Despite the alleged centrality of EAV, few

studies directly address it in a substantial

(fact-based) manner.

– As far as EAV is substantiated, the

different models and the varying degrees

of quantiﬁcations show considerable

differences within each of the three

98 E.g. Wanzenböck, I. & Frenken, K. (2018) The

subsidiarity principle: Turning challenge-oriented

innovation policy on its head, in Papers in

Evolutionary Economic Geography, Utrecht: Urban

& Regional Research Centre Utrecht with regard

to societal challenges and Bertelsmann Stiftung

(2017) op. cit. in relation to education.

Clingendael Policy Brief

case studies. Methodological difﬁculties

hamper the substantive use of EAV.

These difﬁculties include deﬁnition

problems, the impossibility to usefully

quantify EAV, major differences between

countries, and the lack of quality data.

As a result, the claims regarding EAV in,

for example, Commission documents cast

doubts about the Commission’s objectivity

and sometimes create the impression

of political preferences presented as

unsubstantiated added value.

Added value is certainly important and

reﬂection is required on strengthening the

legitimacy of claims of EAV:

– The role of the Regulatory Scrutiny Board

(RSB) in solidifying EAV seems to be

in need of reinforcement. The Scrutiny

Board appears to be under-resourced

and its location within the Commission

hampers its external credibility. The RSB

also pays little attention to claims made

by the Commission on added value and

claims on EAV are hardly questioned.

– The policy cycle in the Better Regulation

Agenda is not always functioning

properly. Major Commission proposals

lack impact assessments and ex-post

assessments are either absent (see the

case of the CAP) or delayed and hence

cannot be part of the preparation of

subsequent impact assessments (as in

the case of Cohesion Policy – more work

is put into ex-post assessments in the

R&D policy).

– Attention for alternative instruments

other than the budget is poor. Generally,

EAV studies lack key questions as

to whether the budget is the most

appropriate tool. A point of concern is

also the extent to which compliance

with the principles of subsidiarity and

additionality – a necessary precondition

for EAV and sometimes used as synonyms

for EAV – is checked.

– The role of the European Court of

Auditors is already developing from

auditing of the legality of expenses to

ex post assessments. This development

is however recent. With the deepening

of European integration, a considerable

reinforcement of the EU Court of Auditors

is in order.

The literature indicates a higher potential

for EAV in R&D than in CP and CAP. Yet, the

review of the available material suggests

that EAV in its current form is (so far) not a

suitable concept to act as a key test justifying

EU spending. This corroborates earlier and

more limited reviews and discussions of EAV.

As it is currently organised, EAV is largely

a political topic argument under the veil

of objectivity. EAV remains, potentially, an

important topic but additional investments

are required to increase the quality and

the quantity of added value studies. As

it currently operates, EAV arguments do

not enhance trust in proposals nor in the

Commission. More fact-based studies are

required, as is greater independence of

studies. The way EAV is used now indicates

that the evaluation culture of the EU and the

Commission falls short of the ambitions as

formulated. The next EU Commission needs

to consider its credibility (as was the case

twenty years ago

99 Majone, G. (2000), ‘The Credibility Crisis of

Community Regulation’, Journal of Common

Market Studies, 38/2, 273-302.

About the Clingendael Institute

Clingendael – the Netherlands Institute of International Relations –

is a leading think tank and academy on international affairs.

Through our analyses, training and public debate we aim to inspire

and equip governments, businesses, and civil society in order to

contribute to a secure, sustainable and just world.

www.clingendael.org  @clingendaelorg

info@clingendael.org  The Clingendael Institute

+31 70 324 53 84  The Clingendael Institute

About the authors

Adriaan Schout is Senior Research Fellow and Coordinator Europe at

the Clingendael Institute. He combines research and consultancy on

European governance questions for national and European institutions.

He has worked on projects addressing issues of the EU presidency,

EU integration and Improving EU regulation, amongst others.

Davide Bevacqua is a former research assistant at Clingendael’s

Europe and the EU Research Unit.