Social democracy, Social Europe, and the “post‐Third way agenda”: From the European Pillar of Social Rights to the Covid‐19 pandemic

• Published in: Constellations Vol. 27; no. 4; pp. 608 - 620
• Main Authors: Corti, Francesco, Vesan, Patrik
• Format: Journal Article Web Resource
• Language: English
• Published: Hoboken John Wiley & Sons, Inc 01.12.2020; Blackwell Publishing Ltd
• Subjects: COVID-19; Democratization; Employment; Employment policies; European cultural groups; Legislatures; Pandemics; Social democracy; Social democratic parties; Social policy; Europe
• ISSN: 1351-0487; 1467-8675
• DOI: 10.1111/1467-8675.12534

[...]the recent appointment of Von der Leyen as President of the European Commission, with the support of the social and democrats (S&D) group1 1 For acronyms, see the appendix. in the European Parliament, has contributed to widen such a window of opportunity, as immediately emerged from the working program of the new European Commission and the answers it provided to the outbreak of the Covid‐19 pandemic crisis. In 2000, the European Commission, the Parliament and the Council adopted a solemn proclamation on the European Charter of Fundamental Rights. [...]in the same year, the European Council launched the so‐called Lisbon Agenda, which aimed at transforming the EU in the most competitive and dynamic “knowledge‐based economy”. [...]new modes of governance based on the so‐called Open Method of Coordination were introduced, thus extending the potential influence of the EU institutions in the domain of employment and social policies, beyond the strict EU legislative competences (Zeitlin et al., 2005). [...]implementation led to the adoption of a “supply‐side” social democratic policy agenda, which ‐ along with paying lip service to the idea of “social investment” (Hemerijck, 2013) ‐ was often accompanied by “internal devaluation” policy measures (Armingeon