EU-bargaining situations:: a theoretical analysis of the common fisheries policy

On the basis of an actor-centered institutionalist approach, the article provides a theoretical framework for the analysis of bargaining outcomes in the EU utilizing the Common Fisheries Policy as a case study. The research design is quite simple: a set of independent variables (member states' preferences, the European Commission's preferences and the institutional setting) is used to try to determine the dependent variable (the bargaining outcomes). This theoretical framework is then applied to two key negotiations which led to the establishment of the Common Fisheries Policy. Whereas the first bargaining situation deals with the negotiations on the settlement of the structural policy and of the common market organisation for fisheries products, the second focuses on the conservation and management policy of fish stocks. The central issue, besides member states' preferences, is to show the impact which the Commission's preferences, along with formal (unanimity voting) and informal rules (shadow of the future), had on the outcome of the two bargaining situations under consideration.