Under which conditions is Cohesion Policy effective: proposing an Hirschmanian approach to EU structural funds

Under which conditions is EU Cohesion Policy effective? Which are those 'conditioning factors' that help in explaining where, when, and how the Cohesion Policy is effective? This article adopts an Hirschmanian approach to argue that that the institutional characteristics of domestic authorities involved in the management of funds, as well as the decisions of policy makers, represent the key factors for understanding the effects of the Cohesion Policy in European regions. By using Cohesion Policy implementation in Italy and Spain as a pilot study, this article empirically investigates the interaction of three different types of factors (institutional, strategic [related to the types of investments made], and administrative), and elaborates an original framework for comparing different Cohesion Policy implementations, and existing studies analyzing the impact of the Cohesion Policy. The framework presented in this article could be extended to other European countries by political scientists who are interested in studying the Cohesion Policy as a case of development policy.