Industry’s growth architects – an Analysis of an emerging European industrial policy in a classic national domain

Abstract

This work wants to resume the so far scholarly overlooked scope and use of European industrial policy and help to understand if the EU had an impact on national principles of industrial policy. Based on current typologies of industrial policy, this thesis develops a very own one, which centres on which policy targets are part of industrial policy and on which level they intervene, to display which state’s action can be considered industrial policy. The theoretical concepts of governance architectures and national growth models are used. Both concepts claim that a sustainable policy change is only possible if legitimized by a larger audience. The concept of dominant social blocs is used to display how the adjustment of industrial policy is legitimized.The results display that national industrial policy is highly influenced by states’ individual growth models. These present the conception of national industrial policy and determine the adoption of European ideas. The major effects of Europeanization can be detected among new fields of industry such as electric mobility. This work clearly displays that national growth models are combined with new structural concepts, shared by the European Union. In conclusion, national growth models determine the conceptualisation of industrial policy and furthermore the adoption of European industrial policy.