European policy coordination processes are the governments' central tool to shape its European policies.  They enable the governments to participate in the European law making process and their support is crucial for the input legitimacy of the European Union (EU). Meanwhile, they are partly considered as inefficient or even as ineffective.  Especially the German process is criticised.  But this criticism is disputable.

The criteria for the coordination processes' evaluation differ, because an usable or applicable definition of "coordination" (and related with: coordination process) does not exist.  This missing definition is obstructive for the comparative analyses and produces studies that compare only a part of the process and that do not account for the national context.  Hence, their results are often not meaningful, their proposals seem not realisable or at least not promising.  Additionally, efficiency as a coordination process feature is not "measurable."

In my thesis, I use a different method.  Coordination processes are defined as negotiation processes, from which the participants expect a "better" result as without the use of coordination (while using the least possible amount of resources).  Better results especially include a Pareto efficient solution.  National policy coordination processes shape the government's policies.  They combine differing interests to produce the government's preferences, while limiting the formal recourse to hierarchical decision-making.  I assume that a coordination process which generates regularly non-satisfying results has to have structural defects (=ineffectiveness) or structural deficiencies (=inefficiency).  I also choose a different starting point: The national governments' common policy coordination processes.  Other studies analyse the European policy coordination processes as independent processes.  In my thesis, they are adaptations of the "normal" processes to the European constraints.  I suppose furthermore, that common processes are principally efficient. Otherwise, the continuing existence of the government would be endangered.

This change of perspective results in a intra-governmental comparison, researching the differences between the common and the European policy coordination processes.  I analyse the sequence of the processes and identify structural deficiencies.  The latter arise from the requirements to coordination (they are, as mentioned, paradox) combined with the tasks and functions of the government's internal decision-making process.  This analytical grid contains 14 indicators.  For example, the human resources provided for the function "Determination of preference" could be too limited (an institutional deficiency) or the result of the process does not consider all recognisable interests (a process deficiency).  In a second step, case studies verify if the possible structural deficiencies produce significant effects.  Furthermore, if a government fulfils the requirements of a function especially well, this can be considered as a "strength."

I find out that while there are signs for structural deficiency or for the suboptimal adaptation to European requirements or constraints, there is no proof that these deficiencies produce regularly "bad" results (i. e. non representation of important national preferences).  Contrarily, there are no hints for such a systematic relationship.  Hence, the European policy coordination processes of the three governments analysed are not inefficient (nor ineffective).

Furthermore, the basic demands for the processes are similar and, at first sight, the processes show similar features.  The (possible decisive) differences are in the details.  Finally, transferring the advantages or strengths of one government's process to another government's process is not possible, because their adaptation margin is almost completely used.  Further improvements of the European policy coordination process require changes to the fundamental structures of the government and are therefore impractical and unrealistic.

An example illustrates these difficulties.  The British process shows an impressive speed (reaction rate) and produces well defined positions.  Contrarily, the German position is often not clear and is presented rather "late."  Meanwhile, if the German government identifies a dossier as important, it is also able to present its preferences precisely and is assertive.  Furthermore, flexibility in producing its positions can be an advantage because it leaves room for negotiations.  Finally, a fast decision-making process that ignores major interests is not efficient.  Problems raise when the policy is implemented.  The European Secretariat, which is in the British government (together with the private office of the Foreign secretary) responsible for organising the negotiations in the competent cabinet committees, is not a body independently created for European policy purposes.  Its functioning and composition is largely similar to the other cabinet secretariats.  If one tried to transfer this body into the German policy-making administration, a partial disempowerment of the departments would be required.  Furthermore, the decision-making procedure in cabinet would have to be changed, cabinet committees would have to be really used, and either the office of the Chancellor (Bundeskanzleramt) would have to prepare the cabinet committee agendas or a new body would have to be established.  This short list clarifies that a transfer of one government to another is not a meaningful project.  To improve considerably the European policy coordination processes, the European level must gain importance.