Territorial Cohesion – Current Views of the Commission and the Member States of the European Union

Abstract

Although the Constitutional Treaty of the European Union (which failed because of negative referenda in France and the Netherlands) and the EU Treaty of Lisbon (which at least temporarily failed after the negative referendum in Ireland) have not yet come into effect, these new treaties established "territorial cohesion" as a new basic goal of the European Union in addition to "economic and social cohesion". In this context, EU ministers responsible for spatial development and territorial cohesion as well as the European Commission have started a debate on the meaning and interpretation of territorial cohesion and the elements, challenges, and strategies of a territorial cohesion policy. Territorial cohesion, as the wording implies, combines cohesion policies and territorial policies complementarily. It adds the element of territory to cohesion policy and to economic and social cohesion, and it emphasises the aspect of cohesion within European spatial and territorial policies. In this spirit, one could suppose that, on the one hand, cohesion policy involves more than territorial cohesion and that, on the other hand, territorial policy includes more than territorial cohesion. In this article I will explore what contributions EU ministers responsible for territorial cohesion and the European Commission have recently made to shaping and clarifying the policy object of territorial cohesion in Europe.