Policy networks and European union policy making: A reply to Kassim

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Abstract
The policy networks model recently has become a more frequent analytical tool of EU policy analysts. In a recent article, Hussein Kassim offers a sceptical view about its applicability to the EU. Kassim fails to make explicit the key variables — or internal characteristics of policy networks ‐ which help to explain policy outcomes. However, his own analysis echoes many of the assumptions of the model: that policy networks are rife in the EU because they facilitate informal bargaining amid fluid policy processes, that networks provide order amid extreme institutional complexity and frequent change, and that the hard work involved in identifying EU policy networks is worth the effort. The policy networks model requires further testing and refinement at the EU level, but it remains the most analytically powerful approach on offer.