IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/jcmkts/v63y2025i4p1027-1051.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The Role of Electoral Interests in the National Distribution of EU Covid‐19 Funds

Author

Listed:
  • Romy Hansum

Abstract

Expectations are high regarding the impact of the extensive Covid‐19 crisis support ‘Next Generation EU’. Mixed experiences from established EU distributive policies indicate, though, that ultimate policy outcomes largely depend on national implementation decisions. This article scrutinises vote‐buying strategies according to which domestic governments exploit the largely autonomous national distribution of EU funds to target certain constituencies. To study national strategies, the analysis takes advantage of the extraordinary leeway given to domestic governments in distributing REACT‐EU funds, part of Next Generation EU. The encompassing quantitative analysis covers a large sample of member states and committed funds. The regression results provide no support that national governments distribute REACT‐EU funds to politically opportune regions. In a departure from most previous analyses focusing on specific member states, these findings suggest that vote buying is not the dominant strategy in the national implementation of all EU funds.

Suggested Citation

  • Romy Hansum, 2025. "The Role of Electoral Interests in the National Distribution of EU Covid‐19 Funds," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 63(4), pages 1027-1051, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:jcmkts:v:63:y:2025:i:4:p:1027-1051
    DOI: 10.1111/jcms.13711
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/jcms.13711
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/jcms.13711?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:jcmkts:v:63:y:2025:i:4:p:1027-1051. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/journal.asp?ref=0021-9886 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.