Visions franco-allemandes - Breakthrough for Decentralized Franco-German cooperation? Perspectives after the Aachen Treaty Visions franco-allemandes, No. 30, Ifri, June 2020
The development of Franco-German cooperation can be described as an intergovernmental process. Depending on the perspective, the capacity for innovation of the relationship lies either with central decision-makers at the state level or with decentralized actors at the local level.
This Vision franco-allemande analyzes the Aachen Treaty and the French-German Parliamentary Agreement as regards new possibilities for decentralized cooperation. The paper concludes that Treaty and Agreement have the potential to overcome persisting obstacles, permitting to take decentralized cooperation to a new level. In order to succeed, political and pragmatic approaches are necessary: Politically, local, regional and national levels need to be linked up; pragmatically, a consequent policy of results is to be pursued.
Andreas Marchetti is honorary professor at the University of Paderborn and regularly teaches at the Franco-German campus of the Parisian Institut d'Études Politiques (Sciences Po) in Nancy. He was Associate Research Fellow at the Cerfa at the Ifri in 2009/2010.
This publication is available the following languages:
- FRENCH: "Briser le plafond de verre ? La coopération franco-allemande décentralisée suite au Traité d’Aix-la-Chapelle [1]" (pdf)
- GERMAN: "Durchbruch für die dezentrale deutsch-französische Zusammenarbeit? Perspektiven nach dem Vertrag von Aachen [2]" (pdf)