ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the 'core executive' both as an empirical field of actors, institutions, and behavioural practices at the centres of Central European governments and as a theoretical concept formulated to study this field. It distinguishes two paradigms that have shaped core executive studies focusing on Central Europe and that reflect the history of the region: transition and Europeanisation. The chapter suggests a third paradigm of 'executive governance' as a perspective for future work. It argues that the trend towards centralised executive authority in several Central European countries suggests complementing the analysis of institutional arrangements with a broader analysis of governance. The Sustainable Governance Indicators survey has integrated Central European core executives as additional cases into broader European or global research designs, indicating that 'Central Europe' or 'post-socialist' may persist as regional or historical identifiers, but no longer constitute substantively defining attributes of these country cases.
