ABSTRACT
National bureaucrats are undoubtedly one of the main factors that ensure efficient and successful implementation of Cohesion Policy. The practical implementation of the Partnership Principle for Structural Funds, one of the crucial principles of Cohesion Policy, is frequently referred to as an example of the above-mentioned mechanisms of 'bureaucratic menace', low capacities or shallow socialization that result in failed implementation. By contrast, actor-centered explanations found in the literature on public policy and partnerships in public policy making attribute the failure of partnership to facets of bureaucratic behaviour such as the strategic abuse of the idea of partnership, low administrative capacities of state representatives or contingently realized preferences and interests. This chapter argues that analysis of how state officials relate rather than respond to the requirement of partnership and interpretive reconstruction of the meanings-in-use of partnership would reveal a lot more about what role state officials play in partnership implementation.
