ABSTRACT
This chapter analyses a negative case of EU social policy expansion – the non-adoption of a European Minimum Income Framework Directive. Minimum income protection has featured on the EU social agenda since the 1990s. The increase in poverty and social exclusion that followed the economic crisis revived the debate on such policy. Since the early 2010s, a broad advocacy coalition has formed around the proposal of a European Framework Directive on minimum income, crucially supported by a number of civil society organizations, EU policy networks and left-leaning groups in the European Parliament. Nevertheless, contrary to what happened with the minimum wage directive and SURE, in 2023 the Commission adopted a recommendation instead of a binding directive on the matter, without therefore departing from the soft-law approach that has proved ineffective in alleviating poverty over the last 20 years. Why was this the case? What hindered the political viability of an EU-wide measure on minimum income despite broad advocacy? By answering these questions, this chapter seeks to single out the factors that prevent some social policies being strengthened at the EU level, whereby the advocacy from organized interests does not seem to be a sufficient condition for EU social policy expansion.
