The reform of the Common Agricultural Policy (2014-2020) and the obstacles posed by its implementation: an essay

A reforma da PAC (2014-2020) e os percalços de sua implementação: um ensaio

Abstract

This article aims to analyze some of the impressions of social actors involved in the implementation of European rural development policies, starting with the reform of the PAC (Common Agricultural Policy) for the period of 2014-2020, particularly its second pillar, with its territorial policy. In the first part, we review the main changes introduced by that reform, approved at the end of 2013. In a following section, we summarize the theoretical reference of neo-institutionalism, in a broad perspective, which seems appropriate to the analysis carried out, both in the process of horizontal institutionalization and in the structure of governance of the rural territorial development policy of the European Union. In a third section, we highlight some aspects identified by us together with some Local Action Groups (GAL), responsible in the first instance for implementing the changes introduced by the second pillar of the PAC. Finally, in a last section, taking as reference the field work carried out through qualitative interviews and the theoretical references used, we argue that the innovations introduced in the period of 2007-2013 and reformed for the period 2014-2020, modified the vertical institutions involved in rural development policy, by incorporating in its implementation the national and subnational governments, and ended up provoking, in our view, a crisis that also affects the horizontal institutions of their governance structures.