Kleiner, Thibaut --- "Modernization of State Aid Policy" [2011] ELECD 697; in Szyszczak, Erika (ed), "Research Handbook on European State Aid Law" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2011)

Book Title: Research Handbook on European State Aid Law

Editor(s): Szyszczak, Erika

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9781849802741

Section: Chapter 1

Section Title: Modernization of State Aid Policy

Author(s): Kleiner, Thibaut

Number of pages: 27

Extract:

1 Modernization of State aid policy
Thibaut Kleiner*


I. INTRODUCTION

When looking at the analysis of State aid policy development in the
recent literature, one may be reminded of the Quarrel of the Ancients and
the Moderns at the Académie française in the early 1690s. Whereas the
Ancients considered that the classical Graeco-Roman culture had reached
perfection, the Moderns considered that the writers of the time were able
to innovate and to overcome antique authors. A somehow similar debate
seems to have gained prominence in the field of State aid, with certain
scholars, mostly economists, praising the introduction of a refined eco-
nomic approach in State aid (Hancher 2006; Heidhues and Nitsche 2006;
Röller and Stehmann 2006) as a way towards modernization, and others,
essentially lawyers, criticising it as a threat to State aid discipline, and
calling for going `back to basics' (Buendia 2006; Buendia and Smulders
2008).
This chapter looks critically at the development and structuring of EU
State aid policy over the last twenty years, with a particular focus on the
State aid reform programme introduced by Commissioner Neelie Kroes
through the State Aid Action Plan (SAAP).1 First of all, the chapter
presents an analytical framework to examine what can be defined as mod-
ernization, on the basis of three models of influence for State aid policy.
The chapter then looks at the recent period of State aid reform to analyse
to what extent it can be analysed as an attempt towards one ...