Trajectories of institutional design in policy networks. European interventions in the Dutch fisheries network as an example.

There are important reasons to look at the phenomenon of institutional design more closely both theoretically and empirically. We do that in this paper by first exploring the phenomenon theoretically. We build on network theory to work out a conceptual scheme with which we can analyse interventions in the institutional characteristics of networks. With this conceptual scheme we analyse the institutional design interventions of the European Union in the national fishery networks. In this case we trace the influence of these interventions on the Dutch fishery network between 1990 and 2000. For that we make a detailed analysis of the changes in rules within the network and try to assess the impact that the EU interventions have on that change. So the rules and changes in rules are being treated as the dependent variable and the changes in strategies of the actors (partly) in reaction on the interventions of the EU which affect these the independent variable. Section 2 contains as mentioned the conceptual framework that has been developed. In section 3 we discuss the Dutch fisheries network and its relation to the European Union. We then sketch the most important rules in the 1990-2000 period (section 4). In section 5 the EU interventions and the developments in the Dutch fishery network are outlined. Then we analyse the results of the process of institutional redesign (section 6). Finally, we address the consequences and impact of the EU intervention especially for the typically Dutch construction of the Product Corporation (section 7).