Converging administrative systems: Recruitment and training in eu member states

This article proposes a methodology for testing whether the administrative systems of the EU and its member states are converging as a consequence of the institutional development of the EU. The aims are twofold: (1) to discover how far the institutional development of the EU is bringing about common recruitment and training practices within the administration of the EU and its member states, and (2) to examine whether the roles and role perceptions of officials are converging as a consequence of this development. The hypothesis underpinning the investigation is that the institutional development of the EU - with the negotiation and bargaining between administrative systems (i.e. the joint policy-making process) - may be bringing the way in which officials see their roles and their recruitment and training policies closer together. By categorizing officials surveyed according to their level of exposure to EU policy-making, the methodology enables any specific convergence induced by EU integration to be distinguished from the second common influence of west European administrative modernization: new public management. @ 1995 Taylor & Francis Group.