This Handbook maps the expanding field of gender and EU politics, giving an overview of the fundamentals and new directions of the sub- discipline, and serving as a reference book for (gender) scholars and students at different levels interested in the EU. In investigating the gendered nature of European integration and gender relations in the EU as a political system, it summarizes and assesses the research on gender and the EU to this point in time, identifies existing research gaps in gender and EU studies and addresses directions for future research. Distinguished contributors from the US, the UK and continental Europe, and from across disciplines from political science, sociology, economics and law, expertly inform about gender approaches and summarize the state of the art in gender and EU studies. The Routledge Handbook of Gender and EU Politics provides an essential and authoritative source of information for students, scholars and researchers in EU studies/ politics, gender studies/ politics, political theory, comparative politics, international relations, political and gender sociology, political economy, European and legal studies/ law.

Gender has traditionally proven to be a 'blind spot' for new institutionalists. This book bring gender to the fore as a critical aspect of institutions and opens up new avenues to interrogate the dynamics of power and change. Casting its empirical lens on the EU, where institutional efforts to realize gender equality are quite pronounced, the book interrogates attempts to bring about more 'gender just' polities - supranationally, nationally, and more locally. The book takes a 'best case' scenario - with explicit transformative aims to the social (gendered) order - in order to illuminate how institutions and their gendering, help and hinder institutional change. In doing so, it aims to: 1) consolidate and expand the theoretical 'toolkit' in terms of synergies between feminism and new institutionalism's various strands; and 2) bring it to bear on the trajectory of Europe's gender equality agenda towards better understanding the institutional and institutionalized challenges to redressing gender inequalities.

Gender has traditionally proven to be a 'blind spot' for new institutionalists. This book bring gender to the fore as a critical aspect of institutions and opens up new avenues to interrogate the dynamics of power and change. Casting its empirical lens on the EU, where institutional efforts to realize gender equality are quite pronounced, the book interrogates attempts to bring about more 'gender just' polities - supranationally, nationally, and more locally. The book takes a 'best case' scenario - with explicit transformative aims to the social (gendered) order - in order to illuminate how institutions and their gendering, help and hinder institutional change. In doing so, it aims to: 1) consolidate and expand the theoretical 'toolkit' in terms of synergies between feminism and new institutionalism's various strands; and 2) bring it to bear on the trajectory of Europe's gender equality agenda towards better understanding the institutional and institutionalized challenges to redressing gender inequalities.

This Handbook maps the expanding field of gender and EU politics, giving an overview of the fundamentals and new directions of the sub- discipline, and serving as a reference book for (gender) scholars and students at different levels interested in the EU. In investigating the gendered nature of European integration and gender relations in the EU as a political system, it summarizes and assesses the research on gender and the EU to this point in time, identifies existing research gaps in gender and EU studies and addresses directions for future research. Distinguished contributors from the US, the UK and continental Europe, and from across disciplines from political science, sociology, economics and law, expertly inform about gender approaches and summarize the state of the art in gender and EU studies. The Routledge Handbook of Gender and EU Politics provides an essential and authoritative source of information for students, scholars and researchers in EU studies/ politics, gender studies/ politics, political theory, comparative politics, international relations, political and gender sociology, political economy, European and legal studies/ law.

European institutions have begun to elaborate a distinctive gender regime. Relying on a largely liberal understanding of equality, European measures are frequently at odds with established policies in a number of member states, especially those where a male breadwinner/female caregiver regime predominates. This thesis examines the way in which European initiatives, inspired by the liberal gender regime, have fed into policy debates and reforms in Germany, a notoriously resilient male breadwinner state and a "laggard" in European gender policy. Three case studies (drawing on policy from the 1970s until 2005) are used to explore tensions between the nascent European gender regime and Germany's gender regime. The findings suggest that Europeanization of the German gender regime has been uneven and incomplete. Although the German gender regime cannot thus be said to have been transformed, the changes that have been introduced are contributing to the emergence of a hybrid regime, incorporating aspects of both the male breadwinner and the dual earner model.

The authors engage a dialogue between European integration theories and gender studies. The contributions illustrate where and how gender scholarship has made creative use of integration theories and thus contributes to a vivid theoretical debate. The chapters are designed to make gender scholarship more visible to integration theory and, in this way stimulates the broader theoretical debates. Investigating the whole range of integration theory with a gender lens, the authors illustrate if and how gender scholarship has made or can make creative use of integration theories.