Territorial Institutionalism – Capturing a Horizontal Dimension of the European Administrative Space

As part of European integration, the interaction between different administrative levels has become more intense over years. Accordingly the concept of the European Administrative Space (EAS) has been gaining increasing interest from both academia and practitioners. Going beyond a classical vertical multi-level perception, and focusing on the unsettled transnational patterns of inter-administrative cooperation in border-regions, the article suggests understanding approaches of institutionalization, taking place within the context of European territorial cooperation as an integral horizontal dimension of the EAS. Based on empirical findings that evidence by what patterns such horizontal institutionalizations in the field of European cross-border cooperation are characterized, the article develops a classification for the different forms of territorial institutionalism and suggests a set of intervening territorial variables, complementing established independent variables of neo-institutionalism in order to differentiate further analysis. As a conclusion perspectives of research are developed that may allow to better capture the diversity of forms of European territorial institutionalism and to recognize the role that cross-border territories are playing for the embellishment of the European Administrative Space.