European policy coordination processes are national governments' central tool to shape their European policies.  They enable the national governments to participate in the European law making process and their support is crucial for the input legitimacy of the European Union (EU). Those policy coordination processes are, however, partly considered inefficient, even ineffective.  Especially the German process is criticized.  Comparative research encounters theoretical and analytical difficulties; it can rarely account for the national context. Therefore, these research propositions are mostly without practical use.

But a national government's European policy coordination is intertwined with its general policy coordination process. The former is adapted to the specific demands of the EU. These adaptations vary in every country to fit their specific needs. This change of perspective results in an intra-governmental comparison. While there are signs of structural deficiency or suboptimal adaptation to European requirements or constraints, there is no proof that these deficiencies produce "broken" coordination processes. Learning from other countries’ adaptations is misleading because of the differences of a country’s separate coordination process. Changes to these fundamental structures are unrealistic.