How ESA Works

The European Space Agency

Course 1 · Chapter 3 · How ESA Works

ESA is unusual because it belongs to governments but does most of its building through industry, is spread across several countries, and has to keep many members content at once. This chapter explains how it is organised: who the members are, how decisions are made, how it is paid for, the "fair return" rule that links money to contracts, where its main sites are, and how it differs from the European Union. As in the rest of the course, figures such as budgets and member counts change, so they are given in broad terms and flagged for checking.

Members and Status

ESA is an intergovernmental organisation. Its member states sign the convention, pay into the budget and sit on its governing council. At the time of writing there are around two dozen members, including the large industrial countries (France, Germany, Italy, the United Kingdom, Spain) and many smaller ones such as Austria, Belgium, the Netherlands, Sweden, Switzerland, Norway, Ireland, Poland, Hungary and Romania. Check the current list in ESA's own pages, because membership has grown over the years.

Full members. They pay into the programmes and vote in the council.
Associate members and cooperating states. A looser tie for countries that take part in some activities without full membership. Canada has long had a special cooperation agreement of this kind.

Not all European countries, and not only EU countries ESA membership is not the same as EU membership. The United Kingdom, Norway and Switzerland are members but are not in the EU, and some EU countries are not full ESA members. The section on the European Union below returns to this.

How Decisions Are Made

The governing body is the ESA Council, in which each member state has a vote regardless of its size. The council sets the programmes and approves the budget. Every few years ministers responsible for space meet at a ministerial council to agree the next round of major spending, which is when members decide how much to commit to each programme. The agency itself is run by a Director General. The details of the voting rules differ for different kinds of decision, so this course does not set them out.

Mandatory and Optional Programmes

ESA's money is split into two parts, and the difference explains a great deal of how the agency behaves.

	Mandatory programmes	Optional programmes
What they cover	The science programme, basic technology and the running of the agency	Launchers, Earth observation, human spaceflight, navigation, telecommunications and others
Who pays	All members, according to the size of their economies	Members choose which to join and how much to give
Why it matters	Gives a stable base that no member can easily withdraw from	Lets countries invest where their industries and priorities lie

The optional system is flexible, and it lets a country with a strong interest in launchers, for example, take a larger role than one whose priority is Earth observation. It also means that the largest contributors have the largest say in the programmes they pay for. The total budget is several billion euros each year, but the exact figure changes, so check ESA's latest published figure before quoting it.

Fair Return

The most distinctive rule is geographical return, often called "fair return" or by the French juste retour. Roughly speaking, the value of the contracts placed with companies in a country should match what that country contributes to the programme. If a country pays a given share, its industry receives about that share of the work.

The case for it

Governments are more willing to commit money when they know it will support their own industry and jobs. It built a space industry in countries that would not otherwise have had one, and it keeps members from leaving.

The case against it

The best company for a job may not be in the country that is owed the work. Splitting work across many countries can raise costs and slow projects, and it can be hard to hold together a rocket built in many places, which is not unlike the problem that sank the earlier launcher project (Chapter 2).

The compromise

Return is balanced over a programme or over several years and not on each contract, and ESA has tried to introduce more competition. How far the system has really been loosened is a matter of argument.

A familiar argument The fair-return rule resembles other European arrangements in which money buys privileges, such as the automatic places given to the largest funders of the Eurovision contest, discussed in The Eurovision Song Contest 3. In both cases the funding countries accept a deal in which paying more brings a guaranteed benefit, and in both cases critics ask whether that is fair to everyone else.

Sites

ESA does not work from one campus. Its work is spread across several countries, which again reflects the need to keep members involved.

Paris, France: headquarters and policy.
Noordwijk, Netherlands: the technical centre where spacecraft are tested and designed (ESTEC).
Darmstadt, Germany: mission operations (ESOC), where missions are flown from the ground.
Cologne, Germany: the astronaut centre.
Frascati, Italy: Earth observation (ESRIN).
Madrid, Spain: science data from space telescopes and probes (ESAC).
Harwell, United Kingdom: a centre for applications and technology.
Kourou, French Guiana: the launch site, covered in Chapter 4.

The list is a selection, and names and roles of some sites change, so check ESA's own page for the current set.

ESA and the European Union

People often assume ESA is an EU body, but it is not. The two are separate organisations with different members, different rules and different histories.

	ESA	European Union
Type	Intergovernmental space organisation	Political and economic union
Members	About two dozen, including some non-EU countries (UK, Norway, Switzerland)	EU countries only
Founded	Mid-1970s	Much of its present form from the 1990s, with earlier roots
Space role	Builds and operates space missions	Owns and funds some programmes, such as navigation and Earth observation, and sets space policy

The two work closely: for some EU programmes, ESA acts as the technical developer and the EU funds and owns the system. The details are covered in Chapter 8. This is also why the United Kingdom stayed in ESA after it left the EU, a subject returned to in Chapter 9. For the political background of the EU itself, see the course European Politics Fundamentals.

Check before quoting The member list, the budget figure, the roles of the sites and the exact relationship between ESA and the EU programmes are all subject to change. Use ESA's own pages and the EU's space pages, and give the date you checked.

Exercises

Exercise 1

Explain the difference between mandatory and optional programmes, and say why the optional system suits a group of countries with different priorities.

→ Solution

Exercise 2

Describe the fair-return rule in your own words and give one argument for it and one against it.

→ Solution

Exercise 3

Give three differences between ESA and the European Union, and name one ESA member that is not in the EU.

→ Solution

Quick Reference

Type: intergovernmental, about two dozen members, headquartered in Paris
Governing body: the council, one vote per member
Mandatory programmes: science and basics, paid by all
Optional programmes: launchers, Earth observation and others, chosen by each member
Fair return: contracts roughly match what each country contributes
Sites: Paris, Noordwijk, Darmstadt, Cologne, Frascati, Madrid, Harwell, Kourou
Not the EU: UK, Norway and Switzerland are members but outside the EU
Check: the member list, the budget and the roles of the sites

Next chapter: Getting to Space: Ariane, Vega and Kourou, which follows the launchers.