The Commission of the European Union (formerly European Community) most resembles the executive or civil service branch of government in the sense that it generates and executes policies, but does not legislate. It is useful to focus on the evolving relationship between the Commission and the Council of Ministers in order to understand the role of the former. It is said that ‘the Commission proposes, the Council disposes’. While the Council (representing the member states' governments) passes EU legislation into law, it can only do so on a proposal of the Commission. Historically this simple pattern has not obtained, and the work of the Commission and Council is often so interconnected as to be indistinguishable. Successive Treaty amendments have furthermore steadily integrated the ‘co-decision’ role of the European Parliament as well. For example, design and implementation of the budget is based on a Commission proposal approved by the Council, but the parliament can reject it and on occasion has done so.
In the first place, the twenty-member Commission is appointed by member governments for a renewable term of four years. Complicated political jockeying takes place as member states attempt to place national candidates in key positions. There is an informal quota system of two commissioners each for the five larger members and one each for the rest (this will become problematic in the context of proposed eastward enlargement of EU membership), and in the process the two-year renewable position of Commission President emerges with Council approval. The President can to an extent shape his ‘team’ and influence the appointment of key personnel among the twenty-three ‘Directorates-General’ (somewhat akin to ministerial departments) including agriculture, industry, competition, and external relations.
Once appointed, commissioners are obliged to serve the interests of the Union as a whole, not their governments of provenance. This rule has held relatively well, with commissioners and EU officials seconded from national governments ‘going native’ in Brussels, home of the Commission. Member states may treat proposals sceptically, even suspiciously: once a particular ‘competence’ or jurisdiction has passed from national to EU level, EU laws are regarded as overriding national laws where the two conflict.
If proposals are to be successful, then, contact with national governments is made early on through the Committee of Permanent Representatives (COREPER) consisting of permanent national officials in Brussels. Some proposals may even be suggested to the Commission by one or more member states, but the Commission must formally propose. Consultation also takes place with national ministry officials, the secretariat of the Council, the European Parliament, Euro-interest groups, large corporations potentially affected by the proposals, and national-level interest groups. The proposals may languish in this Brussels machinery before the Council views it favourably, and many are never brought forward. That said, initiatives dear to a particular Commission may be submitted with relatively little overt support in the Council, whereupon the Commission attempts to mobilize lobbying and a coalition of forces behind it. The Commission oversees the execution or implementation of legislation, but as Brussels staff is very limited it is usually national ministries which apply the legislation, monitored by Brussels and if necessary prodded by the European Court of Justice. Over time the national and EU ‘levels’ have become sufficiently blurred in this policy process so as to constitute what is called multi-level governance as distinct from intergovernmental and genuinely supranational processes.
The power of the Commission to succeed with its proposals depends on a number of factors such as prevailing public opinion on the subject of EU integration, economic conjunctural circumstances, the dynamism of the commissioners (particularly the President), the predispositions and the level of consensus or agreement among member governments, and of course on the authority assigned to it by the various treaties. In this regard the prerogatives of the Commission have tended to grow over time, but the road has not been smooth nor the passage inevitable. Up to about 1964 the Commission was surprisingly successful at sponsoring and indeed accelerating the integration process, supported strongly by the European Court. The French government subsequently challenged the Commission, and the then EC settled into a pattern representing a ‘Europe of States’. This continued through the first enlargement (1973) and up until the early 1980s when the need for members to address their common economic difficulties and unblock the decision-making machinery led to the Single European Act. This moderately enhanced the powers of the Commission, but the momentum led to Maastricht, which along with later treaties of Amsterdam 1997 and Nice 2001 further reinforced the role of the Commission; although this was balanced with the European Parliament's enhanced powers of scrutiny and ability to initiate legislation. Over time, then, the Commission along with the parliament has been strengthened in relation to the member governments, with more policies moving to the EU and the Union taking on more supranational characteristics.
Post-single currency, attention is turning to the role of the Commission in an enlarged EU. While some member states continue to resist enhanced powers for the Commission, it is recognized that enlargement could fatally ossify the decision-making process, for example in the domain of foreign and security policy cooperation under crisis conditions. At the same time the Commission appears remote to the citizens of the EU. Both points imply a quasi-federal role for EU-level machinery led by the Commission, though it is by no means certain at the time of writing that obstacles to such a new ‘constitutional’ order will be surmounted.
— Geoffrey R. D. Underhill
The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Politics. Copyright © 1996, 2003 by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved.
