Between power and influence: the European parliament in a dual constitutional regime (original) (raw)
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After Lisbon: National Parliaments in the European Union
West European Politics, 2015
The role of national parliaments in EU matters has become an important subject in the debate over the democratic legitimacy of European Union (EU) decision--making. Strengthening parliamentary scrutiny and participation rights both at the domestic and at the European level is often seen as an effective measure to address the perceived 'democratic deficit' of the EU -the reason for affording them a prominent place in the newly introduced 'Provisions on Democratic Principles' of the Union (in particular Art.12 TEU). Whether this aim can be met, however, depends crucially on the degree and the manner in which national parliaments actually make use of their institutional rights. This volume therefore aims at providing a comprehensive overview of the activities of national parliaments in the post--Lisbon era. This includes the 'classic' scrutiny of EU legislation, but also parliamentary involvement in EU foreign policy, the use of new parliamentary participations rights of the Lisbon Treaty (Early Warning System), their role regarding the EU's response to the eurozone crisis and the, so far under--researched, role of parliamentary administrators in scrutiny processes. In this introduction, we provide the guiding theoretical framework for the contributions. Based on neo--institutionalist approaches, we discuss institutional capacities and political motivation as the two key explanatory factors in the analysis of parliamentary involvement in EU affairs.
2009
To address the uncertainties surrounding the Treaty of Lisbon, this book examines several issues from various angles. Regardless of the results of the second referendum in Ireland and the pending ratifications in Poland, the Czech Republic and Germany, the European Union (EU) will not be the same after the Lisbon Treaty. If it comes into effect, Europeans will enter into a new stage in the deepening of the integration process; if it is rejected, the first decade of the 21st Century will represent a period of institutional stagnation in Europe's integration. Nonetheless, the chapters in this book share the consensus that, despite its limitations, the Lisbon Treaty will make the EU decision making process more efficient, enhance regional democracy and strengthenits international voice.
Policy brief on « Parliaments in European governance »
The European Union’s institutions have often been criticized as being too technocrat and lagging being in term of democracy. Due to the complex apparatus of the European Union (EU), the concept of “democratic deficit” has been invoked to reproach the lack of citizen’s representation/ participations. This situation leads to call into question the EU’s legitimacy. The empowerment of the European Parliament (EP) in the legislative and budgetary decisions, with the Lisbon Treaty in 2008, had the purposes to alleviate the existing democratic deficit. To counter the democratic deficit and gain the trust of the citizens in the EU, work on visibility at the European parliamentary level must be undertaken as the EP failed to present itself as the representative of the citizens’ interests.
Anticipating the European Constitution: Parliamentarization or Re-nationalization?
Biennial EUSA Conference, Austin TX, 2005
Since the entry into force of the Treaty of Maastricht and up to the adoption of the draft constitution by the IGC in June 2004, the European Parliament has acquired growing legislative influence, redefining its relationship with the Council and modifiying the balance of powers among the three institutions, arguably to the detriment of the Commission. In contrast, a number of new provisions of the constitution, especially the “presidential” innovations, are designed to increase the Member States' influence. Only few areas of shared sovereignty are added, important fields of activity are left untouched or appear to be shifted under executive domination. This is particularly manifest in foreign and macro-economic policy. Furthermore, the accession of ten new Member States, introducing new decision-making dynamics and enhanced socio-cultural and socio-economic diversity, combined with the historically novel coincidence of a liberalconservative Commission and a Parliament dominated by liberal-conservative groups, could reduce legislative proposals with redistributive or harmonizing ambitions. Borrowing instruments from both historical institutionalism and liberal intergovernmentalism, we analyse selected institutional novelties of the constitution which will transform the future functioning of policymaking in the Union. In particular, the focus of the EU's activities could increasingly shift from the legislative to the executive domain, which raises the question of how, in which policy fields, and with which institutional interplay the Union will probably carry out its tasks under the new provisions in the foreseeable future, with rather limited resources.
Introduction: the European Parliament at a crossroads
The Journal of Legislative Studies, 2018
This introductory article discusses the rationale and the aim of this special issue on the European Parliament. Examining the ongoing multidimensional crisis the EU is facing, it emphasizes how the current content has reduced the EU output legitimacy. It also argues that the Parliament has been affected by the recent developments. On the one hand, it has been further empowered with the Lisbon Treaty and the Spitzenkandidaten procedure. On the other hand, the management of the crisis has been essentially intergovernmental and the EP has been sidelined. A second section critically discusses the literature on the EP and highlights the need to further develop our understanding of this institution, which cannot yet be called a 'normal parliament'. It then presents the articles composing this special issue.
EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT IN THE INSTITUTIONAL FRAMEWORK OF EUROPEAN UNION
The article explores the functioning of the European Parliament within the institutional system of the European Union. Over the time the EU has established some common principles of functioning of its institutional mechanism. In this article the European Parliament is studied in light of its formation, structure and its role in decision-making process of EU. The further analysis of its powers reveals how over the time they gradually expanded. Today different ideas are put forward to strengthen even more the role of the European Parliament, in particular, with reference to its supervisory powers. Concerns over effective work of European Parliament after enlargements have proven to be ungrounded and even after the Brexit, despite of changes in the way the Parliament is set up, strong 'pro-European' majority remained at the European Parliament.
This paper will examine the impact the last enlargements and treaty change have had on the European Parliament and the EU's system of legislative procedures. The paper assesses the dynamics of the European Parliament in operating according to a set of parliamentary functions. The overall question is, how the EP performs in adopting European legislation and in controlling the Union's quasi-executive brances. Do the rules provided by treaties, inter-institutional agreements and similar bases matter for the EP as a "multifunctional organization" (Judge/Earnshaw 2003: 24) and how do they matter for the repartition of workload within the European Parliament? In analysing the European Parliament's practice during the past 1994-1999, 1999-2004, and 2004-2009 legislatures, I propose to investigate the parliamentary implementation of the treaties and treaty amendments. In other terms, I explore the "real use" of different "constitutional offers" at h...
European Law Journal, 2003
become, but what it is and surely will continue to be, that is a very distinct federal structure. The European Parliament is a parliament in an executive federalism-with farreaching consequences for its form and functions. After outlining the characteristics of this federal structure, these consequences will be demonstrated by analysing the European Parliament in contrast with two ideal types of parliaments: the working parliament, separated from the executive branch and centred around strong committees (like the US Congress), and the debating parliament, characterised by the fusion of parliamentary majority and government as well as plenary debates (like the British House of Commons). Dwelling thus on a comparison to a legislature in a non-parliamentary federal system, like the US Congress, this paper argues that the European Parliament might best be understood as a special case of a working parliament. Finally, it will be proposed to consider the influence of executive federalism not only as fundamentally shaping the European Parliament but also as rendering the EU generally a semi-parliamentary democracy.