Week 8: what is the European Union + Caramani ch. 23 and Lelieveldt & Princen (2015) Chapter 3

Question 1

Why and how did the states start to cooperate? Which factors drove this? -> two views

Answer 1

Intergovernmental view (Stanley Hoffmann)
Supranational view (Ernst Haas)

Question 2

Intergovernmental view

Answer 2

• National governments are main actors
• Integration only occurs in accordance with member states’ interests
• European Institutions serve member states’ (collective) interests
• From the intergovernmental view, there is no democratic deficit
• Intergovernmental institutions facilitate bargaining

Question 3

Supranational view

Answer 3

• Neo-functionalism
• “Spillover” -> the idea that if we integrate one aspect, in order to get this benefit, we have to integrate another aspect (there will always be next steps)
• Common market of coal would work better if there was a common market for all goods
• Political, economic and social forces beyond national governments
• The process will ultimately lead to full political integration

Question 4

Intergovernmental institutions:

Answer 4

• The European Council
• Council of the EU

Question 5

The European Council

Answer 5

• Founded in 1974
• Heads of State or Government
• Provide political direction
• Highest-level of decision making
• Treaty revisions
• Appointments

Question 6

Council of the EU

Answer 6

• National ministers
• Meets in 10 different configurations
• Negotiaties and adopts EU law
• International agreement
• External relations
• Accession -> council has to agree with new members
• Budget
• Rotating presidency

Question 7

Supranational institutions

Answer 7

• European commission
• European Parliament

Question 8

European commission

Answer 8

• 26 commissioners + 1 president
• “Shall promote the general interest of the Union”
• Initiates EU legislation
• Manages and implements EU policy
• External representation (trade)
• ‘Guardian of the Treaties’ -> To see that all the states stick to the agreements that they agreed to

Question 9

European Parliament

Answer 9

• Only directly elected EU institution
• 705 members
• Legislator
• Has to approve budget
• Controls the executive
• Appointments (commission)

Question 10

Legislating in the EU:

Answer 10

• European Council sets the EU’s policy agenda
• European Commission proposes legislation and budget to
• European Parliament and Council of the EU, who jointly decide legislation and budget
• It’s a very high consensus system.
• Power battles are very high in the EU, lots of veto powers

Question 11

Is the EU democratic? minimalist view:

Answer 11

• Legislature is elected
  Parliament, yes
  Council, indirectly
• More than one political party, yes

-Alteration of power under same electoral rules has taken place, yes

• Chief executive is elected
  Question of interpretation -> indirect elections with parliament and council
  Also the question if the council president is powerful enough to be called chief executive.

The EU is some kind of democracy but not fully as we learned in CAPI.

Question 12

Democratic deficit and the EU

Answer 12

• Missing a ‘European demos’ -> there is not a single european people. Means it can never be a full democracy, because there is no one european people
• EP elections are ‘second order elections’. Less important elections, lower turnout
• Voters preferences not clearly translate into executive power
• No collective accountability for council
  For example: German and French ministers in the council, no control over from different members
• Weak european parliament: no right to initiate legislature, can only ask the commission

Question 13

EU, a political system?

Answer 13

Yes, using Eastons model:
- Clearly defined set of institutions
- Citizens seek to achieve their political desires through the system
- Collective decisions have impact on the distribution of resources and allocation of values
- Continuous interaction between political outputs and new demands on the system.

It is however not a state since the EU is based on voluntary cooperation between the member-states, there is no direct taxation, the budget is small and the EU relies on the coercive forces of its member-states.

But, there is a constitutional architecture

Question 14

Vertical dimension: the EU as a ‘regulatory state’

Answer 14

The dominant policy goal of the EU is the creation and regulation of a market on a continental scale. The EU is often described as a ‘regulatory state’.

• Creation and regulation of the single market: the creation of the single market has both deregulatory and regulatory aspects.
• Deregulatory: fiscal barriers; harmonization of e.g. taxes, physical barriers; removing border controls and customs formalities on the movements of goods and people, technical barriers; to free the movement of goods and services whereby e.g. any product meeting the standards of one member state can be legally sold in another member state.
• Re-regulatory: the EU replaced national policies on different matters. (Competition policies: anti-trust, environmental policy: air and noise polution, social policy: rights of workers to free movement).

Economic and monetary union: economic and monetary union is a complement to the single market, in that a single market functions more effectively with a single currency, and a single currency governed by an independent central bank ensures economic stability.

EU expenditure policies: EU expenditure policies are a secondary policy instrument of the EU, and have mainly been used to enable major steps in the process of economic integration by consensus. Consists of solidarity payments (from richer to poorer states) and side payments (bargaining by member states, compensation for losing a battle)

Interior policies and external relations:
The EU has begun to expand beyond economic policies, into justice and interior affairs policies and foreign and security policies, and security policies, and policy-making in these areas has developed rapidly in recent years.
The basic policy architecture of the EU, where a continental-scale market is created and regulated at the European level while spending and security policies remain largely at the national level, means that the EU is more a ‘regulatory state’ than a welfare state or security state.

Question 15

Horizontal dimension of the EU

Answer 15

• Multiple actors have the ability to block policy changes, leads to hyper consensus system of government
• Executive politics: competing agenda setters
  Agenda-setting power is split between European Council and the Commission
  Council decides broad policy directions. The European Commission has the monopoly on the initiative.
• Bicameral legislative
  Over the years, the EU parliament is growing in strength
  Maastricht treaty gave life to the co-decision procedure
  Council usually votes by qualified majority (55% of member states, 65% of Eu population). On sensitive issues it requires unanimity. Voting, however rarely takes place, strong incentives for consensus
• Judicial politics: a powerful and independent court
  ECJ have a powerful role. Supremacy and direct effect of EU law

Question 16

Positives and negatives to hyper consensus system

Answer 16

• On the positive side, the checks and balances means that legislation cannot be adopted without overwhelming support in the Commission, amongst the governments in the council, and the parties in the European Parliament, and with the approval of the ECJ.
• On the negative side, the checks and balances mean that the EU is prone to ‘gridlock’ and lowest common denominator policy outcomes, and these problems are likely to increase with the enlargement of the EU from fifteen to twenty-eight or more states.

Question 17

Democratic policies: the missing link?

Answer 17

Procedurally, the EU is democratic: governments and MEPs are elected, procedures are fair and transparent, checks and balances make sure policy outcomes are close to the median voter. But in a substantive sense, the EU does not have real democratic politics. Is there a democratic deficit?

• Low public support for the EU
• Competitive party system in the EU, but still second order elections
• The ‘failure’ of European Parliament elections: second order, turnout is 20 percent lower, Voters use the EP to express their view on national issues, rather than European
• Interest groups in Brussels: Highly developed.
  Very vibrant civil society, with lots of different groups and some groups even funded directly from EU budget

Question 18

The EU institutional framework + function + who they represent

Answer 18

• European Council -> executive: representing member states
• Council of the European Union -> Executive + legislative: representing member states
• European Commission -> Executive: Representing European Union
• European Parliament -> Legislative: representing citizens
• Court of Justice of the European Union -> Judicial: Representing European Union
• European Central Bank -> Executive: representing European Union
• Court of Auditors -> Control role: representing European Union

Question 19

Representation of interest:

Answer 19

• Citizens are represented by the European Parliament, whose members are chosen via direct popular elections in each of the member states
• Member states are represented in the European Council and the Council of Ministers
• The interests of the European Union as a whole are represented and protected by all other institutions

Question 20

Allocation of powers:

Answer 20

Executive tasks = consist of giving political direction, implementation policies and externally representing the EU. In the EU these task are distributed over four different institutions:
- European Council (provides political direction and represents the EU externally in its relations with other countries and international organizations)
- Council of the European Union (implementation of policies)
- European Commission: all three (initiating legislation, implementing policies, representing the EU externally with respect to specific policies for which the Commission bears responsibility)
- European Central Bank (implementing monetary policy in the member states that have the Euro as their currency)

Legislative tasks = consist of examining, modifying and adopting legislative measures which provide the basis for EU policies
- European Parliament
- Council of the European Union → this arrangement can be likened to the organization of a bicameral legislature in federal systems (= two houses or chambers)

Judicial tasks = consist of the interpretation of EU law as well as the adjudication of conflicts involving EU institutions, member states and all other parties that may be involved
- Court of Justice of the European Union

Question 21

Difference between EU institutional framework versus national institutional framework:

Answer 21

• Executive and legislative functions are both shared between the different institutions → This means that the core policy-making functions in the EU are not in the hands of one institutional actor, but require cooperation and collaboration between different bodies that represent different interests.

The EU does not fit either in a presidential or a parliamentary system because legislative and executive powers do not emanate solely from the people. Instead, it can be better characterized as ‘mixed government’ or as ‘a polity with many principals’

Clearly not a presidential system, but also not a parliamentary system