‘The Roles Bureaucrats Play’: The Input of European Parliament (EP) Administrators into the Ordinary Legislative Procedure: A Case Study Approach

Abstract

The European Parliament (EP) is branded as one of the winners of the Lisbon Treaty. It has seen its role expanded to more than 40 Treaty articles and obtained the status of co-legislator in previously uncharted territory such as agriculture, fisheries and legal migration. This raises the question of how the EP adapts itself to the newly obtained powers in order to fulfill its legislative role. A very pertinent issue in this context are the type of tasks that are delegated to EP civil servants as this might have implications for the democratic legitimacy of the directly elected Members. This contribution identifies the conditions under which civil servants take up different types of tasks by looking at four cases in two different policy areas: migration and fisheries. Political importance of the dossier and expertise are identified as key determinants for the role of civil servants in the ordinary legislative procedure.

Key words:

• civil servants
• European Parliament
• European Union
• ordinary legislative procedure
• politicized competence
• co-decision

Notes

1. All interviews are anonymous as requested by the interviewees. The interviewees have been selected according to their relevance for the files under study. They include officials from all three institutions of different levels. Interviews have been carried out between April and July 2011. The primary focus of the interviews was the inter-institutional negotiations of the files under study and the role of committee civil servants therein.

2. The respective context is the study of voting behavior in the US.

3. It has to be emphasized however that MEPs always have the last word.