Anchrit Wille
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- September 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780199665693
- eISBN:
- 9780191755989
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199665693.001.0001
- Subject:
- Political Science, European Union
The European Commission is evolving into a normal executive. In the 1950s, it started out as a technocratic international organization, but it has acquired many of the organizational features and ...
More
The European Commission is evolving into a normal executive. In the 1950s, it started out as a technocratic international organization, but it has acquired many of the organizational features and behavioural patterns that are highly typical of the ‘normal’ executives in national settings. This ‘normalization’ of the EU executive is due to a series of treaty reforms and internal administrative transformations that were effectuated after the demise of the Santer Commission. Based on a large number of in-depth interviews with commissioners, heads of cabinet, and senior civil servants in the Commission, and on extensive documentary evidence, this study shows how a reinforced regime of political and administrative accountability has profoundly changed the executive relationships between politicians and bureaucrats in the Commission. The book presents a grounded empirical portrait of life at the top in the EU, exposing the Commission’s struggle to revive its legitimacy and to turn it into a more transparent, accountable, and efficient organization during the Prodi and Barroso’s tenures. Officials and officeholders describe in their own words the imperatives they face and the relationships they maintain, allowing readers to have a rare look at the day-to-day practices in one of the world’s most powerful executives.Less
The European Commission is evolving into a normal executive. In the 1950s, it started out as a technocratic international organization, but it has acquired many of the organizational features and behavioural patterns that are highly typical of the ‘normal’ executives in national settings. This ‘normalization’ of the EU executive is due to a series of treaty reforms and internal administrative transformations that were effectuated after the demise of the Santer Commission. Based on a large number of in-depth interviews with commissioners, heads of cabinet, and senior civil servants in the Commission, and on extensive documentary evidence, this study shows how a reinforced regime of political and administrative accountability has profoundly changed the executive relationships between politicians and bureaucrats in the Commission. The book presents a grounded empirical portrait of life at the top in the EU, exposing the Commission’s struggle to revive its legitimacy and to turn it into a more transparent, accountable, and efficient organization during the Prodi and Barroso’s tenures. Officials and officeholders describe in their own words the imperatives they face and the relationships they maintain, allowing readers to have a rare look at the day-to-day practices in one of the world’s most powerful executives.
Anchrit Wille
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- September 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780199665693
- eISBN:
- 9780191755989
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199665693.003.0003
- Subject:
- Political Science, European Union
This chapter describes how political and administrative reforms have changed the basic accountability system of the European Commission over the last decade. It is shown how the vision and values, ...
More
This chapter describes how political and administrative reforms have changed the basic accountability system of the European Commission over the last decade. It is shown how the vision and values, the organizational DNA, on which the EU Commission was built became incongruent with internal and external challenges. There was a strategic reorientation, after the Commission’s crisis in 1999. Ex ante constraints and ex post incentives combined to provide a system for more control in and accountability over the Commission. There was a strengthening of accountability mechanisms and a shift in the salience of different types of accountability. In addition to legal and professional accountability systems, an elaborate structure was created that stressed political and bureaucratic mechanisms and has created new expectations of accountability from commissioners and their senior officials.Less
This chapter describes how political and administrative reforms have changed the basic accountability system of the European Commission over the last decade. It is shown how the vision and values, the organizational DNA, on which the EU Commission was built became incongruent with internal and external challenges. There was a strategic reorientation, after the Commission’s crisis in 1999. Ex ante constraints and ex post incentives combined to provide a system for more control in and accountability over the Commission. There was a strengthening of accountability mechanisms and a shift in the salience of different types of accountability. In addition to legal and professional accountability systems, an elaborate structure was created that stressed political and bureaucratic mechanisms and has created new expectations of accountability from commissioners and their senior officials.
