Each enlargement had an impact on the institutions of the Community.
It affected the size, composition and working practice of the respective institution. Adaptations and cautious innovations prevailed over any radical changes or a complete overhaul of the institutional architecture. We look at the institutional triangle of Commission, Council/European Council and the European Parliament.
The Commission
Enlargement affected the Commission mostly in terms of its size, organization and the principle of collegiality (Dinan, 1998). The EC6 started with nine Commissioners; the Commission of the EU25 counts 25 members. Up to 2004 bigger member states (EC6 France, Germany, Italy; EC9 plus UK;
EC12 plus Spain) nominated two Commissioners (Table 5.1).
Table 5.1 Commission and enlargement
Commission Members Vice presidents Directorate general
EC6 9 (14)* 2–3 9
EC9 13 4–5 19/20
EC10 14 5
EC12 17 6 23
EU15 20 2 23 (May 2002)
EU25 30**/25 5
EU27 TCE 27***/18
Notes:
* Transitory period 1967–70 following the merger treaty.
** Between 1 May 2004 and 30 October 2004.
*** Until 2014, thereafter two-thirds of member states.
Source: Own compilation.
Only the enlargement of 2004 introduced a change in the composition of the Commission which is now made up of one national per member state. An extrapolation of the status quo would have led to a Commission of 30,6 which was only the case in the period between the accession date 1 May and the date the new Commission took offi ce in November 2004.
The Commission of 25 in an EU25 was however only a halfway success for those who had advocated, like France since the Amsterdam IGC, for a
smaller Commission which would not be based on the ‘representation of all member states at one time. Since the seventies proposals for a smaller Commission were put on the agenda, not in the least by the Commission itself ’ (Dinan, 1998, pp. 22–5). Against the background of a comparatively small and stagnant acquis the Community already had some problems in defi ning meaningful portfolios for an increasing number of commissioners (Commission of the EC, 1979) after the fi rst enlargement. The Spierenburg report of 1979 proposed ten (stable) portfolios for the EC12 and favoured limiting the number of commissioners while the president should be strengthened and supported by a vice president who would be responsible for coordinating the work of the commissioners and so improve coherence.
The provision of the Nice Treaty and the common position of the EU15 in the accession negotiations of 2002 to allow for only one national per member state in the next Commission was part of a broader compromise.
The big member states that would ‘lose’ one of two posts in the Commission achieved a reweighting of votes in the Council in their favour. The link between a reform of the Commission and the Council was already laid down in the protocol on the institutions to the Amsterdam Treaty (No. 7).
As far as the Commission was concerned, efforts for a permanent restriction of its growth failed again. Proponents for a fi xed size of 15, 12 or even fewer members argued that a smaller Commission would be more effi cient, more independent and hence more supranational. Others, among them many small and all new members of 2004, argued that one commissioner per member would improve communication with the countries ‘they know best’ and enhance the legitimacy of the Commission and the Union as a whole. Consequently the IGC of 2003/04 refused to accept the provision of the draft European Constitution of the Convention which foresaw to limit the size to 15 European commissioners (including the president and vice president) with voting rights and include other commissioners without voting rights from the countries not represented among the 15 (Article I-25 Draft TCE). The TCE now provides for a limitation of the members of the Commission to two-thirds of the member states which shall be elected through the European Council on the basis of a system of equal rotation.
This rule shall apply from 2014 unless the European Council does not decide otherwise and sticks to the status quo (Article I-26, 6 TCE).
Linked to the problem of the size of the Commission is the trend towards a stronger hierarchization and differentiation among the commissioners, who are supposed to be equal. Although the principle of collegiality persists, the position of the president, who is also member of the European Council, was strengthened over the years, in particular as far as political guidance and organizational power (design and distribute portfolios; dismiss members of the Commission) were concerned. The number of the vice presidents
and their role depend on the decision of the president (see Table 5.1). The TCE will bring change through the double-hatted EU Foreign minister who acts as a (fi xed) vice president with responsibility for external relations.
Informally a core group of commissioners holding key portfolios (budget, single market, trade, competition, external affairs, economic and monetary policy, CAP, regional policy) has emerged so that there are heavyweights and less important portfolios/commissioners in the college. Neither nationals of small nor new member states were relegated to the insubstantial posts in the Barroso Commission. Ms Hübner of Poland as a new member state and Ms Boel of Denmark as a small member state are responsible for regional policy and CAP, which account for 80 per cent of the EU budget. However, up to the Prodi Commission 1999/2004 nationals of the big member states were responsible for at least one of the key portfolios. The European Council in Brussels (June 2004) upheld the principle of collegiality and rejected the proposal of the European Convention to formally create junior commissioners or any other differentiation with regard to the status of the members of the Commission. It can be expected that informal groups will emerge in the Commission of 25 and more. Fragmentation and groupings can follow different patterns and criteria, such as geography and culture, interests of member states, party or other political affi liation, or thematically linked portfolios (Wessels, 2004, p. 172).
Occasionally, the creation of portfolios was inspired by interests and preferences of new members. In connection with the southern enlargement, President Delors established a portfolio for Mediterranean policy and North–South relations. President Prodi was the fi rst to create a portfolio for enlargement to deal with the exceptionally high number of applications and candidates. President Barroso maintains this portfolio, while he resisted any attempts to single out relations with the ‘new neighbours’ in a European neighbourhood portfolio but adds it to the external relations commissioner. Enlargement necessarily leads to a proliferation of portfolios and departments. Hence under the Barroso Commission portfolios were split, for example fi sheries from CAP or budget control from budget in order to reach the number of 24 portfolios. Horizontal tasks are mostly taken over from the fi ve vice presidents, which then is not merely a honorifi c title.
President Barroso regroups all commissioners and their cabinets together and bases them centrally in the Berlaymont building, hoping this will strengthen team spirit and smooth coordination.
As far as administrative cultures were concerned, the accession of the UK was most infl uential and long term. The British administrative culture, including the spread of the English language, challenged the French, which had dominated and shaped the administration of the EC from its origins in terms of structures, procedures and styles. Membership of Finland
and Sweden added a Northern dimension and generally strengthened the Anglo-Saxon and Germanic administrative traditions. Key concerns of the Northern countries were transparency, access to information, the post of the ombudsman and so on, which highlight defi cits in terms of accountability and legitimacy of the EU. It is quite an open question whether the new member states from Central and Eastern Europe, who largely belong to the administrative traditions already represented in the EU, will add specifi c features to the EU administration as post-communist states (Lippert and Umbach, 2004).
The Council, the European Council and Decision Making
The Council ‘suffers’ most from enlargement because the range of interests and preferences widens and makes decision making more diffi cult (Kerremans, 1998; Edwards, 1998). To accommodate heterogeneity and diversity is particularly diffi cult when unanimity is explicitly required or when the Council tries – as is common practice – to produce consensus among all member states. Thus enlargement makes EU decision making potentially less effi cient. That is one reason why areas where unanimity is the rule were gradually reduced in favour of Qualifi ed Majority Voting (Figure 5.1).
Before proposing the allocation of votes to candidates in the accession negotiations the member states have a chance to review and revise the existing system of weighted votes. Up to the enlargement of 2004 the EC pursued a conservative approach and extrapolated the status quo. It adapted the existing formula to a growing number of members. The threshold for QMV settled down around 71 per cent and increased to 72.3 in the EU25 and even 73.9 in the EU27 according to the Nice Treaty. After the fi rst enlargement only countries of relatively small size of population joined the EC9 which aggravated the implicit and intended imbalance in favour of small countries.7
The TCE introduces a double majority of states and population that will replace the entire system of weighted votes. This innovation was the most controversial issue at the IGC 2003 and led to the fi rst failed summit on the TCE in December the same year. Finally the IGC raised the threshold which the Convention had proposed from 50 to 55 per cent of member states and from 60 to 65 per cent of the population. The double majority in combina- tion with an extension of the areas where this procedure can be applied shows a way towards more effi ciency and improved capacity to act. Under the TCE, countries with a population around 10 million (such as Hungary or the Netherlands) will lose power compared to the rules on qualifi ed majority in the Nice Treaty while the big countries and Germany in particular gain
in power (Baldwin and Windgrén, 2004). The new rule for double majority would give Turkey as the probable most populous member state in the EU after 2014 a powerful stance in both making and blocking decisions. Inter- estingly, at the Nice IGC the EU15 only agreed on a list of 12 new members and their integration into the EU institutions. The newcomer Turkey will have the combined size of population of all ten countries that acceded in 2004 and could – together with Germany – dominate the Council and large parts of policy making. Turkish accession will affect the entire balance of power between the big member states and also affect the power constella- tions between the big and all other members. The membership of Turkey would have implications for institutions and decision making like none of the fi ve previous rounds of enlargement. Scenarios and speculations like these show how delicate and probably transitory these arrangements are.
Where a qualified majority is needed for a decision, the effects of enlargement on voting coalitions is of particular interest. It is diffi cult to make
5 26
51
99 105
137
181
0 20 40 60 80 100 120 140 160 180 200
ECCS 1952
EEC 1958
SEA 1987
TEU 1993
TEU 1999
TEU 2003
TCE 2007/09 Qualified Majority Voting
Source: Wessels (2004), p. 166.
Figure 5.1 Growth areas where Qualifi ed Majority Voting in the Council is provided for by the treaties (in absolute fi gures)
a prognosis on the likely dynamic in decision making and coalition building.
Under the Nice Treaty and the TCE a (very) broad coalition of states that transcends most cleavages (North/South, poor/rich, intergovernmentalist/
integrationist) must be built to get a (qualifi ed) majority of votes and thus shape policies. The new members, which probably won’t act collectively or gang up against the old EU15, have no majority under the Nice Treaty to block decisions. Even under the TCE forming a blocking minority will still be easier than reaching a qualifi ed majority. However, the TCE is a clear improvement in transparency, legitimacy and probably effi ciency over the Nice rules which will be applied at least until the end of 2009.
The question of how to organize a blocking minority became more acute when countries such as the UK joined that were keen to preserve a high degree of national sovereignty in EU decision making. Thus the British government threatened to veto EFTA enlargement in order to push through a lower ceiling for the blocking minority to safeguard formal power. The principle of the so-called ‘Ioannina compromise’ survived in the provision of the TCE on a suspensive veto (26 per cent of EU population or two-thirds of member states [10 in EU27] required for a blocking minority), but in practice it had rarely been called upon in the Council (see Table 5.2).
Table 5.2 Council and enlargement
Council Total Spread QMV* QMV Blocking vote of votes threshold (%) vote
EC6 17 1–4 12 70.6 6
EC9 58 2–10 41 70.7 18
EC10 63 2–10 45 71.4 19
EC12 76 2–10 54 71.0 23
EU15 87 2–10 62 71.3 26**
EU25 321 4–29 232 72.3 90
(1 November 2004) plus 62%
EU population
EU27 TCE 27 1 15 55 14
(1 November 2009) (minimum 15 MS) member states or plus 65% EU more than 35%
population of the pop. of at least 4 member
states
Notes:
* Decisions after proposal of Commission.
** 23–25 according to Ioannina compromise.
Source: Own compilation.
From the origins of the EC votes were weighted in favour of the smaller countries who feared a dominance of the big, notably France and Germany.
According to the TCE a minimum of four states is needed to block a vote because some countries wanted to make sure that Germany, France and Italy could not build a blocking minority. For countries such as Poland and initially also Spain the rules for blocking decisions were a crucial point in the negotiations.
The reform of the Council and its confi gurations was another point of concern. The need for better coordination and hierarchization of the Council formations was emphasized in recent rounds of enlargement. Some changes in the organization were possible without a change of the primary law and lengthy ratifi cation. Thus, at the European Council in Seville in 2002 the EU decided to reduce the confi gurations of the Council from 16 to 9. However, more radical reforms were again turned down. The draft TCE of the Convention stipulated the creation of one single super Council dealing with all legislative acts. The TCE preserves the old system of mixed legislative and executive tasks but strengthens the coordinating role of the General Affairs Council which is separated from the new Foreign Affairs Council (former external relations) of foreign ministers. This might well lead to a strengthening and creation of European ministers who are located close to the heads of government in their capitals and would certainly also affect COREPER (the Committee of Permanent Representatives).
Another issue linked to enlargement was the rotating presidency. In a larger EU member states would only hold the presidency every 12 or 15 years for six months. Concerns over administrative capacities of the many small countries had already led to a manipulation of the alphabetical order of the presidencies so that a smooth sequence of small and big states holding the presidency was possible. Also the composition of the troika for CFSP was changed so that it is now made up of the Presidency, the High Representative and the President of the Commission. As a real improvement, the TCE foresees permanent and elected chairs only for the Foreign Affairs Council which is held by the newly created post of a European Foreign minister.
Moreover, the president of the Euro-Council is elected for a term of two and a half years. Small countries were particularly interested in preserving the principle of rotation. In the TCE only a shallow compromise was found which remains close to the status quo. For the other Council confi gurations a team presidency of three member states shall chair at all Council levels for a period of 18 months and based on a joint work programme. The old system is continued because each member state in the team shall chair for a period of six months. This does not seem a real improvement in terms of effi ciency, continuity and visibility.
The European Council steadily enlarged and strengthened its power and gradually got locked into the institutional system of the EU. Over the
years but not only as a result of enlargement, the European Council lost its original informality and confi dentiality. According to the constitutional treaty of 2004, the European Council will become a proper organ (however, outside the jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice). The TCE confi rms and even extends the role of the European Council as the highest and ultimate centre of decision making in the EU, not only for the history- making decisions (for example on constitutional and fi nancial questions) but also for elections and nomination for key posts in the EU and many everyday decisions which could not be solved otherwise. Even earlier some members made an effort to refocus the agenda of the summit meetings on crucial questions, reduce the size of the delegations and so on (Schröder and Blair, 2002). The TCE now provides for a permanent president of the European Council who shall prepare, chair and coordinate the work and also represent the Union externally. The TCE opens the possibility for a future merging of the President of the European Council with the President of the Commission.