The Creeping Transformation of the European Commission

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In this volume the role of the European Commission in the domestic implementation of EU programmes was conceptualised theoretically and traced empirically. In theoretical terms, the Commission is pulled into policy implementation because the particular conditions of the emerging multi-level policy-making style impede a clear-cut separation of tasks and responsibilities between the actors involved. However, the longer a common policy is conducted, the greater the Commission’s need to link-up with the implementation stage. There are two major reasons for this. First, the Commission is accountable before the Council and other European peers for the quality of EU interventions and has to verify and communicate the efficiency and effectiveness of joint programmes. Second, and more importantly, the longer a common policy runs the more the Commission will need detailed socio-economic and technical information about the situation on the ground in order to optimise and re-adjust its policy proposals—the production of which is the Commission’s principal task. Both circumstances make the Commission politically vulnerable to what happens to EU programmes at the implementation stage and will thus induce the Commission to expand its steering or management capacities to policy execution in order to reduce the threat of interdependence.