Transparency and Accountability of EU Decentralised Agencies and Agencification in Light of the Common Approach on EU Decentralised Agencies

Abstract

Since transparency and accountability are core values of good governance, they also determine to a large degree the legitimacy of the EU decentralized agencies and the process of agencification itself. This chapter argues that there are three levels (macro, meso and micro) at which good governance can be assessed, focusing on (i) the process of agencification itself, (ii) the establishing instrument of an individual agency and (iii) the actual functioning of the agency. As regards the macro level, the chapter analyses the 2012 Common Approach on EU Decentralized agencies to conclude that the CA has not improved the accountability of agencification and has only slightly improved the transparency of the process. Turning to the meso level, the analysis of the CA shows that the EU institutions have imposed an incomplete and partial form of accountability on EU agencies, mainly because there was no agreement between themselves on the role and place of EU agencies in the EU's institutional setup. This problematic conceptualization of accountability results in knock on effects for transparency as conceptualized in the CA, given that transparency is a necessary but insufficient condition for accountability.