EU Law - Who Actually Has the Power in the EU Triangle - Essay Example

?The big question nowadays in Europe is that who actually has the power in the EU triangle? European commission, the council of ministers or Europeanparliament (EP) in the European Union? This question is rising due to the changing scenario of power shifting in the European union owed to different treaties, Treaties of Maastricht (1992), Amsterdam (1997) and Nice (2001) and Lisbon (2007). Practitioners and scholars, both are endowing people with verifying views of a simple and a straight forward question who has the power in EU and how power balances amongst these three main actors in the context of legislative decision making. The simple answer is European Parliament is gaining more and more power. The first elections of the European parliament “by direct universal suffrage” took place in June 1979 (Europa, 2007). Since then these elections take place every five years giving more strength and responsibility to the Parliament. In European Union, EP is the only directly elected body. Every five year, 27 member states select 736 Members, which represent 500 million people of EU (EuroParl, 2011a). It covers every sphere of EU’s citizens life; civil, social, political, economical and environmental. Its domain of control is huge. Gradually EU’s parliament has gained a position of “co legislator” for all the new laws and amendments. Few people say that it has given increased powers and it can exercise it anywhere it wants. It has given supervisory powers in law making; even the Central bank cannot select its president without EU’s Parliaments assent. EuroParl (2011a) writes, “The European Parliament and the Council must adhere to the annual spending limits laid down in the multiannual financial perspective.” It has all the controlling power in monetary matters. It can also set up inquiries over controversial matters. EuroParl (2011b) writes, “With the entry into force of the Lisbon Treaty, the Parliament became a true co-legislator for the EU's entire annual budget, deciding on it in close collaboration with the Council.” The whole document is repeatedly filled with such sentences. “The European Parliament and the Council may, by means of directives adopted in accordance with the ordinary legislative procedure, establish…” The Fall of Berlin wall completely changed the Europe’s scenario. In 1990, unification of Germany took place. On the other hand, Treaty of European Union, the new treaty was negotiated by the members of the EU, taking place at Maastricht in Dec 1991. It was put to force in Nov 1993. EP’s role under Maastricht Treaty stretched and each citizen regardless of its nationality was given the right to vote in the elections of the European Parliament. During March 2000, EU wore a new, modernized face enabling Europe to emerge as a giant business Union, concerning many other issues like, education, information, environment, unemployment etc. People, who were voters of EU were getting really restless demanding their Governments to find real solutions of their problems. EU has been evolving ever since it came into being along with its parliament’s powers and functions. This enhanced cooperation procedure, introduced firstly in Amsterdam treaty, has come a long way and literally plays a role in most of the EU matters. EU’s parliament either has to give consent or has to be kept informed throughout. The main provision of Nice treaty was to change the decision-making process to make it more democratic. French and Dutch voters discarded the constitutional treaty and took 18 months to process the reforms. In December 2007 Lisbon treaty was signed by all the EU members and it is currently being endorsed. This treaty gave increased powers to European parliament at three fronts; Legislative, budgetary and supervisory powers. Witte, et al. (2010, pp.67) states, “Lisbon treaty has entrusted the EP with more active role in law making.” Enhanced co operation procedure was initiated in 1987, in which EP was free to give opinions and regulate directives proposed by the EC and ask for amendments. Along with it assent procedure also brought in, under which EP had to assent to commission on any proposal taking place. The powers expanded in 1992 when treaty of Maastricht established the term “co-decision” placing parliament at the “equal footing with the council” writes Ref 1. REF 1It also gave “power to throw out proposed legislation” in case of no vote by the maximum numbers of EP’s members. EP also plays a crucial role in EU’s budgetary matters along with democratic supervision. In the time of difficulty, Lisbon treaty gave potency to EU’s parliament. Europa (2007) writes, “The European Parliament, which represents the people, shares legislative and budgetary power with the Council of the European Union” (Europa, 2007). EU’s parliament has a direct link with EU citizens and impacts their lives directly. This body is elected by the people themselves to play a crucial role in legislative procedures and political exercises. Phinnemore (2004, pp.13) writes, “The role of the European Parliament in most decision-making is therefore increased to one of co-legislator with the Council. However, there are various areas where the Council is still obliged only to consult the European Parliament.” Lisbon treaty gives its citizens a new right to bring about any plan to the Commission that has the bear of one million EU citizens. This is a solid clause but with a procedural fault. For example, when Greenpeace (an environment friendly group) ran a campaign against growing of genetically modified crops in Europe and successfully got support of more than a million people via internet. It gave birth to lot of heated discussions and raised lot of questions about the authenticity of those signatures and the procedures to deal with the matter. In addition, Article 8A writes, “Every citizen shall have the right to participate in the democratic life of the Union.” So in this scenario, in a so called democratic setting, can the people decide whether Turkey shall become the part of EU or not? Does Lisbon treaty actually give the power to people to decide or it is just a contradiction? An important article that has also been included and stressed upon is that the parliament of the EU members has the authority to send back any proposals for verification before it becomes a law. All the states may assess any information and directions of its working before it becomes a law and ask for reconsideration in a comfortable environment to enhance the maximum democracy in its true sense. Along with this, the introduction of co decision of parliament and council working hand in hand is a measure which needs to be praised from democratic point of view and gives a lot of room to accountability and transparency. Although people feel that there is an absurd increase of power given to the parliament. Mulvey (2003) writes that, “the paradox of parliament's increasing power” is not a very good step. Many scholars consider this as a “default decision making process” (Phinnemore, 2004, pp.13). None of us will disagree that Lisbon provisions are mainly relevant to legislative domain. It has also gained supervisory powers and can act like a watch dog. Witte, et al. (2010, pp.33) write, “The changes brought by the Lisbon treaty do not relate so much to the operation of the legislative process but to the institutional and substantive framework within which the P legislative role is played out.” Harris and Horspool (2010) write, “The role that EU law plays in the national legal systems is increasingly important.” ‘Cooperation’ procedure, Assent’ procedure and Co-decision’ procedure are the backbone of EP’s powers. Now vast majority of EU’s legislative matters take place with the consent of EP. Increased powers and roles were given to parliament to make EU fall in the category of Democratic body. Another common approach to this typology is to look at the scope, domain, weight and its costs. EP’s scope and domain of influence has become wider than. The legislative role has a big domain of 40 sections come under it. (EuroParl, 2011b) writes, “The Treaty gives a huge boost to the powers of the European Parliament. The rise in legislative powers for the European Parliament represents almost a doubling in power.” Although each treaty has swelled EP’s legislative power but Lisbon has made it stand on equivalent footing with the Council of ministers to come to a decision on the EU laws. These equal rights of Parliament with the council put lot of responsibility on the European Parliament to cope with the citizen’s expectations in a democratic manner. Witte, et al. (2010, pp.4) writes, “Two important innovations that are external to the EP but may have important consequences for its legislative role, namely the Citizen’s initiative and the new social clause.…” Last but not the least, the Lisbon Treaty also offers Parliament a fresh right to put forward treaty changes and also has the power to block the proposal to move forward. (Solberg, 2008) In today’s scenario, Witte, et al. (2010, pp.40) writes, “EP has more expertise, experience and resources.” Another complication is the process of decision making route; example is of US led invasion of Iraq, where EU could not come up to a unanimous decision urgently. Many argue that working style is undemocratic and it becomes very difficult for member states to take a decision. “Institutional and political reforms” needs to take place along with self sufficiency (Landaburu, 2006). EU’s focal point is economy and enhanced commercial ties which are soft power tools. Toje (2010, p.55) conclusion is so far the best, he writes, “As a power, the EU is economically strong, militarily weak and politically fragmented reasons for calling it a soft power.” Other major clause which has been modified, to promote and lessen the democracy deficit in EU, is the transparency factor, an open debate about the issues related to people shall be discussed in front of the people. Article 15 ensures it by writing, “The European Parliament shall meet in public, as shall the Council when considering and voting on a draft legislative act.” Another name of democracy is transparency. Parliament is pledged to be as open as possible. It shall be people’s choice to be part of the debate or not. The elected Heads have no privilege to decide that becomes a part of the discussion about the matters which are solely related to people and with their paid taxes money. This is the most fundamental to democracy. According to this clause each citizen of EU has a right to access any document related to the offices and institutions. Since the beginning, EU has been evolving and seems to progress at its own pace. But change has always been a vital part of EU. EU’s Parliaments increased power in internal and external legislative matters is becoming controversial and mixed views are taking birth. This all is done for the sake of democracy. It won’t be wrong to say that “democratic challenge “is one of the considerable reasons for this treaty to come into being” (Mulvey, 2003). EU was facing a major democracy deficit in pre Lisbon times. Lisbon treaty wins a place in 2009 by the European Union, along with other things, it intends, to do well to democracy in the EU. In order to do so, many procedural and institutional reforms are initiated in the treaty, to make it fall in the category of democratic body. The idea behind the improvements of Lisbon treaty is to get connected to people in order to meet the needs of a democratic organization. It seems that EU has put an effort by allowing the aspect of direct democracy into the Union‘s policy-making process. In a democratic environment, governments and institutions are accountable to their people. Menken (1949) writes, “Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want and deserve to get it good and hard.” EU citizens are getting it hard but not good enough. The main deficit in Lisbon treaty is of partial public information, lack of public’s interest, lack of clarity in the document, along with the restricted consent, unmet commitments and questionable credibility of the EU. However, lot of effort has been put to regain credibility and public’s trust. For the first time, Lisbon treaty gives the power to people to question and test the power of European institutions. The falling voter’s turnout, support graph, opinion polls and shaken trust on EU is becoming making it obvious that people are getting disconnected and indifferent by having no opinion about the doings of EU. It is ironic, as on one hand major steps are taken purely to give as much as possible, democracies to people yet people are reacting this way. Emmanouilidis and Stratulat (2010) quoted, the Laeken Declaration of 2001 in their article and stated that they replicated this idea by stating that “the Union needs to become more democratic, more transparent and more efficient”. In fact scholars feel that there is lot of public speaking and imagery rather than the core. The intentions behind these make up clauses are may be genuine. They newly introduced clauses, try to strengthen democracy and give EU citizens a transparent and democratic Europe. They have tried to get connected to people and give them an opportunity to raise questions at National and European level. It also tries to ensure the social, economic and political rights of people, which is the very basic demand of democracy. However; it still seems like a dream due to constraints, which are procedural and lack coherence. European Union needs to get connected to people to achieve its goals. EU’s nation is very much aware of the fact that there is a long way to go to shape the world in their manner and radical, structural changes are required to make it more effectively. EU is a trend setter for a modern form of foreign policy in a globalize world and states look up to it and wants to join it. It raises lot of arguments and questions that when EU is influential and rational in its Economic policy then it can definitely has the power and the ability to paint the world according to their fancy, although, the furthermost obstacle in its advancement is its own policies. It is very difficult for EU to come to a unanimous decision due to its long procedures. Along with this we all agree after reading the treaty itself that it is almost unreadable and incomprehensible. It lacks clarity and coherence, which damages EU’s image. Its legislative text is almost incoherent and needs urgent attention still there is a need for speed. References Europa, 2007. Europe in 12 lessons. [online] Available at: [Accessed 3 December 2011] EuroParl, 2011a. European Parliament. [online] Available at: [Accessed 3 December 2011] EuroParl, 2011b. European Parliament & the Lisbon Treaty. [online] Available at: [Accessed 2 December 2011] Harris, S. and Horspool, M., 2010. EU law. [online] Available at: [Accessed on 3 December 2011] Landaburu, E., 2006. Hard facts about Europe’s soft power. [online] Available at: [Accessed on 30 November 2011] Lisbon Treaty, 2010. Treaty on European Union and Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union. [online] Available at: http://www.lisbon-treaty.org/wcm/the-lisbon-treaty/ [Accessed on 29 November 2011] Mulvey, S., 2003. The EU's democratic challenge. BBC NEWS. [online] (Last Update 21 November 2003) Available at: [Accessed on 1 December 2011] Phinnemore, D., 2004. The Treaty establishing a constitution for Europe: An Overview. Chatham House Briefing Note. [online] Available at: [Accessed on 1 December 2011] Solberg, J., 2008. European Union legislative triangle. [image online] Available at: [Accessed 01 June 2010]. Toje, A., 2010. The European Union as a Small Power, Journal of Common Market Studies, 49(1), pp.43-60. [online] Available at: Witte, B. et al., 2010. Legislation after Lisbon: New Opportunities for the European Parliament. [online] Available at: [Accessed on 2 December 2011] Read More