The rapid proliferation of EU agencies represents one of the most significant changes to the EU’s organisational set-up in past decades. At the same time, this development has significantly affected regulatory policy-making in the EU.
This volume assembles the most renowned scholars in the field to address the key themes and challenges that agency governance in the EU poses to effective and legitimate policy-making. The first theme addresses the causes and dynamics of the creation and design of regulatory bodies in EU governance, focusing not only on EU agencies but also on alternatives to the agency format, such as regulatory networks. Second, once agencies are established, the book goes on to explore the consequences and trajectories of agency governance. How effective and autonomous are EU agencies? How does EU agency governance transform existing patterns of executive governance in the EU? Third, the book addresses the design of EU agencies as independent, non-majoritarian institutions poses pressing questions with a view to their legitimacy and accountability.
The volume appeals to scholars and practitioners interested in the development and transformation of executive governance in the EU.
This book was published as a special issue of the Journal of European Public Policy.
Berthold Rittberger (University of Mannheim) and Arndt Wonka (University of Bremen)
Introduction: agency governance in the European Union
Mark Thatcher (London School of Economics and Political Science)
The creation of European regulatory agencies and its limits: a comparative analysis of European delegation
David Levi-Faur (Hebrew University of Jerusalem)
Regulatory networks and regulatory agencification: toward a Single European Regulatory Space
Martino Maggetti (University of Zurich) and Fabrizio Gilardi (University of Zurich)
The policy-making structure of European Regulatory Networks and the domestic adoption of standards
Madalina Busuioc (University of Amsterdam), Deirdre Curtin (University of Amsterdam) and Martijn Groenleer (Delft University of technology)
Agency growth between autonomy and accountability: the European Police Office as a ‘living institution’
Morten Egeberg (ARENA, University of Oslo) and Jarle Trondal (Agder University)
EU-level agencies: new executive centre formation or vehicles for national control?
Arndt Wonka (University of Bremen) and Berthold Rittberger (University of Mannheim)
Perspectives on EU governance: an empirical assessment of the political attitudes of EU agency professionals
Christopher Lord (ARENA, University of Oslo)
The European Parliament and the legitimation of agencification
Biography
Berthold Rittberger is Professor and Chair of political science and contemporary history at the University of Mannheim, project director at the Mannheim Centre for European Social Research (MZES), and adjunct Professor at the University of Canterbury, Christchurch (NZ).
Arndt Wonka is field coordinator and postdoctoral researcher at the Bremen International Graduate School of Social Sciences (BIGSSS) and external fellow and project director at the Mannheim Centre for European Social Research (MZES).
