Do Too Many Chefs Really Spoil the Broth? The European Commission, Bureaucratic Politics and European Integration, CES Germany & Europe Working Papers, No. 09.2, 5 August 1999

There is a puzzling, little-remarked contradiction in scholarly views of the European Commission. On the one hand, the Commission is seen as the maestro of European integration, gently but persistently guiding both governments and firms toward Brussels. On the other hand, the Commission is portrayed as a headless bunch of bickering fiefdoms who can hardly be bothered by anything but their own in­ ternecine turf wars. The reason these very different views of the same institution have so seldom come into conflict is quite apparent: EU studies has a set of relatively autonomous and poorly integrated sub­ fields that work at different levels of analysis. Those scholars holding the "heroic" view of the Com­ mission are generally focused on the contest between national and supranational levels that character­ ized the 1992 program and subsequent major steps toward European integration. By contrast, those scholars with the "bureaucratic politics" view are generally authors of case studies or legislative his­ tories of individual EU directives or decisions. However, the fact that these twO images of the Commis­ sion are often two ships passing in the night hardly implies that there is no dispute. Clearly both views cannot be right; but then, how can we explain the significant support each enjoys from the empirical record? The CommiSSion, perhaps the single most important supranational body in the world, certainly deserves better than the schizophrenic interpretation the EU studies community has given it. In this paper, I aim to make a contribution toward the unraveling of this paradox. In brief, the argument I make is as follows: the European Commission can be effective in pursuit of its broad integration goals in spite of, and even because of, its internal divisions. The folk wisdom that too many chefs spoil the broth may often be true, but it need not always be so. The paper is organized as follows. 1 begin with an elaboration of the theoretical position briefly out­ lined above. 1 then tum to a case study from the major Commission efforts to restructure the computer industry in the context of its 1992 program. The computer sector does not merely provide interesting, random illustrations of the hypothesis 1 have advanced. Rather, as Wayne Sandholtz and John Zysman have stressed, the Commission's efforts on informatics formed one of the most crucial parts of the en­ tire 1992 program, and so the Commission's success in "Europeanizing" these issues had significant ripple effects across the entire European political economy. I conclude with some thoughts on the fol­ lowing question: now that the Commission has succeeded in bringing the world to its doorstep, does its bureaucratic division still serve a useful purpose?

State Transformation and the European Integration Project. Lessons from the financial crisis and the Greek paradigm. CEPS Special Report No. 130/February 2016

The financial crisis that erupted in the eurozone not only affected the EU’s financial governance mechanisms, but also the very nature of state sovereignty and balances in the relations of member states; thus, the actual inequalities between the member states hidden behind their institutional equality have deteriorated. This transformation is recorded in the case law of the Court of Justice of the European Union and the member states’ constitutional courts, particularly in those at the heart of the crisis, with Greece as the most prominent example. It is the issue of public debt (sovereign debt) of the EU member states that particularly reflects the influence of the crisis on state sovereignty as well as the intensely transnational (intergovernmental) character of European integration, which under these circumstances takes the form of a continuous, tough negotiation. The historical connection between public debt (sovereign debt) and state sovereignty has re-emerged because of the financial crisis. This development has affected not only the European institutions, but also, at the member state level, the actual institutional content of the rule of law (especially judicial review) and the welfare state in its essence, as the great social and political acquis of 20th century Europe. From this perspective, the way that the Greek courts have dealt with the gradual waves of fiscal austerity measures and structural reforms from 2010 to 2015 is characteristic. The effect of the financial crisis on the sovereignty of the member states and on the pace of European integration also has an impact on European foreign and security policy, and the correlations between the political forces at both the national and European level, thus producing even more intense pressures on European social democracy. In light of the experience of the financial crisis, the final question is whether the nation state (given the large real inequalities among the EU member states) currently functions as a brake or as an engine for future European integration.