"Absorbing the Shock: Enlargement’s Effects on the Committee of the Regions"

Scherpereel, John A. (2005) "Absorbing the Shock: Enlargement’s Effects on the Committee of the Regions". In: UNSPECIFIED, Austin, Texas. (Unpublished)

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Abstract

[From the Introduction]. The Committee of the Regions (CoR) is a novel, infrequently studied node in the EU’s system of governance. Established by the Maastricht Treaty, the CoR was designed to recognize the voice of regional and local authorities in the Union’s policy-making process. In addition to embodying the Union’s commitment to subsidiarity, the CoR was meant to address the democratic deficit by offering representatives of sub-national bodies a formal place on the EU’s policy-making stage. Scholars debated the practical and theoretical implications of the Committee in the years immediately following its establishment. They wondered, among other things, whether the CoR could overcome the diversity of its membership, whether it could establish an effective niche within the EU’s decision-making system, whether it could truly help to overcome the democratic deficit, and whether sub-national authorities across the EU would appreciate the body as an effective channel of representation. After ten years of CoR activity and in the wake of 2004’s historic enlargement, the moment is fortuitous to address some of these questions anew. This paper briefly analyzes the first decade of CoR activity and pays particular attention to the possible effects of enlargement on the Committee’s modus operandi. What role has the Committee struck for itself within the EU’s policy-making game? Has it succumbed to the bickering and immobility that some early analysts predicted? How will enlargement affect the CoR’s emerging position within EU politics? Will it reinforce, detract from, or otherwise transform the CoR’s roles? Might it bury the CoR in acrimony and (further) discredit the body in the eyes of the Union’s more powerful and established institutions? The paper attempts to throw light on these questions.

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