The European Parliament and the European Political Cooperation. The search for a proper role in the Community’s first foreign policy

Abstract

The article focuses on the European Parliament and the development of the European Political Cooperation (EPC), the first attempt to harmonize EC member states’ national foreign policies into a single European framework. Being an intergovernmental policy, developing outside of the Treaties, the European Parliament had no official role in the development of the EPC. Yet, it challenged member states’ monopoly over foreign relations through some autonomous initiatives and forced them to accept small increase in the Parliament’s powers of scrutiny over the EPC. Once the European Council accepted the introduction of direct elections, the European Parliament could legitimately claim a greater role on the development of the EPC: being the only elective institution it could assure a democratic oversight over the EPC. By assuring a (limited) role to the European Parliament, the EPC remained an intergovernmental field of actions, although it now contemplated some supranational features.

Pushing the Boundaries. New Research on the Activism of EU Supranational Institutions

“…Roos (2017), for example, shows the struggle of the European Parliament to gain the powers typical of parliaments in national liberal democracies, not least in order to legitimise EU decision-making and legal procedures through parliamentary control and involvement. Tulli (2017) analyses the EP's activism in order to solidify its role in the European Communities, aiming to eventually have the power to justify direct elections, which most MEPs considered crucial for the EP's legitimacy by the late 1970s. Once the Council had agreed to direct elections, the Parliament used its position as the only directly elected EC institution and as representative of European citizens to claim a broader involvement in Community legislation and policy.…”

“…For example, strategic constructivism (Jabko 2006) emphasises the strategic manipulation of ideas (in the EU context by supranational institutions) to achieve preferences stemming from rationalist or other interests. While not applying the strategic constructivist framework, both Roos (2017) and Tulli (2017) argue that MEPs wielded the concept of 'democratic legitimacy' to justify the expansion of the Parliament's role and powers and, eventually, direct election itself.…”