IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/erp/eiopxx/p0254.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The Council, the European Parliament, and the paradox of inter-institutional cooperation

Author

Listed:
  • Mühlböck, Monika and Berthold Rittberger

Abstract

Decision-making between the Council of Ministers and the European Parliament is characterized by a paradox. On the one hand, there is a high potential for inter-institutional conflict. Historically, the EP and the Council have been opponents in the struggle for power. In addition, both institutions can be said to fulfill different representational roles within the political system of the EU, with the Council representing the member states and the Parliament representing the citizens. Furthermore, agreement between the two is complicated by decision rules posing high thresholds for agreement and actors with often diverging preferences. On the other hand, in day-to-day policy-making, the Council and the European Parliament display a high level of consensus and decision-making efficiency. Most legislation is decided in first reading, and early agreements provide a shortcut for cumbersome inter-institutional negotiations. To shed light on this paradox, we conceptualize the mechanisms and dynamics underlying inter-institutional cooperation and conflict by taking recourse to factors derived from historical, sociological and rational choice institutionalisms. We argue that the same logics which account for conflict also contain the explanation for cooperation. Furthermore, we demonstrate that each of the theoretical approaches is particularly well suited to highlight a certain aspect of the paradox.

Suggested Citation

  • Mühlböck, Monika and Berthold Rittberger, 2015. "The Council, the European Parliament, and the paradox of inter-institutional cooperation," European Integration online Papers (EIoP), European Community Studies Association Austria (ECSA-A), vol. 19, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:erp:eiopxx:p0254
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://eiop.or.at/eiop/texte/2015-004a.htm
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: http://eiop.or.at/eiop/pdf/2015-004.pdf
    File Function: Full text
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Sara Hagemann & Bjørn Høyland, 2010. "Bicameral Politics in the European Union," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 48, pages 811-833, September.
    2. Daniel Naurin, 2007. "Safe Enough To Argue? Giving Reasons in the Council of the EU," ARENA Working Papers 11, ARENA.
    3. Kã–Nig, Thomas & Lindberg, Bjorn & Lechner, Sandra & Pohlmeier, Winfried, 2007. "Bicameral Conflict Resolution in the European Union: An Empirical Analysis of Conciliation Committee Bargains," British Journal of Political Science, Cambridge University Press, vol. 37(2), pages 281-312, April.
    4. Andreas Maurer, 2003. "The Legislative Powers and Impact of the European Parliament," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 41(2), pages 227-247, April.
    5. Robert Thomson, 2008. "The Council Presidency in the European Union: Responsibility with Power," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 46, pages 593-617, June.
    6. Toshkov, Dimiter and Anne Rasmussen, 2012. "Time to Decide: The effect of early agreements on legislative duration in the EU," European Integration online Papers (EIoP), European Community Studies Association Austria (ECSA-A), vol. 16, May.
    7. Rory Costello & Robert Thomson, 2011. "The nexus of bicameralism: Rapporteurs’ impact on decision outcomes in the European Union," European Union Politics, , vol. 12(3), pages 337-357, September.
    8. Robert Thomson, 2008. "The Council Presidency in the European Union: Responsibility with Power," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 46(3), pages 593-617, June.
    9. Pierson, Paul, 2000. "Increasing Returns, Path Dependence, and the Study of Politics," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 94(2), pages 251-267, June.
    10. George Tsebelis & Geoffrey Garrett, 2000. "Legislative Politics in the European Union," European Union Politics, , vol. 1(1), pages 9-36, February.
    11. Johannes Lindner & Berthold Rittberger, 2003. "The Creation, Interpretation and Contestation of Institutions — Revisiting Historical Institutionalism," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 41(3), pages 445-473, June.
    12. Lewis, Jeffrey, 2005. "The Janus Face of Brussels: Socialization and Everyday Decision Making in the European Union," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 59(4), pages 937-971, October.
    13. Hall, Peter A. & Taylor, Rosemary C. R., 1996. "Political science and the three new institutionalisms," MPIfG Discussion Paper 96/6, Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Guofeng Wang & Rui Shi & Wei Cheng & Lihua Gao & Xiankai Huang, 2023. "Bibliometric Analysis for Carbon Neutrality with Hotspots, Frontiers, and Emerging Trends between 1991 and 2022," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 20(2), pages 1-23, January.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Muhlbock, Monika & Tosun, Jale, 2015. "Deciding over controversial issues: Voting behavior in the Council and the European Parliament on genetically modified organisms," GMCC-15: Seventh GMCC, November 17-20, 2015, Amsterdam, the Netherlands 211480, International Conference on Coexistence between Genetically Modified (GM) and non-GM based Agricultural Supply Chains (GMCC).
    2. Nicola Maaser & Alexander Mayer, 2016. "Codecision in context: implications for the balance of power in the EU," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 46(1), pages 213-237, January.
    3. James P Cross & AustÄ— VaznonytÄ—, 2020. "Can we do what we say we will do? Issue salience, government effectiveness, and the legislative efficiency of Council Presidencies," European Union Politics, , vol. 21(4), pages 657-679, December.
    4. Andreas Warntjen, 2008. "The Council Presidency," European Union Politics, , vol. 9(3), pages 315-338, September.
    5. Hatani, Faith, 2016. "Institutional plasticity in public-private interactions: Why Japan’s port reform failed," Journal of World Business, Elsevier, vol. 51(6), pages 923-936.
    6. Vladimír Bilčík, 2017. "The Slovak EU Council Presidency: In Defence of Post-Brexit EU," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 55, pages 64-72, September.
    7. James P Cross, 2013. "Everyone’s a winner (almost): Bargaining success in the Council of Ministers of the European Union," European Union Politics, , vol. 14(1), pages 70-94, March.
    8. André Sorensen & Anna-Katharina Brenner, 2021. "Cities, Urban Property Systems, and Sustainability Transitions: Contested Processes of Institutional Change and the Regulation of Urban Property Development," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(15), pages 1-19, July.
    9. Anand Menon, 2011. "Power, Institutions and the CSDP: The Promise of Institutionalist Theory," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 49(1), pages 83-100, January.
    10. Mónica D. Oliveira & Inês Mataloto & Panos Kanavos, 2019. "Multi-criteria decision analysis for health technology assessment: addressing methodological challenges to improve the state of the art," The European Journal of Health Economics, Springer;Deutsche Gesellschaft für Gesundheitsökonomie (DGGÖ), vol. 20(6), pages 891-918, August.
    11. Sophie Jacquot & Cornelia Woll, 2003. "Usage of European Integration - Europeanisation from a Sociological Perspective," Post-Print hal-01019642, HAL.
    12. Fabio Franchino & Camilla Mariotto, 2013. "Explaining negotiations in the conciliation committee," European Union Politics, , vol. 14(3), pages 345-365, September.
    13. James P Cross & Henrik Hermansson, 2017. "Legislative amendments and informal politics in the European Union: A text reuse approach," European Union Politics, , vol. 18(4), pages 581-602, December.
    14. Ripoll Servent, Ariadna and Amy Busby, 2013. "Introduction: Agency and influence inside the EU institutions," European Integration online Papers (EIoP), European Community Studies Association Austria (ECSA-A), vol. 17, July.
    15. Svetličič Marjan & Cerjak Kira, 2015. "Small Countries’ EU Council Presidency and the Realisation of their National Interests: The Case of Slovenia," Croatian International Relations Review, Sciendo, vol. 21(74), pages 5-39, December.
    16. Christopher Wratil & Sara B Hobolt, 2019. "Public deliberations in the Council of the European Union: Introducing and validating DICEU," European Union Politics, , vol. 20(3), pages 511-531, September.
    17. repec:hal:wpspec:info:hdl:2441/8391 is not listed on IDEAS
    18. Resnick, Danielle & Babu, Suresh & Haggblade, Steven & Hendriks, Sheryl L. & Mather, David, 2015. "Conceptualizing Drivers Of Policy Change In Agriculture, Nutrition, And Food Security: The Kaleidoscope Model," Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Food Security Policy Research Papers 258732, Michigan State University, Department of Agricultural, Food, and Resource Economics, Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Food Security (FSP).
    19. Bothfeld, Silke, 2008. "Under (Re-) Construction: die Fragmentierung des deutschen Geschlechterregimes durch die neue Familienpolitik," Working papers of the ZeS 01/2008, University of Bremen, Centre for Social Policy Research (ZeS).
    20. Yiru Jia & Nicky Morrison & Franziska Sielker, 2023. "Delivering common property in Chinese contractual communities: Law, power and practice," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 60(16), pages 3272-3293, December.
    21. Arthur Corazza, 2020. "Power, interest and insecurity: A comparative analysis of workplace dualization and inclusion in Europe," LEQS – LSE 'Europe in Question' Discussion Paper Series 153, European Institute, LSE.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:erp:eiopxx:p0254. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Editorial Assistant (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/ecsaaea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.