IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/jcmkts/v54y2016i4p793-808.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Not all Treaties are Created Equal: The Effects of Treaty Changes on Legislative Efficiency in the EU

Author

Listed:
  • Jørgen Bølstad
  • James P. Cross

Abstract

One of the key motives behind recent reforms of the EU's legislative process has been to increase efficiency. This study examines whether the Amsterdam, Nice and Lisbon treaties have successfully increased the speed with which the EU creates new laws. An interrupted time series approach is utilized to detect the total effects of treaty change on the decision‐making process. This study thus complements existing research on the effects of decision‐making rules, by employing a design more robust to the challenge of endogeneity. The findings suggest that the Amsterdam treaty was very successful at increasing legislative efficiency. In contrast, the Nice treaty does not appear to have had a notable impact, and, more interestingly, neither does the Lisbon treaty.

Suggested Citation

  • Jørgen Bølstad & James P. Cross, 2016. "Not all Treaties are Created Equal: The Effects of Treaty Changes on Legislative Efficiency in the EU," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 54(4), pages 793-808, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:jcmkts:v:54:y:2016:i:4:p:793-808
    DOI: 10.1111/jcms.12349
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/jcms.12349
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/jcms.12349?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Crombez, Christophe, 1996. "Legislative Procedures in the European Community," British Journal of Political Science, Cambridge University Press, vol. 26(2), pages 199-228, April.
    2. Andrew Moravcsik & Kalypso Nicolaïdis, 1999. "Explaining the Treaty of Amsterdam: Interests, Influence, Institutions," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 37(1), pages 59-85, March.
    3. Stasavage, David, 2004. "Open-Door or Closed-Door? Transparency in Domestic and International Bargaining," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 58(4), pages 667-703, October.
    4. Imbens, Guido W. & Lemieux, Thomas, 2008. "Regression discontinuity designs: A guide to practice," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 142(2), pages 615-635, February.
    5. 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.
    6. Crombez, Christophe & Hix, Simon, 2015. "Legislative Activity and Gridlock in the European Union," British Journal of Political Science, Cambridge University Press, vol. 45(3), pages 477-499, July.
    7. Robin Hertz & Dirk Leuffen, 2011. "Too big to run? Analysing the impact of enlargement on the speed of EU decision-making," European Union Politics, , vol. 12(2), pages 193-215, June.
    8. Garrett, Geoffrey, 1992. "International cooperation and institutional choice: the European Community's internal market," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 46(2), pages 533-560, April.
    9. Junge, Dirk & König, Thomas & Luig, Bernd, 2015. "Legislative Gridlock and Bureaucratic Politics in the European Union," British Journal of Political Science, Cambridge University Press, vol. 45(4), pages 777-797, October.
    10. Jonathan Golub, 2007. "Survival Analysis and European Union Decision-making," European Union Politics, , vol. 8(2), pages 155-179, June.
    11. Crombez, Christophe, 2000. "Spatial models of logrolling in the European Union," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 16(4), pages 707-737, November.
    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. Philippe van Gruisen, 2019. "The Trio Presidency and the Efficiency of Council Decision‐Making: An Empirical Study," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 57(4), pages 692-709, July.
    2. 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.
    3. Steffen Hurka & Maximilian Haag, 2020. "Policy complexity and legislative duration in the European Union," European Union Politics, , vol. 21(1), pages 87-108, March.
    4. Serra Boranbay-Akan & Thomas König & Moritz Osnabrügge, 2017. "The imperfect agenda-setter: Why do legislative proposals fail in the EU decision-making process?," European Union Politics, , vol. 18(2), pages 168-187, June.
    5. 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.

    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. Thomas König & Bernd Luig, 2017. "The impact of EU decision-making on national parties’ attitudes towards European integration," European Union Politics, , vol. 18(3), pages 362-381, September.
    2. Vibeke Wøien Hansen, 2014. "Incomplete information and bargaining in the EU: An explanation of first-reading non-agreements," European Union Politics, , vol. 15(4), pages 472-495, December.
    3. Serra Boranbay-Akan & Thomas König & Moritz Osnabrügge, 2017. "The imperfect agenda-setter: Why do legislative proposals fail in the EU decision-making process?," European Union Politics, , vol. 18(2), pages 168-187, June.
    4. Thomas König & Daniel Finke, 2007. "Reforming the equilibrium? Veto players and policy change in the European constitution-building process," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 2(2), pages 153-176, June.
    5. Christophe Crombez & Simon Hix, 2011. "Treaty reform and the Commission’s appointment and policy-making role in the European Union," European Union Politics, , vol. 12(3), pages 291-314, September.
    6. Keith Dowding, 2000. "Institutionalist Research on the European Union," European Union Politics, , vol. 1(1), pages 125-144, February.
    7. Madeleine O. Hosli & Běla Plechanovová & Serguei Kaniovski, 2018. "Vote Probabilities, Thresholds and Actor Preferences: Decision Capacity and the Council of the European Union," Homo Oeconomicus: Journal of Behavioral and Institutional Economics, Springer, vol. 35(1), pages 31-52, June.
    8. Philippe van Gruisen, 2019. "The Trio Presidency and the Efficiency of Council Decision‐Making: An Empirical Study," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 57(4), pages 692-709, July.
    9. Corinna Ahlfeld, 2010. "Reputation Sells -Compensation Payments in the Political Sphere," Departmental Discussion Papers 145, University of Goettingen, Department of Economics.
    10. Philipp Broniecki, 2020. "Power and transparency in political negotiations," European Union Politics, , vol. 21(1), pages 109-129, March.
    11. Crombez, Christophe, 2000. "Spatial models of logrolling in the European Union," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 16(4), pages 707-737, November.
    12. Christophe Crombez & Pieterjan Vangerven, 2014. "Procedural models of European Union politics: Contributions and suggestions for improvement," European Union Politics, , vol. 15(2), pages 289-308, June.
    13. Thomas Konig & Jonathan Slapin, 2004. "Bringing Parliaments Back in," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 16(3), pages 357-394, July.
    14. James P Cross & Jørgen Bølstad, 2015. "Openness and censorship in the European Union: An interrupted time series analysis," European Union Politics, , vol. 16(2), pages 216-240, June.
    15. van Gruisen, Philippe & Crombez, Christophe, 2021. "The Commission and the Council Presidency in the European Union: Strategic interactions and legislative powers," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 70(C).
    16. Christophe Crombez, 2000. "Institutional Reform and Co-Decision in the European Union," Constitutional Political Economy, Springer, vol. 11(1), pages 41-57, March.
    17. Berthold Rittberger, 2003. "Removing conceptual blinders: Under what conditions does the ‘democratic deficit’ affect institutional design decisions?," The Constitutionalism Web-Papers p0023, University of Hamburg, Faculty for Economics and Social Sciences, Department of Social Sciences, Institute of Political Science.
    18. Clifford J. Carrubba & Craig Volden, 2001. "Explaining Institutional Change in the European Union," European Union Politics, , vol. 2(1), pages 5-30, February.
    19. Persson, Petra & Qiu, Xinyao & Rossin-Slater, Maya, 2021. "Family Spillover Effects of Marginal Diagnoses: The Case of ADHD," IZA Discussion Papers 14020, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    20. KAMKOUM, Arnaud Cedric, 2023. "The Federal Reserve’s Response to the Global Financial Crisis and its Effects: An Interrupted Time-Series Analysis of the Impact of its Quantitative Easing Programs," Thesis Commons d7pvg, Center for Open Science.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:bla:jcmkts:v:54:y:2016:i:4:p:793-808. 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: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/journal.asp?ref=0021-9886 .

    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.