IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/zbw/mpifgd/p0072.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The Composition of the College of Commissioners: Patterns of Delegation

Author

Listed:
  • Döring, Holger

Abstract

Recent theoretical studies question the view that the European Commission is a preference outlier. This paper addresses this question by discussing the composition of the European College of Commissioners and by focusing on the appointment process. The analysis is based on a dataset that contains biographical information for all commissioners since 1958. The analysis highlights the importance of commissioners? party affi liation and their former political positions. Multivariate regression analysis shows that smaller member states have tended to send more high-ranking politicians to the College of Commissioners than larger member states. However, party affi liation has not become more important as an appointment criterion. What has changed with time has not been the party link but the caliber of positions held by commissioners before they are appointed to the College.

Suggested Citation

  • Döring, Holger, 2006. "The Composition of the College of Commissioners: Patterns of Delegation," MPIfG Discussion Paper 06/4, Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies.
    • Handle: RePEc:zbw:mpifgd:p0072
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/19932/1/dp06-4.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    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. Mark A. Pollack, 2001. "International Relations Theory and European Integration," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 39(2), pages 221-244, June.
    3. Tsebelis, George & Garrett, Geoffrey, 2001. "The Institutional Foundations of Intergovernmentalism and Supranationalism in the European Union," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 55(2), pages 357-390, April.
    4. Burley, Anne-Marie & Mattli, Walter, 1993. "Europe Before the Court: A Political Theory of Legal Integration," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 47(1), pages 41-76, January.
    5. Tsebelis, George, 1994. "The Power of the European Parliament as a Conditional Agenda Setter," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 88(1), pages 128-142, March.
    6. Hix, Simon & Noury, Abdul & Roland, Gérard, 2005. "Power to the Parties: Cohesion and Competition in the European Parliament, 1979–2001," British Journal of Political Science, Cambridge University Press, vol. 35(2), pages 209-234, April.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Holger Döring, 2007. "The Composition of the College of Commissioners," European Union Politics, , vol. 8(2), pages 207-228, June.
    2. Manow, Philip & Döring, Holger, 2006. "Divided Government European Style? Electoral and Mechanical Causes of European Parliament and Council Divisions," MPIfG Discussion Paper 06/8, Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies.
    3. Keith Dowding, 2000. "Institutionalist Research on the European Union," European Union Politics, , vol. 1(1), pages 125-144, February.
    4. Thomas Konig & Jonathan Slapin, 2004. "Bringing Parliaments Back in," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 16(3), pages 357-394, July.
    5. Abdul Ghafar Noury & Gérard Roland, 2002. "More power to the European Parliament?," ULB Institutional Repository 2013/7760, ULB -- Universite Libre de Bruxelles.
    6. 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.
    7. Magnus Lundgren & Stefanie Bailer & Lisa M Dellmuth & Jonas Tallberg & Silvana Târlea, 2019. "Bargaining success in the reform of the Eurozone," European Union Politics, , vol. 20(1), pages 65-88, March.
    8. Thomas König & Mirja Pöter, 2001. "Examining the EU Legislative Process," European Union Politics, , vol. 2(3), pages 329-351, October.
    9. James P. Cross, 2012. "Interventions and negotiation in the Council of Ministers of the European Union," European Union Politics, , vol. 13(1), pages 47-69, March.
    10. 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.
    11. repec:lic:licosd:21508 is not listed on IDEAS
    12. Brian Efird & Gaspare M. Genna, 2002. "Structural Conditions and the Propensity for Regional Integration," European Union Politics, , vol. 3(3), pages 267-295, September.
    13. Justin Leinaweaver & Robert Thomson, 2014. "Testing models of legislative decision-making with measurement error: The robust predictive power of bargaining models over procedural models," European Union Politics, , vol. 15(1), pages 43-58, March.
    14. Torsten J. Selck, 2004. "On the Dimensionality of European Union Legislative Decision-Making," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 16(2), pages 203-222, April.
    15. Jean-Yves Pitarakis & George Tridimas, 2003. "Joint Dynamics of Legal and Economic Integration in the European Union," European Journal of Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 16(3), pages 357-368, November.
    16. Jonathan B Slapin, 2014. "Measurement, model testing, and legislative influence in the European Union," European Union Politics, , vol. 15(1), pages 24-42, March.
    17. Abdul G. Noury, 2002. "Ideology, Nationality and Euro-Parliamentarians," European Union Politics, , vol. 3(1), pages 33-58, March.
    18. Rene Lindstadt, Jonathan B. Slapin & Ryan J. Vander Wielen, 2009. "Balancing Competing Demands: Position-Taking and Election Proximity in the European Parliament," The Institute for International Integration Studies Discussion Paper Series iiisdp295, IIIS.
    19. repec:bla:jcmkts:v:47:y:2009:i::p:357-384 is not listed on IDEAS
    20. Clifford J. Carrubba & Matthew Gabel, 2005. "Do Governments Sway European Court of Justice Decision-making?: Evidence from Government Court Briefs," Working Papers 2005-06, University of Kentucky, Institute for Federalism and Intergovernmental Relations.
    21. repec:bla:jcmkts:v:48:y:2010:i::p:811-833 is not listed on IDEAS
    22. 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.
    23. Dirk Junge & Thomas König, 2007. "What's Wrong With Eu Spatial Analysis?," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 19(4), pages 465-487, October.

    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:zbw:mpifgd:p0072. 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: ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/mpigfde.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.