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Szapiro, Manuel --- "Comitology: The Ongoing Reform" [2009] ELECD 346; in Hofmann, C.H. Herwig; Türk, H. Alexander (eds), "Legal Challenges in EU Administrative Law" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2009)

Book Title: Legal Challenges in EU Administrative Law

Editor(s): Hofmann, C.H. Herwig; Türk, H. Alexander

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9781847207883

Section: Chapter 4

Section Title: Comitology: The Ongoing Reform

Author(s): Szapiro, Manuel

Number of pages: 27

Extract:

4. Comitology: the ongoing reform1
Manuel Szapiro2

I. COMITOLOGY IN A NUTSHELL

Comitology has become an emblematic feature of the EU administra-
tive governance system. `Comitology' committees first developed in the
1960s with a view to assisting the Commission in its exercise of delegated
implementing powers.3 The choice to delegate executive competence to the
Commission was ­ and still is ­ made prima facie for the sake of speed, so
as to avoid a legislative procedure which could otherwise last several years.
Before adopting an implementing measure, the Commission consults a
committee made up of Member States' (MS) representatives, which it
chairs. Thus, it facilitates downstream implementation and application
by the national administrations. Committees allow for the participation
of MS upstream in the decision-making process, when implementing
measures are being drafted.
In addition to this vertical integration, comitology committees play
a decisive role in the horizontal allocation of competence between
the two branches of the Community executive: the Council and the
Commission. Under two procedures4 ­ management and regulatory ­ if

1
Section IV of this chapter draws in part upon another article by the same
author: `Comitologie: rétrospective et prospective après la réforme de 2006', (2006)
3 Revue du droit de l'UE, 545­86.
2
European Commission, Secretariat-general. Professor at the College of
Europe in Bruges and the Institut d'Etudes Politiques de Paris. Former Deputy
Head of the Institutional Affairs Unit, European Commission, Secretariat-
General. In this capacity, the author participated, for the Commission, in ...