The Implications of a Dual Executive for Parliamentary Control: The EU between Separation and Confusion of Powers

The Lisbon Treaty has institutionalized a dual decision-making regime in the EU: a supranational decision-making regime for single market policies and an intergovernmental decision-making regime for policies traditionally close to core state powers. The paper analyses the relations between the European Parliament, the European Council and the Commission in these two policy regimes, by paying particular attention to the role played by the European Parliament. In single market policies, we have a dual executive in a quasi-separated system of government (European Council as a collective head of state and the Commission as a governing institution): here the European Parliament has the tools and the prerogatives for checking executive power. In core state powers, instead, we have a dual executive in a confusion of powers system (the European Council as a collective head of government and the Commission as an administrative institution): the European Parliament has been excluded from the decision-making process, but only informed on its outcomes. The paper concludes with a reform proposal for locating the dual executive in a governmental structure of separation of powers where the European Parliament can play its checking role across policy regimes.