| This study concentrates on the evolving role of the European Commission in the enlargement procedure over time. A comparison will be made between three rounds of enlargement: the break down of negotiations between the European Community and Great Britain in 1963, the first enlargement of the EC with Great Britain, Ireland and Denmark in 1973, and the most recent entrance of ten central and east European countries, namely Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovakia and Slovenia in 2004. The differences between the first and latest enlargement process stem from the progressing European integration. Whereas the first negotiations dealt primarily with economic requirements, the latest enlargement was for a great deal driven by moral force, by political and strategic considerations. Another striking difference is the number of states involved in the processes: from six Member States and three candidates in the first round to fifteen Members and ten candidates in the latest one. The EU has become a highly complex entity with increasing competence in different policy areas and a growing number of its constitutional parts. As a consequence, intergovernmental decision-making has become increasingly difficult as the European integration moves forwardand the enlargement procedure depends more and more on preparatory and monitoring work of the Commission. Though the legal base of the enlargement procedure and the formal role of the European institutions has remained unrevisited (Article 237 of the Treaty of Rome states that any European State may apply to become a member of the Community by addressing its application to the Council, which shall act unanimously after consulting the Commission and after receiving the assent of the European Parliament which shall act by an absolute majority of its component members) the general idea is that the autonomous role of the Commission has been strengthened over time. This hypothesis is based on the historical institutionalist assumption that institutions have their own dynamics. The claim here is that initially, in 1963, Member States were in a strong position, seeking to maximise their interests in the bargaining process (the veto of General De Gaulle is a well known example). Nevertheless, they carried out institutional and political reforms that fundamentally transformed their own position. This is demonstrated by the dependence of the states on the work of the Commission during the latest negotiations during which the right of veto was more a symbolic token than a real instrument. In this way gaps emerge in state authority that cannot reliably be closed. One important reason for this lies in the concept path dependence (Pierson, 1996). Individuals and states make important commitments to supranational initiatives and by doing so they lock-in former decisions. Path dependence explains why European integration is a cumulative process in which the decision to grant a certain amount of control to a supranational institution, like the Commission, is hard to reverse. The historical institutionalist theoretical perspective, together with the permission to do research in the recently opened archives of the Commission in the period of 1958 until 1973, provide the foundation for answering the central question in this research project: To what extent did the institutional autonomy of the European Commission in the enlargement procedure evolve over time, considered from a historical institutionalist perspective, when comparing the enlargement negotiations of 1963, 1973 and 2004? |
