An examination of the implementation difficulties which the European Commission has identified as undermining the policy-making abilities of the EU institutions.
This paper discusses how the European Commission has become aware of an “implementation deficit” within the EU policy process. It looks at how its primary role regarding EU policy implementation is that of supervisor and overseer and how although it is responsible for direct implementation to a limited extent, the majority of implementation is delegated to agencies within the member states. It attempts to show how it is this subsidiarity of policy implementation which has emerged as the principal cause of the implementation deficit, although various other factors add to this problem. In order to understand the extent to which these implementation difficulties undermine EU policy-making, each of the primary factors which contribute to this deficit are examined and examples of actual EU policies that have suffered as a result are provided.
“A further means by which EU policy-making may be undermined is the presence of too many intervening links in the implementation process. The higher the number of links, the greater is the risk of failure. For instance, the EU’s anti sexual discrimination policies would go through so many links before reaching their intended target (e.g. an office) that the policy may have been eroded to such an extent that, when implemented, it can be totally distorted from the original Commission policy.”