|
Abstract:
|
Multi-level forms of governance, as representing a less top-down and more bottom-up approach, have
been promoted with a view to enhancing not only the legitimacy of EU action but increasingly also its
effectiveness. At the same time, however, their use raises effectiveness and legitimacy concerns of its
own. This also goes for the open method of coordination, as one of the major manifestations of the
Union’s multi-level governance development. Much research on the OMC focuses on its use in
particular policy areas and the effectiveness concerns that may arise in such areas. In this contribution
the focus will be more generally on the legitimacy of the OMC as a regulatory device, in terms of its
legal foundations. It asks how the use of the OMC fits in the European regulatory and legalconstitutional
landscapes, in particular to what extent its current patch in these landscapes, in the light
of the quest for more legitimacy of the EU, can be said to lead to a need for a) more conceptual clarity
and b) a better constitutional embedment in the Treaties? After analysing the development of the OMC
in the broader regulatory context of the EU, the relation between the OMC and the classic Community
– now Union – method and the European legal framework within which the OMC is being resorted to,
the focus is on whether this legal framework meets the requirements imposed by the principle of
legitimacy; in particular, under what legal conditions would one be able to say that the OMC makes
indeed a contribution to the legitimacy of the European Union? It is argued that some constitutional
changes need consideration in this regard. |