European institutional architecture after Amsterdam : parliamentary system or regulatory structure?

Abstract

To write about the institutional provisions of the Treaty of Amsterdam is something of a paradox. Although the European Council, meeting in Corfu in June 1995, had indicated that the upcoming intergovernmental conference (IGC) would have as one of its main tasks the consideration of a series of measures “necessary to facilitate the work of the institutions and guaranteee their effective operation in the perspective of enlargement”, the IGC has notoriously failed to agree on the most important issues, such as the composition of the Commission or the weighting of Member States’ votes in the Council of Ministers. At the same time, it is well known that large-scale international negotiations are far from representing an inspired exercise in constitutionmaking: the need to reach consensus among all participants naturally results in piecemeal compromises which often crystallize around the lowest common denominator. The Single European Act, with its heavy emphasis on the completion of the internal market, nonetheless contained a large number of quid pro quos.