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The European Commission’s White Paper on governance: A vista of unbearable democratic lightness in the EU?

01 November 2001

Examines the background to the planned "debate" on the future workings of the EU and whether it can meet the demands of civil society for the right to know what is being discussed and how decisions are made

The context of the Commissions’ “governance” agenda
The defining act of the Prodi Commission was, according to its own rhetoric, to be its much-vaunted, much touted, White Paper on Governance in the European Union, just as the White Paper on the Internal Market was considered the (highly successful) equivalent of the Delors Commission. The sub-text of the White Paper on Governance from the very beginning of its preparation was the ambition to introduce more democracy into the various phases of policy preparation, decision-making and implementation processes of the European Union. Indeed the Commission’s “Work Programme” of October 2000 is explicitly sub-titled “Enhancing democracy in the European Union”. It grandly proclaims in this perspective that: “if it is accepted that democracy in Europe is based on two twin pillars - the accountability of executives to European and national legislative bodies and the effective involvement of citizens in devising and implementing decisions that affect them- then it is clear that the reform of European modes of governance is all about improving democracy in Europe”.
The White paper adopted by the Commission at the end of July 2001 is more modest in its ambitions. The sub-title has disappeared and the focus is much less about the general public interest in enhancing democracy and much more about enhancing the traditional role of the Commission in the Union’s decision-making processes (in particular by strengthening the so-called “Community method” of decision-making). The White Paper is rather “about the way in which the Union uses its powers given by its citizens. It is about how things could and should be done”. At the same time the decision by the Commission to focus only on those aspects of the topic which did not in principle require Treaty amendment, a task regarded as more appropriate for the forthcoming Inter-Governmental Conference to amend the existing Treaties in 2004, is not only artificial but limits both the approach and the recommendations of the White Paper very considerably.
That said the Commission did attempt to portray the process leading up to the adoption of the White Paper as an open and inclusive one and to work on improving its image as a listening and engaged public administration. Quite striking were the pains taken by the Commission to ensure that the process leading up to the production of the definitive White Paper was as open and inclusive as possible (via extensive Internet sites and links, public hearings, invited experts and other “actors”) and to listen and engage publicly with some of what it termed the “new actors of Europe”. The latter term it transpired related mainly to “new” actors such as local and regional authorities involved in the process of implementation and enforcement of Community (first pillar) law as well as constitutional entities such as national parliaments. In addition the term “civil society” was reserved for a wide-range of non-governmental actors albeit that their positioning in the rule-making process was clearly prior to the drawing up of policy proposals rather than in a continuum during the policy-making and implementation process in its entirety. The term “governance” itself involves recognition of the need to move beyond being a bounded public administration towards a more unbounded existence where it is recognised that there is a need to include outside interests and stakeholders in the process of decision-making. The use of the word “governance” is precisely meant to indicate a level and intensity in the “unboundedness” process. The conscious use of the term “governance” thus announces a significant erosion of the boundaries separating what lies inside an administration and what lies outside (politics, the