Constitutionalising EU Executive Rule-Making Procedures: A Research Agenda

The existence or non-existence of procedural rules for executive rule-making in the EU is not merely a ‘technical’ question free of constitutional value choices. This article argues that constitutional principles such as transparency, openness and participatory democracy highlighted by the Treaty of Lisbon constitute decisive guidelines for the design of administrative procedures in the EU as they can have a considerable impact on substantive outcomes. We apply such principles with regard to non-legislative rule making procedures in the EU, highlight the salience of this discussion and argue that some systematization of non-legislative rule making procedures is needed in order to implement constitutional principles in a complex and plural environment.