The Commission's Institutional Role In Initiating Union Acts

Since the early days of the EEC, it is for the European Commission, an unelected - yet supranational - institution, to draft
proposals for most of the Union’s legal acts. Given the Commission’s independence, it is said to be best placed to identify the
general interest of the Union in its proposals and not succumb to national agendas. For a long time, this was not particularly
problematic, especially since a Commission proposal is eventually adopted or at least indirectly approved by the Council and/or
the Parliament. Yet in recent years, the Commission has withdrawn its proposal and refused to act upon an invitation by the
Parliament, a successful European Citizens’ Initiative and an invitation by the social partners. It is these situations which are
particularly problematic, given that the Commission can effectively veto the adoption of an act. According to the Court, in deciding
whether or not to make use of its power of initiative, the Commission is to be solely guided by its duty to pursue the general
interest under Article 17(1) TEU. Yet given that the general interest is itself an open concept, this thesis argues that the general
interest cannot currently serve as an effective guidance, let alone a limitation to the Commission’s broad discretion. The thesis
thus calls for a procedural understanding of the general interest, which would allow the Court to determine compliance with the
procedure as such and thereby ensure that, at the very least, all facts and interests have been taken into account in the
determination of what is the general interest in a given case. This, in turn, is argued to be a means to ensure that the Commission
is not exercising its discretion regarding its power of initiative and the question of which initiatives are in the general interest
arbitrarily.