The New Politics of Leadership Selection in the EU: From Intergovernmental Bargaining to Electoral Competition?

The proposed paper presents a model for the systematic analysis of the impact and the effects of the transformation of leadership appointments in the European Union (EU) from intergovernmental bargaining to electoral competition. This transformation subsequent to the Lisbon Treaty has a number of different dimensions: first, new leadership positions beyond the President of the European Commission have been created with addition of the post of the President of the European Council and the High Representative for Foreign Policy; second, the procedure of the appointment of the European Commission President now involves the election by the European Parliament of a candidate proposed by the European Council. The latter treaty change engendered a new dynamic in the process of leadership selection, namely the so-called Spitzenkandidaten system involving the main political parties at the European level nominating candidates for the post of Commission President. The proposed paper raises the question of how these changes have impacted on the public perception of the EU leadership, on executive-legislative relations in the European Union, on intra- and inter-party politics in the EU, and on the balance of power between national governments and the supranational institutions? In doing so, the paper will relate to wider debates about the nature European democracy, the capacity of the EU’s leadership to formulate and execute European objectives and thus the resilience of the European Union both vis-à-vis an increasingly sceptical population and towards an ever-more challenging external environment.