During the last half century, a transformation of governance has taken place in Europe. States, executives and parliaments have empowered a growing number of so called non-majoritarian institutions (NMI) to make public policy. At the national level, many independent regulatory bodies have been established for making new rules or applying existing one. Also in the European Union, more and more regulatory task are assigned to European Union Agencies (EUA). EUAs are often set up in sensitive policy fields dealing with societal risks (e.g. chemicals, food safety or medicines) and in some areas they are replacing the traditional committee system as the main regulatory institution of the EU. This paper explores the rather underexplored relationships between EUAs and their national counterparts in the member states. First, two basic models of interactions between EUAs and national counterparts are conceptualized and further explained: formal incorporation and more informal networking. The paper then highlights the more formal relationships and especially the incorporation of (representatives of) national counterparts in EUAs. This is done by an analysis of the Management Boards (MB), the main steering bodys of EUAs, of five EUAs . It is empirically analysed who participates in these MBs and in how far the participating national representatives are responsive and accountable to the representative institutions in their home countries. This is important because from a demoicratic point of view, EUAs should be accountable to the member states and the MBs thereby play a prominent role. This paper tries to illustrate in how far the MBs of EUAs are really dominated by member states representatives or if they are rather composed of representatives of more or less independent national authorities/agencies. The paper concludes with an outlook concerning the legitimacy implications for EUAs based on the empirical findings.
