Politics Research Seminar: The Constitutional Implications of 'Insignificant' Rules
- When?
- Wednesday 24 November 2010, 16:00 to 17:30
- Where?
- 05DK02
- Open to:
- Public, Staff, Students
- Speaker:
- Claudio Radaelli, University of Exeter
As part of the Politics Research Seminar series Claudio Radaelli from the University of Exeter discusses The Constitutional Implications of 'Insignificant' Rules
Abstract: A grand constitutional debate has dominated the last decade of European Union (EU) politics. This article sheds light on a less-noticed change with constitutional implications, consisting of apparently 'insignificant' procedures affecting rulemaking. We start from the observation that the distinction between constitutional decisions and decisions affecting public policy and rulemaking in particular is not as stark as we often think. We then compare systematically the USA and the EU, with empirical focus on the latter. To explore the constitutional effects of regulatory oversight, we address two research questions, that is, (a) what are the mechanisms of institutionalization of regulatory impact assessment and (b) how, exactly, do constitutional effects vary in the two cases? We compare the mechanisms of institutionalization by drawing on the notion of incomplete contracts. We observe a similar logic of delegation in the USA and the EU, but with different paths. As for our second research question, we find differences about values, the role of the executive in the context of institutional balance, and accountability. We conclude that constitutional changes in the EU have not settled yet, but we may be close to a turning point.
