Who is really in charge in Brussels? by Antonio Maria Rinaldi*
The European Union's official language repeatedly states that the European Parliament is the democratic heart of integration. But this statement is more symbolic than factual. From its inception, European integration has been based on a technocratic approach that prioritizes decision-making efficiency over political legitimacy. This has resulted in a system in which formal and actual power diverge: the former resides in the Treaties, the latter in the established practice of the Commission and Council, which over time have assumed an increasingly decisive role in defining the Union's political direction.
According to Article 17 of the Treaty on European Union, the European Commission holds a monopoly on legislative initiative. It is the only body that can propose new legislation, setting the political agenda and defining the boundaries of debate. Neither the Parliament nor the Council can act autonomously: they intervene only to amend or approve. This gives the community bureaucracy, composed of unelected officials, a centrality that no institutional balance has ever truly undermined. It is a de facto sovereignty, exercised in the name of technical neutrality, but one that profoundly affects the substance of political decisions and the balance of power between institutions.
In theory, the system of checks and balances should balance popular representation and national interests. In reality, the Council's dominance reveals the Union's intergovernmental nature: it is there that member states negotiate their interests, often along North-South fault lines, between rigorists and proponents of flexibility, between defenders of fiscal sovereignty and supporters of regulatory uniformity. Real decisions are made here, while Parliament, despite being vested with the legitimacy of universal suffrage, limits itself to implementing them with limited scope for intervention. This reflects a Europe that claims to be federal, yet still acts as a permanent diplomatic arena.
Internal research by Parliament itself shows that over 80% of Commission proposals are approved with minimal amendments. This is a sign of an "institutional asymmetry" that has marginalized the citizenry's vote over time. Parliament is weak not because of incompetence, but because of its structure: it has neither legislative initiative nor effective tools to oversee the EU executive.
This deficit of democratic sovereignty fuels a broader problem of political legitimacy, accentuated by the perceived distance between Brussels and European voters.
This imbalance finds its most opaque expression in the so-called trilogue, the informal forum in which the Commission, Council, and Parliament negotiate legislative texts behind closed doors. There are no accessible minutes or official records of the discussions. Decisions are made in the name of efficiency, but at the expense of transparency and political accountability. It is a procedure that responds to the logic of orderly administration, not that of democratic deliberation. The Commission safeguards technical consistency, the Council defends national interests, and the Parliament ratifies a pre-written compromise. In this process, democracy recedes, and with it the very principle of representation.
This phenomenon is particularly evident in economic and financial matters, where "technical" decisions directly impact the sovereignty of states. The new rules of the Stability Pact, the tax on multinationals, and the governance of the Banking Union were developed in the Commission and Council, with a parliamentary role reduced to mere validation. This has consolidated a verticality of power that recalls the logic of technical governments: efficient management, yet removed from the political judgment of citizens and the dynamics of consensus.
In the short term, this model may guarantee stability and reassure markets, but in the long term it generates a different risk: the loss of consensus and belonging. Democracies thrive not only on rules, but on mutual recognition between governments and the governed. When decisions appear distant, or it's unclear who bears responsibility, trust erodes. And without trust, economic integration also weakens. This is the blind spot of the European model: the more decision-making power is centralized, the more the perception of collective participation diminishes.
We must therefore ask not so much "who" rules in Brussels, but "in whose name." From the balance of power between governments? From technocrats? Or from citizens? As long as the former continues to prevail and the latter continues to govern, the latter will remain merely a wish.
The Commission imposes, the Council decides, the Parliament ratifies: this, in the end, is the real hierarchy of the Union.
An orderly but not fully legitimized system, which ensures continuity but not consensus. Until the asymmetry between political responsibility and decision-making power is resolved, Europe will remain an unfinished project: economically unintegrated and politically lacking shared sovereignty. It is on this ground—more than on debt or the budget—that the future of European democracy, and perhaps the very credibility of the integration project, will be played out.
* Member of the IX legislature of the European Parliament
The article Who's Really in Charge in Brussels? by Antonio Maria Rinaldi* comes from Scenari Economici .
This is a machine translation of a post published on Scenari Economici at the URL https://scenarieconomici.it/chi-comanda-veramente-a-bruxelles-di-antonio-maria-rinaldi/ on Sat, 06 Dec 2025 20:01:38 +0000.