Institutions of the European Union

The institutions of the European Union are the seven principal decision making bodies of the European Union. They are, as listed in Article 13 of the Treaty on European Union: the European Parliament, the European Council, the Council of the European Union, the European Commission, the Court of Justice of the European Union, the European Central Bank and the Court of Auditors. Institutions are different from agencies of the European Union.

Most EU institutions were created with the establishment of the European Community in 1958. Much change since then has been in the context the shifting of the power balance away from the Council and towards the Parliament. The role of the Commission has often been to mediate between the two or tip the balance. However the Commission is becoming more accountable to the Parliament: in 1999 it forced the resignation of the Santer Commission and forced a reshuffle of the proposed Barroso Commission in 2004. The development of the institutions, with incremental changes from treaties and agreements, is testament to the evolution of the Union's structures without one clear "master plan". Some such as Tom Reid of the Washington Post said of the institutions that "nobody would have deliberately designed a government as complex and as redundant as the EU".

The first institutions were created at the start of the 1950s with the creation of the ECSC, based on the Schuman declaration, between six states. The ECSC was designed to bring the markets of coal and steel, the materials needed to wage war, under the control of a supranational authority with the aim of encouraging peace and economic development. It established the first institutions. At its core was an independent executive called the "High Authority" with supranational powers over the Community. The laws made by the Authority would be observed by a Court of Justice in order to ensure they were upheld and to arbitrate.

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