De Novo Bodies and EU Integration: What is the Story behind EU Agencies' Expansion?

Abstract

The contributions of EU agencies are significant components of the EU policy response to migration issues. The extent to which this has come to be in the context of migration, and the successive waves of policy and institutional reforms concerning these agencies in the last decade, pose several questions that the existing literature is only partially equipped to answer. This paper addresses this gap by charting the evolution of EU agencies through documentary analysis, reflecting on the meaning of this evolution for current trends in European integration as captured by the recent theorization on de novo bodies. Findings demonstrate that, far from being static entities, these bodies have constantly deepened their reach into the formation and application of migration policy, while posing no substantial erosion of the authority of the Commission. This incremental empowerment has created accountability issues from the beginning, many of which are still far from being resolved.

The Post‐agencification Stage between Reforms and Crises. A Comparative Assessment of EU agencies' Budgetary Development

“…Groenleer (2009) analysed some agencies' de facto autonomy, Mathieu (2016Mathieu ( , 2019 tackled regulatory integration through case studies. Boin et al (2014) addressed agency-led management of transboundary problems and crises, while Scipioni (2018) compared the development of the European Asylum Support Office (EASO) and Frontex with the Commission's growing role in asylum and immigration policy. Other studies have mapped agencies' entrepreneurial strategies (Arras and Braun, 2018;Wood, 2017) and shown how agencies' involvement in policy implementation becomes more likely as the Commission's powers increase (Migliorati, 2019).…”

“…For example, the EU border agency Frontex was established in 2006 and endowed with a small budget and a narrow mandate. At the time of writing, it has a budget of over € 300 million and is consolidating its role of pooling intelligence and national resources (Scipioni, 2018) in an attempt to reinforce the Schengen system after the 2015 refugee crisis (Angelescu and Trauner, 2018; Schimmelfennig, 2018). Yet the European Environment Agency was established in 1993; its mandate has never been substantially reformed and its budget has changed only modestly.…”

‘There Are Voices in Every Direction’: Organizational Decoupling in Frontex*

“…The de facto operation of agency arrangements remains understudied, and there is a lack of knowledge on how organizational structures function in practice (Egeberg et al ., ). Scipioni () notes that the legal bases of agencies – including Frontex – often lack precision, breeding implementation‐led innovations and a gradual expansion of remits that can occur in parallel to a continued growth of Commission competencies. Further illustrating the limits of de jure analyses, Busuioc () finds that accountability cannot be understood straightforwardly by looking at official mandates and control mechanisms, but that ongoing control – for instance by the Commission – might work informally, despite its underrepresentation on, for instance, Frontex's management board in comparison with member states (see also Rijpma, ).…”

“…While the agency has attracted considerable attention in the academic literature, much of this has focused on the history of its foundation, describing its establishment as a compromise between the divergent interests of the Commission and different member states (Campesi, ; Léonard, ; Mungianu, ; Neal, ; Wolff and Schout, ). Other scholars have discussed questions of autonomy and accountability within the agency, often highlighting difficulties in determining legal responsibility for human rights violations during Frontex operations (Baldaccini, ; Carrera, ; Pollack and Slominski, ; Scipioni, ). Drawing on insights from organizational sociology, this article seeks to complement these accounts with an analysis of Frontex as an organization in a highly contested environment.…”

Frontex and the evolution of European border control

“…But the content of this interest seems rather partial. In particular, most academic literature examines only certain aspects of Frontex, such as the agency's establishment (Léonard, 2009;Neal, 2009;Pollak & Slominski, 2009;Edler, 2013;Ekelund, 2014) and expansion (Niemann & Speyer, 2018;Ripoll Servent, 2018;Scipioni, 2018), its governance framework (Cortinovis, 2015), the promotion of humanitarianism (Perkowski, 2018), its gendered power relations (Stachowitsch & Sachseder, 2019) and the human rights implications of Frontex's activities and its compliance with International and European Law (Wolff, 2008;Fisher-Lescano et al, 2009;Baldaccini, 2010;Fink, 2012;Papastavridis, 2010;Coppens, 2012;Perkowski, 2012;Slominski, 2013;Campesi, 2014;Marin, 2014;Aas & Gundhus, 2015;Carrera & den Hertog, 2015;Mitsilegas, 2015;Pallister-Wilkins, 2015;Mungianu, 2016;Santos Vara, 2016;Coman-Kund, 2018). While Mungianu (2013) using a legal analysis claims that the establishment of Frontex marked a considerable amount of supranationalisation on the EU external border control policy area.…”