Uno, Duo, Trio? Varieties of Trio Presidencies in the Council of Ministers

Abstract

The trio Presidency function entails that Member States in groups of three are responsible for drawing up a common programme for the Council for a period of 18 months and for assisting each other. This article contributes new knowledge by focusing on the variation between four different trio Presidencies that have ended their terms since the function was launched in 2007. A typology is developed to classify past and future trio Presidencies. It is shown that there are considerable variation between past trio formations with regard to whether they follow the same objectives (scope) and how much they co-ordinate to achieve these (depth). The observed variation is linked to the environment in which the trio Presidency operates, the individual trio members' attitude toward European integration, their territorial structuring of the state, their size, the ideology of the government and personality of the involved actors.

The Trio Presidency and the Efficiency of Council Decision‐Making: An Empirical Study

“…The trio presidency has attracted significant attention among scholars since its introduction in 2007. Studies have been conducted in the past on the workings of the trio mechanism in depth (Mazzucelli, 2008;Udovic and Svetlicic, 2012), the effect of a formalized 18-month programme on continuity in the decision-making process (Raik, 2016;Warntjen, 2013b;), the opportunities the trio offers to show collective leadership (Batory and Puetter, 2013;Jensen and Nedergaard, 2014;Vieira and Lange, 2012) and the voting behaviour of trio members (Van Gruisen et al, 2017).…”

Negotiating the morass: measuring and explaining variation in co-ordination mechanisms in the European Union

“…This contribution focuses on the political opportunity structures which are thought to influence the co-ordination mechanism's degree of centralization where three variables will be considered. The first is the attitude towards European integration, where it has been argued that member states which are suspicious of European integration are more likely to have a centralized mechanism in order to safeguard national autonomy (Kassim et al 2000(Kassim et al , 2003Jensen and Nedergaard 2014;Wright 1996: 164). By contrast, member states which are generally in favour of European integration are less likely to devote a lot of resources to having centralized mechanisms that co-ordinate everything in detail.…”

From Summitry to EU Government: An Agenda Formation Perspective on the European Council

“…A third line of research has analysed bargaining processes between Member States in the European Council (Tallberg, , ; Tallberg and Johansson, ), with special attention to (and mixed evidence on) the role of the presidency (Alexandrova and Timmermans, ; Batory and Puetter, ; Elgström 2012; Jensen and Nedergaard, ; Niemann and Mak 2010; Tallberg, ; ; ; Thomson, ).…”