European Commission
From SR
History and Roles
The European Commission (formally the Commission of the European Communities) is independent of national governments. Its job is to represent and uphold the interests of the EU as a whole. It drafts proposals for new European laws, which it presents to the European Parliament and the Council.
It is also the EU’s executive arm, responsible for implementing the decisions of Parliament and the Council. That means managing the day-to-day business of the European Union: implementing its policies, running its programmes and spending its funds.
The European Commission has four main roles:
- propose legislation to Parliament and the Council;
- manage and implement EU policies and the budget;
- enforce European law (jointly with the Court of Justice);
- represent the European Union on the international stage, for example by negotiating agreements between the EU and other countries.
Like the Parliament and Council, the European Commission was set up in the 1950s under the EU’s founding treaties.
Structure
Informally, the appointed Members of the Commission are known as ‘commissioners’. They have all held political positions in their countries of origin and many have been government ministers, but as Members of the Commission they are committed to acting in the interests of the Union as a whole and not taking instructions from national governments.
A new Commission is appointed every five years, within six months of the elections to the European Parliament. The present Commission’s term of office runs until 31 October 2009. Its President is José Manuel Barroso, from Portugal.
