Meroni Circumvented? Article 114 TFEU and EU Regulatory Agencies

Abstract

This paper conceptualizes the somewhat neglected constitutional and constitutive roles of Article 114 TFEU in the establishment and functioning of EU integrated market supervision mechanisms. Relying on a virtually unlimited interpretation of that provision by the Court of Justice, EU institutions and Member States have been able to design an institutional ‘supranational operational support’ narrative that allowed for the expansion of supranational agencies as extensions of national supervisory bodies operating in an EU integrated administration framework.

This paper submits that this interpretation of Article 114 TFEU incorporates a template within which a nascent ius commune underlying the organization and operationalization of EU internal market supervision mechanisms can effectively take shape. That template allows for circumvention of some infamous agency delegation limits and grants Member States and national authorities a more direct role in a supranational system of integrated administration. In doing so however, new constitutional problems are created that have not been adequately addressed by the post-Lisbon Treaty framework. This paper identifies those problems and their impact on the emergence of integrated EU market supervision structures.