The role and impact of institutions on policy-making have been receiving a lot of attention in the academic literature on the European Union (EU). The current special issue aims to contribute to this broader institutionalist debate in the EU literature by paying attention to institutional...

Trust in political institutions is one of the key elements which make representative democracies work. Trust creates a connection between citizens and representative political institutions. Democratic governments which enjoy a large degree of trust also tend to have higher degrees of legitimacy...

Who provides the European Union with information? Are these sources of information biased? Who are excluded and who are included? What can the informational bias tell us about decision making in the European Union? The paper examines patterns of participation in the large and organized expert...

This paper deals with the issue of institutionalising a legal pacifistic international order. While Kant’s idea of perpetual peace serves as the point of departure, it is argued that in order to find a proper institutional arrangement one would have to look beyond the two notions found in...

Germany's presidency of the European Council in the first half of 1999 has focused the attention of schlolars on Germany's attitude towards the EU. Germany's European policy has been guided from the beginning by a pro-European vision of 'the house of Europe'. The hypothesis of the article is...

The notion of 'Administrative Authority' has several dimensions in EU law. From a functional perspective, administrative authority may be exercised according to three patterns: indirect administration by member states' governmental institutions - the typical Community pattern - direct...