Who Really Runs Europe? The EU Institutions Decoded

 

The European Union has its own language that European politicians understand. Inside the EU bubble, there is a variety of terms that sound like aliens speak to the average listener.

 In this series, we are going to decode these terms one by one so that you too can understand the EU's special language and this will give you a greater understanding of the EU itself. The next term is European institutions. The European institutions serve as the governing bodies of the European Union structured under article 13 of the treaty on European Union. 

The term European institutions reflects the unique constitutional structure of the EU. Unlike a traditional nation state, the EU does not operate through a single national government govern. The EU does not operate through a single national government. Instead, authority is distributed among a network of institutions established through the European treaties including the European Commission,

 European Parliament, European Council, Council of the European Union and Court of Justice of the European Union and the European Central Bank. 

The term is therefore more than a description. It is a formal category in EU law that reflects the union's super national architecture and the way its powers are exercised collectively across member states. Understanding these terms is essential to knowing how the EU functions. In this series, we decode these terms one by one.