2 ROLES AND RESPONSIBILITIES
2.2. THE ROLE OF THE EUROPEAN COMMISSION IN CSDP
European Union 2019
by Diego de Ojeda
Group photo of the Commission of Ursula von der Leyen: Ursula von der Leyen, Frans Timmermans, Valdis Dombrovskis, Margrethe Vestager, Josep Borrell, Věra Jourová, Margarítis Schinás, Maroš Šefčovič, Dubravka Šuica, Johannes Hahn, Didier Reynders, Mariya Gabriel, Stélla Kyriakídou, Kadri Simson, Jutta Urpilainen, Thierry Breton, Phil Hogan, Olivér Várhelyi, Paolo Gentiloni, Virginijus Sinkevičius, Helena Dalli, Janusz Wojciechowski, Elisa Ferreira, Adina Vălean, Janez Lenarčič, Ylva Johansson
Although – contrary to most other EU policy areas – the role of the European Commission in the CSDP is secondary to that of the High Representative and the Member States, the Commission remains an essential actor in fully attaining CSDP goals. Indeed, Article 21(3) of the Lisbon Treaty calls upon the Council and the Commission, assisted by the High Representative, to cooperate to ensure consistency between the different areas of the Union´s external action, and between those areas and its other policies. This is without prejudice to the distinctive competences of each institution and both CFSP and non-CFSP decision-making procedures, as per Article 40.
The ‘consistency’ principle was established in the December 2013 Joint Communication on the EU Comprehensive Approach and the ensuing May 2014 Council Conclusions and further developed in the June 2016 Global Strategy for the European Union’s Foreign and Security Policy. The idea is simple: the CSDP is not to act in isolation from other EU external actions and instruments. On the contrary, a strategically coherent use of EU tools and instruments requires that it acts in sync with non-CFSP instruments managed by the Commission as a result of its responsibility to implement the EU budget (Articles 317 and 318 of the Treaty of the Functioning of the EU).
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