[FR] The General Secretariate under the Juncker Commission

The purpose of this research is to understand how the Secretariat-General (SG), the European Commission’s executive branch, was used as a presidential service under President Jean-Claude Juncker’s mandate (between 1 November 2014 and 30 November 2019). After presenting the historical developments of the Secretariat-General, particularly under the influence of different styles of presidency and major institutional advances, we will examine the specific features of the Juncker “sequence”. This was marked by new prerogatives granted to the head of the European Commission by the treaties and by a strong political will.

As a result, the Secretariat-General was transformed into an organised, expert service loyal to the President. Furthermore, we will see that it played an important role as an interface in the new decision-making process of this ‘political Commission’, beyond its traditional tasks. On the one hand, through its coordination function between services, it involved the Directorates-General in strategic policy orientations. On the other hand, it acted as an arbitrator between the vice-presidencies and the project teams, while appearing as the main point of contact between certain commissioners and the directorates-general under their portfolio.

Thus, throughout the mandate, the General Secretariat made it possible to maintain the strategic orientations defined by the President. However, while the fluidity of relations between the President’s office and the management of the Secretariat-General may have raised fears of a “confusion of roles”, we will demonstrate that this service was able to fulfil its role in accordance with the principle of collegiality and the room for manoeuvre given by the President. In essence, assessing the nature of the General Secretariat under Jean-Claude Juncker’s term of office means looking at a presidency marked by several phases, which built a unique model of the Commission. Its legacy remains clearly visible under the new Von der Leyen Commission.