The information phase of accountability: The role of management boards in European Union agencies
| Author | Nuria Font,Ixchel Pérez-Durán |
| Published date | 01 September 2022 |
| Date | 01 September 2022 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/0020852320946813 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
Article
The information phase of
accountability: The role
of management boards in
European Union agencies
Nuria Font
Universitat Auto
`noma de Barcelona, Spain
Ixchel P
erez-Dura
´n
Universitat Auto
`noma de Barcelona, Spain
Abstract
The creation of European Union agencies has prompted normative and theoretical dis-
cussions about their accountability and democratic legitimacy. This study examines the
extent to which different features concerning the institutional design of agencies incen-
tivize information provision on their performance. To do so, it measures four aspects for
which their governing bodies are expected to provide information: governance decisions,
policy performance, financial issues, and interactions with stakeholders. Using a new data
set of informativestatements included in 199 annual activityreports of 29 agencies during
the period 2010–2016, this study demonstrates that formal accountability positively
affects information provision on governance and policy issues, and that the establishment
of scientific bodies within agencies improves information provision on governance
aspects, policy performance and their interactions with stakeholders. Finally, this article
finds that agencies that perform more direct regulation are subject to greater transpar-
ency demands about their governance decisions and stakeholder interactions.
Points for practitioners
The study provides practitioners with an analytical tool for assessing the provision of
information about the decisions and actions of management boards on governance
issues, policy performance, financial aspects and their interactions with stakeholders.
Corresponding author:
Ixchel P
erez-Dura
´n, Department of Political Science and Public Law, Universitat Auto
`noma de Barcelona,
Spain.
Email: ixchel.perez@uab.es
International Review of Administrative
Sciences
!The Author(s) 2020
Article reuse guidelines:
sagepub.com/journals-permissions
DOI: 10.1177/0020852320946813
journals.sagepub.com/home/ras
2022, Vol. 88(3) 882–898
International
Review of
Administrative
Sciences
Keywords
Accountability, European Union agencies, management boards, transparency
Introduction
The spread of the regulatory state has been one of the main transformations in the
public sector in recent decades and has resulted in the creation of different types of
independent agencies (Jordana et al., 2011). At the European Union (EU) level, there
are currently 33 decentralized agencies covering a wide range of policy issues, includ-
ing food security, financial markets and asylum processes. The growth of independent
bodies that are not subject to majoritarian democratic procedures has increased
concerns about their legitimacy and accountability (Olsen, 2013). Therefore, extensive
work on EU agencies (EAs) has examined their political independence (Wonka and
Rittberger, 2010), their relationships with different political principals (Font, 2015b;
Kelemen, 2002) and with stakeholders (Borra
´s et al., 2007; P
erez-Dura
´n, 2019;
Wood, 2018), their parliamentary control (Lord, 2011), their reputation (Busuioc
and Rimkut
e, 2019; Rimkut
e, 2019), and their accountability (Buess, 2015;
Busuioc, 2013; Font, 2015a). However, the question of whether information provi-
sion by agencies – an essential condition for agencies to be held accountable – is
affected by their institutional design remains an underexplored area of research.
The present study fills this literature gap by addressing the following research
question: to what extent do different features of the institutional design of EAs
incentivize their governing bodies to provide information about their performance?
We focus on a core phase of accountability: the provision of information
(Brandsma and Schilemmans, 2013). While we acknowledge that transparency is
not a sufficient condition for accountability, this phase represents a sine qua non
for the subsequent phases of the accountability cycle, namely, justification and
sanction (Meijer, 2013). By addressing the question ‘Accountable to whom?’
(Bovens, 2007), we examine the role of agency management boards (MBs) – under-
stood as account-givers (actors) – in the provision of information that can be
accessible by either their political principals or external audiences – understood
as account-holders (forums). In addition, by addressing the question ‘Accountable
for what?’ (Bovens, 2007), this article assesses the provision of information on four
aspects upon which MBs are expected to provide information: governance issues,
policy performance, financial aspects and their interactions with stakeholders.
Hence, we empirically examine four dependent variables, which correspond to
the provision of information about the decisions and actions of MBs on gover-
nance issues, policy performance, financial aspects and their interactions with
stakeholders. For each of these operational aspects, the study tests theoretically
grounded hypotheses on the effect of agency institutional design on information
provision. In particular, we argue that crucial aspects of institutional arrangements
in agencies, such as formal provisions of accountability, participation of scientists,
883
Font and P
erez-Dura
´n
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