One Treaty – Differentiated Institutional Outcomes. The Changing Perceptions and Expectations About the Rotating Presidency of the Council of the European Union

This paper contributes to the literature on differentiated European integration by investigating the diversified institutional outcomes generated by treaty changes. Its goal is to present how the roles attributed to the institution of the EU Council Rotating Presidency have changed, in a diversified way, after the reform of the Lisbon Treaty concluded in 2009. It posits that while the expected changes altered some of the roles in significant manner – as compared to what was defined in the treaty – some other roles remained relatively stable. The analysis goes beyond reading the Reform Treaty of Lisbon, and rather focuses on the perceptions and expectations (via a so-called “logic of appropriateness”) towards the Presidency as conceptualised by experts on the matter. The shift in perceptions regarding the roles of the rotating Presidency is analysed in relation to the roles attached to the established institution of the Permanent President of the European Council as well as being tested along different levels of the council system and its areas of competence. As a result, this study delivers a map of roles (understood as the expected behaviour in a given institutional setting) according to their salience, level, and the competence area of the Council system. The explanatory variables employed make distinctions between old vs. new, and big vs. small Member States, which makes it possible to identify the relatively important differences in the roles ascribed to chairing Member States of varying sizes and ages.