Posted on 16 July 2015
With her research project “The Commission Presidents and European Integration: Political Leadership Performance in Supranational Governance”, Henriette Müller, PhD Candidate in Political Science at the
Humboldt University of Berlin, aims to analyse the evolution of power and influence within the Commission presidency from the European Economic Community to today’s European Union. To do this, Ms Müller carried out a comparative analysis of the presidencies of Walter Hallstein, Jacques Delors and José Barroso. Each of these personalities served as president of the European Commission for more than one tenure and indeed to terms of almost ten years. More important was that they served their terms during crucial periods in the European integration process (European Economic Community, European Community and European Union), which for Müller implies a particularly strong position in the Presidency.
Her research approach consisted in the analysis of speeches, interviews with experts (current and former civil servants of the European Commission, the Council of Ministers and the European Parliament), and newspaper articles. Her research interest at the Historical Archives of the European Union principally focused on documents of Delors, and Hallstein, as well as the private documents of the latter, the archival holdings of the Commission, Council of Ministers and European Parliament; and the private holdings of Klaus Meyer, Emile Nöel, Robert Toulemon and François Xavier Ortoli.
You have been working in the project “The Commission Presidents and European Integration: Political Leadership Performance in Supranational Governance” since 2011. At what point of the research are you now? Do you plan to publish it?
I am about to finalize my PhD thesis in the next months. I am also planning to publish my thesis after its defense.
Why did you decide to apply for the Sorensen Grant? Did you manage to consult all the documents and materials you needed for your research?
I decided to apply for the Sorensen Grant because I was convinced that it would be a great opportunity to conduct research in the Historical Archives of the European Union. Since I am at the end of my thesis, it is very important to cross-validate my results with the documents in the archival holdings. This research step is essential since it helps to confirm and underline my research findings.
To what extent do you believe the personality of the different presidents of the European Commission have influenced decisive moments in the European integration process?
As my research illustrates, the biography, intellectual vision and leadership style of the individual presidents of the European Commission had at times a crucial influence on the European integration process. The methods and means with which they did so at various points in the Community’s history, especially in light of the relative institutional weakness of the office they occupied, is the topic of my research.
In your M. A. thesis “George W. Bush on State Visit in Europe – The Image of the 43rd U.S. President in the German and British Quality Press” you dealt with the image of the American presidency during visits to Europe and how these were portrayed by the European press. Why this recurrent interest in the concept of leadership and presidency?
Although institutions are essential elements of democratic regimes and in the regulation of the political process, individual actors/politicians, their pre-career steps, political conceptions, strategies and rhetoric nonetheless are significant on the functioning of the democratic process.
To understand what role they play, what strategies lead to political success under what conditions and which circumstances is an area that in my view needs substantial further research. That is the reason why I am recurrently interested in the field of political leadership and governance studies both in the national and international realm.
You have conducted several research stays in different universities, institutes and organizations. What do you think of the European University Institute and, especially, of the Historical Archives of the European Union?
I think the European University Institute and its Historical Archives is one of the major research institutions to conduct research on European integration and its related issues. Both its archival collections and the stimulating research atmosphere are significant points of attractions for anybody working on these topics. The combination of all of these factors turns every stay into a unique and extraordinarily productive experience.
Lastly, how do you think the subject of your research should be approached from today’s critical situation in Europe?
One of the results of my research is that due to the relatively weak institutional structure of the Commission presidency, a successful performance of the office’s functions depends to a large degree on the personality, intellectual vision and political strategies of the incumbent. However, this strong dependence on individuals certainly weakens the continuity and stability of the overall policy-making process in Europe since the weak institutional structure leaves a lot of informal or “grey space” to be filled differently by each incumbent. It would therefore be necessary to strengthen the democratic grounding of European institutions via more formal checks and balances and formally expand the powers of this office. This would make the Commission presidency more independent from the performance of individual incumbents and stabilize the continuity of the overall policy and integration process.