The growth of informal EU decision-making has empowered centrist parties

Legislative decision-making in the European Union is increasingly shifting toward informal secluded arenas, to allow for the early adoption of laws. Edoardo Bressanelli, Christel Koop and Christine Reh assess the implications of this trend for the behaviour of political parties in the European Parliament. They find that informalisation has strengthened the cohesion of the three centrist groups (EPP, S&D and ALDE), which have become more effective in delivering their members’ votes and in limiting defections. However, the authors argue that this increase in cohesion should not be taken as unconditionally good news for EU democracy.