New Actors On The Stage: The Emerging Role Of EU Agencies In Exercising Sanctioning Powers

The well-known fragmentation of EU executive has brought to the emer-sion of new bodies endowed with sanctioning powers or with auxiliary functions within the sactioning procedure: the EU agencies. After a brief overview of these bodies, this chapter discusses how EU agencies have en-hanced the capability of the EU to impose sanctions. In particular, it high-lights EU agencies’ role as bridge between the EU and the Member States and as ‘legislative laboratories’ where new enforcement practices are nego-tiated and tested in practice. Moreover, this chapter provide a detailed tax-onomy of the sanctioning powers exercised by EU agencies, pointing out in particular their auxiliary (yet fundamental) role vis-à-vis the Commission and national authorities; how they are silently eroding the Commission’s prerogatives in the infringement procedure; their powers to impose fees to market operators and the relevance of granting unlimited jurisdiction to the Court of justice for scrutinising those powers. By way of conclusion, the chapter presents and discuss the main driving forces according to which the EU legislator decides to grant sanctioning powers to EU agencies.