Regions and subsidiarity after Lisbon : overcoming the "regional blindness"

The Treaty of Lisbon has strengthened the territorial dimension of the European Union by calling for \nrespect of the regional and local self-government and by recognizing, for the first time, the role of regional \nparliaments in the subsidiarity control mechanism. Regional chambers with legislative competences have \nbeen given the possibility to participate in the so called ‘early warning system’ (EWS) in which national \nparliaments scrutinize EU legislative proposals in terms of their compliance with the principle of \nsubsidiarity. This article takes stock of the recent experience of regional parliaments under the EWS in order \nto determine to what extent, if at all, the new subsidiarity provisions have enhanced the regional involvement \nin EU policy-making. It analyzes two opportunity structures through which regions can participate in EU \npolicy-control, i.e. the national parliamentary channel and the Subsidiarity Monitoring Network of the \nCommittee of the Regions. The findings reveal that regional participation in the EWS is considerably limited \nand disproportionate both between and within the Member States, thus bringing to light new challenges for \nthe implementation of a multilevel inter-parliamentary cooperation in European affairs.