The European Agencies: An Analysis of Their Characteristics and Evolution in the Communitarian Framework

3 I. Introduction: Nowadays, with the advent of globalization, it has become very difficult for single countries to survive in a globally competitive environment without moving their competencies and skills from the national to the international sphere. Together with the major economic trends such as outsourcing, off- shoring and in-sourcing, which have completely changed the way we consider “business”; also other trends concerning political and juridical issues are going to influence the actual balance of power among countries on a global base. In terms of European Union, this means that all the Member States have to start thinking themselves as part of a big institution able to compete on the global market with such big powers like U.S.A. and China. In light of this argument, to have an efficient European Union, the first necessary step concerns the integration and harmonization of all the national regulations, thus smoothing the many differences among the member states and increasing the relational network among them through the use of supranational hubs. Principally considering the fragmented communitarian framework, it has been decided to set up decentralized European bodies involved in the harmonization of procedures and collection of data for different issues, the so called “European Agencies”.