The Formal Bottom-Up Perspective: Constitutional Status and Institutionalised Participation

The chapter explains the evolution of the legal and constitutional status of local government within the EU’s polity. The Lisbon Treaty explicitly acknowledged the right to local self-government and extended the principle of subsidiarity to the local level, and thereby implicitly recognised multilevel governance as a constitutional principle. The chapter then describes the institutions and procedures that provide local actors with formal access to EU policy-making, primarily through the Committee of the Regions, but also through working committees and European and domestic consultation procedures. The increasing formalisation of the partnership principle as part of the cohesion policy and the Urban Agenda have further fostered multilevel governance and enabled local government to participate in the European policy-making cycle.