European Ombudsman as a Supranational Institution of Accountability

Abstract

This chapter analyses the institutional development of the European Ombudsman and the attendant role of transnational norms, policy discourses and actors. The European Ombudsman is interesting as a rare instance of a supranational ombudsman institution. But it is also worth examining because it has profiled itself as an institution of good governance. This chapter highlights the ability of actors to translate transnational norms and policy discourses to promote their own agenda and explores how promoting good governance and transparency has become a strategy to advance the institution in the inter-institutional setting of the EU. The global drive for “good governance” and “transparency” coincided with the establishment of the European Ombudsman in 1995 and resonated with the crises of EU governance. While the discourse on fundamental rights is relevant to the European Ombudsman, its profile and mandate to some extent exclude it from the conceptual field of human rights. While the European Ombudsman has been effective in promoting good governance in the EU, it has had less impact through the complaints of EU citizens that mostly fall outside its competencies.