This book provides the first comprehensive examination of  the European Union’s binding technical standards regime, a specialized form of administrative rulemaking in EU financial services regulation. Drafted by the European Supervisory Authorities (ESAs) rather than the Commission, these standards were originally conceived as a narrow and depoliticized instrument for addressing technical matters rather than policy issues. But they have instead evolved into a central component of the EU financial services rulebook, often dealing with politically salient and contested regulatory issues. This has led to recurring tensions between the ESAs and the EU institutional partners over the scope and content of individual standards.
Drawing on both rational choice and historical institutionalist perspectives, and combining detailed case studies and quantitative surveys, the book analyses all the stages of the technical standards process: from the negotiation of framework legislation and decisions on delegated legislative empowerments, to the drafting, contestation on and adoption of the standards themselves. It provides a detailed examination of the institutions’ strategies and actions, using both formal and informal powers, and how the ESAs respond to their involvement in the standards-making process. In doing so, it also addresses wider questions about the relationship between politics and expertise in regulatory governance.

Dilwyn Griffiths completed a Ph.D. at Birkbeck, University of London, UK following a career in government service and financial regulation.