The most comprehensive studies of the Commission are provided by Cini (1996) and Edwards (1996). Nugent (1994) provides a good text book introduction to the topic; and Nugent (1996) summarises many of the key questions about the Commission's role in the Union in a single article.

More theoretical reflections are provided in Christiansen (1996 and 1997). These suggest that there is a tension between the Commission's role as a source of impartial administration and its position as a policy entrepreneur. It may also suffer from problems of 'multiple accountability': to the member states (individually and collectively) to the EP, to the citizens at large and to European law as laid down by the ECJ. As different sections of the Commission may attempt to resolve these difficulties in various ways, their overall effect may be to increase the fragmentation of the Commission and account for the emergence of different policy styles across the DG's. Other authors, such as Peterson (1995), also tend to emphasise the extent to which individual sections of the Commission attempt to overcome difficulties by (low levels of independent legitimacy, lack of resources and conflict of political masters) by forming 'policy communities' that bring them into direct and intimate contact with individual departments of government bureaucracies and sub-national actors' (companies, interest groups, regional and local government). Wessels (1997) goes so far as to argue that public administration at the EU and national levels is now 'fused' and Dehousse (1997) likewise provides some sharp insignts into the extent of political interpenetration between the two layers of governance. Wallace and Wallace (1996) point to the power of the Commission to build up its own 'client relations' with all kinds of economic and political actors that may greatly increase its independence of governments. Marks et al (1996) considers the argument that the Commission is just the 'agent' of the national goverrnment and then lists three conditions under which this is unlikely to be true. Pollack (1997) addresses the same question but from a more theoretically technical point of view. In combination, this literature provides an excellent coverage of the conditions under which the Commission can achieve a degree of political autonomy.