The European Commission (EC) is part of the executive of the European Union (EU). It operates as a cabinet government, with 27 members of the Commission headed by a President. It includes an administrative body of about 32,000 European civil servants. The commission is divided into departments known as Directorates-General (DGs) that can be likened to departments or ministries each headed by a Director-General who is responsible to a Commissioner.
The president of the European Commission is the head of the European Commission, the executive branch of the European Union (EU). The president of the Commission leads a cabinet of Commissioners, referred to as the College. The president is empowered to allocate portfolios among, reshuffle, or dismiss Commissioners as necessary. The College directs the commission's civil service, sets the policy agenda and determines the legislative proposals it produces. The commission is the only body that can propose or draft bills to become EU laws.
The European Court of Justice (ECJ), formally just the Court of Justice, is the supreme court of the European Union in matters of European Union law. As a part of the Court of Justice of the European Union, it is tasked with interpreting EU law and ensuring its uniform application across all EU member states under Article 263 of the Treaty of the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU).
The General Court, informally known as the European General Court (EGC), is a constituent court of the Court of Justice of the European Union. It hears actions taken against the institutions of the European Union by individuals and member states, although certain matters are reserved for the European Court of Justice. Decisions of the General Court can be appealed to the Court of Justice, but only on a point of law. Prior to the coming into force of the Lisbon Treaty on 1 December 2009, it was known as the Court of First Instance.
António Manuel de Carvalho Ferreira Vitorino is a Portuguese lawyer and politician of the Socialist Party (PS).
The College of Europe is a post-graduate institute of European studies with its main campus in Bruges, Belgium and further campuses in Warsaw, Poland and Tirana, Albania. The College of Europe in Bruges was founded in 1949 by leading historical European figures and founding fathers of the European Union, including Salvador de Madariaga, Winston Churchill, Paul-Henri Spaak and Alcide De Gasperi as one of the results of the 1948 Congress of Europe in The Hague to promote "a spirit of solidarity and mutual understanding between all the nations of Western Europe and to provide elite training to individuals who will uphold these values" and "to train an elite of young executives for Europe". It has the status of Institution of Public Interest, operating according to Belgian law. The second campus in Natolin (Warsaw), Poland opened in 1992. The College of Europe is historically linked to the establishment of the European Union and its predecessors, and to the creation of the European Movement International, of which the college is a supporting member. Federica Mogherini, former High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, was appointed as the Rector to start in September 2020; former President of the European Council Herman, Count Van Rompuy is chairman of the board.
Sophia Helena "Sophie" in 't Veld is a Dutch politician of the Volt party, and formerly of the D66 party. As a D66 member, she was elected as a Member of the European Parliament in 2004, and reelected in 2009, 2014 and 2019. She was her party's top candidate for the three elections and has been its leader in the European Parliament since her first election. She left D66 and joined Volt in 2023.
Janusz Czesław Wojciechowski is a Polish politician and was a long-standing Member of the European Parliament, elected from the Lodz Voivodship representing the Polish People's Party (PSL) (2004–2006), the Polish People's Party "Piast" (2006–2010) and, lately, Law and Justice. In 2016, he left the parliament to become a member of the Court of Auditors. Since 2019 he has been the European Commissioner for Agriculture.
Franciscus Cornelis Gerardus Maria "Frans" Timmermans is a Dutch politician who most recently served as Executive Vice President of the European Commission for the European Green Deal and European Commissioner for Climate Action in the von der Leyen Commission from 2019 until his resignation in 2023. He is a member of the Dutch Labour Party (PvdA).
Tibor Navracsics is a Hungarian lawyer and politician, who served as Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade from June to September 2014. He previously served as Minister of Administration and Justice between 2010 and 2014. He is a member of the Fidesz and was the European Commissioner for Education, Culture, Youth and Sport in the Juncker Commission. Since 2022, he has been the Minister of Regional Development of Hungary.
Koen Lenaerts, Baron Lenaerts is a Belgian jurist and the President of the Court of Justice of the European Union. He is also a Professor of European Law at the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven and was a member of the Coudenberg group, a Belgian federalist think tank.
Robert John Reed, Baron Reed of Allermuir, is a Scottish judge who has been President of the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom since January 2020. He was the principal judge in the Commercial Court in Scotland before being promoted to the Inner House of the Court of Session in 2008. He is an authority on human rights law in Scotland and elsewhere; he served as one of the UK's ad hoc judges at the European Court of Human Rights. He was also a Non-Permanent Judge of the Court of Final Appeal of Hong Kong.
Antonio Tizzano is a former judge at the European Court of Justice. He served as its Vice-President from October 2015 until October 2018.
Gunnar Beck is a German politician, academic and lawyer. He is Member of the European Parliament (MEP) for the Alternative for Germany (AfD) party and currently hold the position of deputy leader of the AfD in the European Parliament and Vice-President of the Identity & Democracy Group. He previously was, and currently remains, a reader in law at the SOAS, University of London.
Egils Levits is a Latvian politician, lawyer, political scientist and jurist who served as the tenth president of Latvia from 2019 to 2023. He was a member of the European Court of Justice from 2004 to 2019.
Katarina Barley is a German politician and lawyer who has been a Member of the European Parliament since 2019, serving as one of its Vice-Presidents. She served as Federal Minister of Justice and Consumer Protection in the fourth Cabinet of Angela Merkel. Prior to that, she had served as Federal Minister of Family Affairs, Senior Citizens, Women and Youth and, from 28 September 2017, as the acting Federal Minister of Labour and Social Affairs, both until 14 March 2018.
Síofra O’Leary is an Irish lawyer and judge who has served as President of the European Court of Human Rights since November 2022 and as a Judge of the European Court of Human Rights since July 2015. She previously served as a Vice-President of the European Court of Human Rights in 2022.
Anthony Michael Collins is an Irish lawyer who is an Advocate General of the European Court of Justice. He previously served as was Judge of the General Court of the European Union from 2013 and 2021.
In the European Union, the advocates general are high-ranking functionaries serving in the European Court of Justice (ECJ). Modelled after the French commissaire du gouvernement, the position of advocate general was created together with the European Court of Justice in 1951, when the Treaty of Paris was signed.
Hatta Hannelore "Hatte" van der Woude is a Dutch politician who has represented the conservative-liberal People's Party for Freedom and Democracy (VVD) in the House of Representatives since 2021. She started her career in Vietnam and Singapore and later worked for The Hague University of Applied Sciences as a researcher, lecturer and policy advisor. Van der Woude was politically active in Delft's municipal council (2012–2016) and as an alderwoman in the city's municipal executive (2018–2021) prior to being elected to the House of Representatives in the 2021 general election.
