The institutional and political roots of complex policies: Evidence from the European Union

The complexity of public policies has repeatedly been identified as a key challenge for modern democracies. Yet, we know only very little about the origins of this complexity. Controlling for functional and legal explanations, this article investigates whether complex policies have distinct institutional and political origins. The study builds on the assumption that complex policies are communicated in more complex language and uses textual data from 1771 legislative proposals issued by the European Commission since 1994 to demonstrate that the complexity of public policies is strongly tied to institutional and political costs of policy formulation. Collegial cabinets formulate more complex policies whenever they face more inclusive decision-making processes and struggle with higher internal preference bias and heterogeneity. The implications of these findings reach far beyond the political system of the European Union and highlight that to a considerable degree, complex policies are the price of inclusive democratic decision making.