Is EU Administrative Law Failing in Some of Its Crucial Tasks? Edoardo Chiti* Abstract: Beneath the surface of steady changes in EU administrative law lurk a number of long-term, structural problems. In this article, I argue that, because of these structural prob- lems, EU administrative law is failing in some of its crucial tasks: (1) finding a balance between administrative convergence and administrative diversity within the EU legal system, (2) structuring administrative power and its exercise, (3) governing administrative instabil- ity. EU administrative law, however, is not necessarily trapped in the status quo. By identi- fying and articulating a number of long-term problems, this article aims at providing some tools that future research could use in the discussion on the possible ways forward. More generally, it suggests that EU administrative law should be reshaped as a project of institutional design. I Three Long-Term Problems European legal scholarship is usually rather complacent about EU administrative law. It is not difficult to understand why. EU administrative law is conceptually interesting and pro- vides scholars with complex examples of principles and rules of administrative law beyond the state. Moreover, it is apparently capable of providing a number of pragmatic solutions to the growing number of challenges that the European Union faces, even in a period of deep crisis like the present one. It can also help manage national administrative shortcomings and trigger national administrative reform. This overall orientation of European legal scholarship—at the same time, a bit passive and uncritically optimistic—brings with itself a conditioned reflex, an implicit understanding of EU administrative law as an essential building block of further legal integration, something which affects the comprehension of the current state of development of EU administrative law as well as its assessment. Against this mainstream orientation, I would like to suggest that a more critical as- sessment is required if we want to understand the situation in which EU administra- tive law finds itself, to figure out where it is heading and to reflect on how EU administrative law can contribute to the functioning of the EU polity. In short, this article aims at laying the ground of a critique of EU administrative law. It is my claim that beneath the surface of steady changes, lurk a number of long-term, struc- tural problems. Three of them are prominent. One results from the forces to which EU administrative law is subject. EU administrative law may be conceived as the body of law governing the EU administrative system, understood as the whole of EU, national and mixed * Professor of Administrative Law in the University of La Tuscia, Italy. European Law Journal, Vol. 22, No. 5, September 2016, pp. 576–596. © 2017 John Wiley & Sons Ltd. 9600 Garsington Road, Oxford, OX4 2DQ, UK and 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148, USA