Abstract This article examines how the European Parliament (EP) has leveraged the budgetary discharge procedure to enhance the political accountability of the EU's Border and Coast Guard Agency, Frontex. Whilst the procedure is formally limited to budget implementation, the EP has used it as an accountability tool that goes far beyond financial oversight, addressing broader issues such as fundamental rights and operational effectiveness. Employing a rationalist bargaining perspective on institutional change, the article highlights the EP's use of strategies to compensate for its lack of formal oversight powers. Based on systematic document analysis and original interview material, the findings reveal how the EP has significantly expanded the scope of the discharge procedure over time, thus increasing its de facto scrutiny powers. The analysis of this informal ‘self‐empowerment’ shows how the EP can enhance the political accountability of increasingly powerful EU agencies even if it lacks formal competences.
Schoeller et al. (Tue,) studied this question.