Overview of high-level office-holders

When choosing the future President of the European Council, EU leaders take into account other factors besides the candidates’ professional experience and performance to date. Attention may notably be paid to ensuring a certain balance between political forces in the EU, Member States and gender.
This balance is partially reflected and formalised in Declaration (No 6) on Article 15(5) and (6), Article 17(6) and (7) and Article 18 TEU, which states that ‘in choosing the persons called upon to hold the offices of President of the European Council, President of the Commission and High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, due account is to be taken of the need to respect the geographical and demographic diversity of the Union and its Member States’. During the nomination process for the EU’s new institutional leadership in 2019, Donald Tusk stressed that the nominations should reflect the EU’s demography and geographical balance, but also gender and political balances.
Unlike in previous cases, the election of Charles Michel as President of the European Council in 2019 was part of a package agreed at the special European Council meeting of 30 June-3 July 2019, which also included the positions of President of the European Commission, High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, and President of the European Central Bank (the latter not being a political appointment).