The debate on the competences between the EU and its Member States has risen in line with the most recent financial and debt crisis. While some supporters of the EU argue that its competences are still too small to face the future, Europe-skeptic lobbies hold the opinion that the existing institutions and competences are already too far reaching. It is the aim of this project to develop ideas for an objectification. Starting point for the investigation is the allocation of tasks between the EU and its Member States as agreed upon in the Lisbon treaty. Using empirical methods and considering both effectiveness and efficiency, the project aims at answering the question which competencies should be shifted from the national to the supranational level or should be reallocated from the EU’s to the national level. Thereby, each individual case study takes changes in the EU’s general framework such as advancing integration (e.g., in the field of the economic and monetary union, EMU) and recent global challenges into consideration.