Title VIII of Part Three of the TFEU deals with economic and monetary policy of the Union. It brings together two policy fields of intense sensitivity for the MS and for citizens, in a highly asymmetrical fashion. Economic policy is an area in which MS retain extensive competences, and in which the TFEU provisions envisage forms of coordination based on multilateral surveillance in which the Commission and the Council jointly exercise key responsibilities and from which the Court is largely excluded in practical terms (see also Commentary on Article 5 TFEU). Monetary policy is a competence of the Union (see Article 3 TFEU) that is largely exercised by the ECB as an independent Union institution, which is relatively insulated from the other institutions so that it can achieve its primary task of ensuring price stability.
