The capacity of the European Union (EU) to regulate various societal fields has attracted considerable attention among political and social scientists. Theoretical debates and empirical studies are numerous. However the definition of regulation is still hard to crystallize. The concept is used in diverse and even contrasting ways, and with different normative backgrounds. Nevertheless, most scholars approached regulation by paying attention to the following questions: Who regulates? What is regulated? How is it regulated? In this panel, we suggest to overcome the actual debate on regulation by shifting the attention from the question of what is regulation to the one of what it does to the political. This shift permits to analyze more closely the relation between regulation and legitimacy of the EU. Indeed, while some may argue that so-called "better regulation" practices improve the quality of policy shaping and reinforce social acceptance of EU policies, others may suggest that, paradoxically, such practices fuel a process of depoliticization of European matters. In other words, does this type of regulation helps to settle the legitimacy of the EU by promoting consensus-based governance mechanisms, or, conversely, does it contribute to reinforce the crisis of legitimacy by eluding the intrinsically conflictual dimension of politics? More precisely, contributions to this panel will focus on: (i) the political effect of the better/smarter regulation principles when applied to practices of consultation, self-regulation and consensus between interested parties; (ii) the transformation of politics resulting from technocratization and/or technologization processes.