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Will Jean-Claude Juncker be the next European Commission president?François Lenoir/Reuters

The fight for control of the European Union Parliament is over. The next fight – to select the president of the EU Commission – looms as even a more crucial factor in determining the course of the increasingly fragmented region. If the new president insists on more sovereignty-robbing integration, Euroskeptic Britain could well take another step toward the EU exit.

The commission is where the real power lies in the EU. It is the executive arm, initiates all legislation that goes to the 751-member Parliament for approval and can shape fiscal policy in the member countries. It also plays a big role in picking the men and women for the EU's top jobs in everything from trade and competition to energy and digital privacy. They are the equivalent of cabinet ministers.

That is why the battle to choose the commission's next president, which could take two or three months, is so important. The battle has already turned nasty and has the potential to drive another wedge into the already divided EU. Sunday's parliamentary election rattled the mainstream centre-right and centre-left parties by delivering about 30 per cent of the vote to Euroskeptic parties, some on the far right, who are anti-immigrant, anti EU or anti-euro, the currency used in 18 of the EU countries. A few, like Marine Le Pen's National Front, which came out top in France, are all three.

Normally, picking the commission president is done through a backroom deal among the leaders of the EU countries. The candidate who is the least objectionable to the most leaders wins.

The newest EU treaty insists that the EU leaders nominate a candidate only after "taking into account the elections in the European Parliament," after which Parliament formally elects the nominee. The idea was to make the selection process more transparent, democratic and entertaining. The lead candidates have tried to run American presidential-style campaigns, complete with TV debates. It didn't really work – the debates were dull-a-thons – but, still, the new system is an improvement over the old system because it is more open.

If the TV debates were a bore, the fighting among the EU leaders is anything but. British Prime Minister David Cameron has emerged as the leader of the "No" camp – he opposes both of the lead candidates for the president's job. They are Jean-Claude Juncker, a former Luxembourg prime minister and long-time EU fixer who has run a rather tedious campaign, and Martin Schulz, the somewhat more animated German who has been president of the European Parliament since 2012. Mr. Juncker represents the centre-right Christian Democratic parties, Mr. Schulz the centre-left Socialists.

By rights, Mr. Juncker should get the job because the centre-right will be the single biggest party in the new EU Parliament, with 213 seats against 190 for the socialists. But Mr. Cameron wants neither Mr. Juncker nor Mr. Schulz, though he seems more opposed to the former. Mr. Cameron's position is backed by the Swedish and Hungarian Prime Ministers. It also appears that French President François Hollande is somewhat sympathetic to Mr. Cameron's view, though Mr. Hollande has not come out forcibly against Mr. Juncker.

To Mr. Cameron, Mr. Juncker and Mr. Schulz represent the business-as-usual view of the EU – that is, more integration at the expense of national sovereignty. On Tuesday night, as European leaders were digesting the results of an election that registered a strong anti-EU vote, he said: "We need an approach that recognizes that Brussels has got too big, too bossy, too interfering. We need more for nation states."

For his part, Mr. Hollande said the EU must pursue an economic growth agenda and that its bureaucracy must be "reoriented" and "simplified" to make it more relevant and appearing to its citizens.

Mr. Cameron has not said whom he would endorse, but possible candidates mentioned by various EU politicians include Finnish Prime Minister Jyrki Katainen, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk and Irish Prime Minister Enda Kenny. Each of them could be expected to take a more critical view of the EU's strategy than a long-term insider such as Mr. Juncker. A real long shot is Christine Lagarde, managing director of the International Monetary Fund.

Mr. Cameron has always been Euroskeptic-lite. Well before the European Parliament election, he had promised an in-out referendum on Britain's EU membership in 2017, assuming that his Conservatives win next year's general election. Now he is hardening his stance, because the people have spoken. In Britain, the EU election was won by the fiercely anti-EU UK Independence Party, led by Nigel Farage, pushing the Conservatives into third place.

Whether Mr. Cameron and his Euroskeptics will get their way is an open question. Their spirits were buoyed on Tuesday when German Chancellor Angela Merkel diluted her support for Mr. Juncker, though she still favours him over other candidates. She noted that "none of the parties has a majority on its own, so we have to look at a somewhat broader tableau of suitable persons."

If Mr. Cameron does not get his way, the risks are high. The election of a commission president who vows not to put the brakes on the grand European integration project will only further alienate Britain as well as France, where the Front National placed first in the election, pushing Mr. Hollande's Socialists into a distant third spot. If Mr. Juncker or Mr. Schulz gets the big job, Britain could well fall firmly into the anti-EU crowd.

The selection of the next president of the commission has emerged as a defining EU event.

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