The European Union’s executive arm is set to miss a target to achieve gender balance among its highest-level members, as national governments around the world and power brokers in Brussels walk away from high-profile equality commitments.

Political expediency and institutional hurdles have complicated EU efforts to meet wide-ranging gender-parity goals.

As well as the European Commission’s failure to uphold its equality targets, the European Parliament decided to rescind its own rules among certain committee members.