Brussels—In a detailed three-page memo published nearly two decades ago, an unnamed European Union official set about codifying just what constitutes a good banana. Few could have predicted that “Commission Regulation (EC) No 2257/94 of 16 September 1994 laying down quality standards for bananas” would ever attract much outside attention. Even by the lexicon of regulatory documents, it is a turgid read. It lays down technical specifications for fruit imported or grown in the EU: their size (“minimum 14 cm”), how their crown is cut (“not beveled or torn”) and their shape (“free from abnormal curvature”). The blameless Eurocrat behind it could not have guessed that his proposals, which became law the following year, would morph into a cause célèbre among detractors of the European Union.
British tabloids led the charge, claiming the EU had become so regulation-crazed it even had an edict about “bendy bananas.” They used it as...
