Kim Hjelmgaard

USA TODAY

BRUSSELS — The United Kingdom's decision to exit the European Union in June and a EU summit meeting Friday have cast a spotlight on the organization. Yet few Europeans understand the massive bureaucracy based here that governs their lives.

A series of polls published in 2014 by the Robert Schuman Foundation, an EU research center, found that about half of the bloc's 500 million citizens don't know how the EU works or have little confidence in how it operates.

"The EU is not good at explaining itself — what it's for and what it's done for people. To an extent, that's its biggest problem," said Giles Merritt, chairman of Friends of Europe, a think tank in Brussels that specializes in analyzing European public policy issues.

"It can be hard to remember nowadays, but the EU manages in a globalized world to focus on Europe's needs for collective strength. It just does it in its rather bumbling, mysterious and impenetrable way," he said.

To help remove some of that mystery, here is a closer look a look at the organization:

HOW IT BEGAN

The predecessor to the EU was set up in 1951, soon after World War II, with the aim of forging unity to prevent another conflict on the continent. The six founding countries — Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg and the Netherlands — believed that economic cooperation on their coal and steel industries would make it difficult to turn their weapons of war against each other. More than half a century later, the EU's steady expansion, including ex-communist states, has ballooned to 28 nations — 27 after the U.K. formally leaves. Nineteen of the EU members share the euro currency in what is known as the eurozone.

HOW BIG IT IS

The EU employs 55,000 public servants in seven institutions — the European Parliament, European Council, Council of the European Union, European Commission, Court of Justice of the European Union, European Central Bank and the Court of Auditors. Altogether, these branches have an annual budget of $160 billion to govern 500 million people in a 1.7-million-square-mile area.

WHO THE KEY PLAYERS ARE

Top officials include European Council President Donald Tusk, European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker, European Parliament President Martin Schulz, European Central Bank President Mario Draghi and EU High Representative Frederica Mogherini, who serves as the bloc's foreign secretary.

WHERE THE MONEY GOES

The EU spends money on more 80 different programs. More than a third is used on five specific funds known as European Structural and Investment Funds. These promote economic and social cohesion among inhabitants of poorer member states, support common fisheries and agricultural policies and underwrite infrastructure projects in less developed regions. It spends 6% of its budget on building maintenance.

WHAT IT REGULATES

It regulates everything from the shape of bananas to workers' rights to the size of vacuum cleaners. The European Central Bank tries to maintain price stability across the euro-area. The Court of Justice makes sure that all EU law is applied in the same way in all EU countries. The Court of Auditors keeps tabs on what the bloc earns and spends. All of these institutions and bodies in turn derive their legitimacy from treaties that need to be unanimously agreed by all member states.

HOW IT GOVERNS

The European Parliament has 751 parliamentarians directly elected for a five-year period by voters in their home countries. They can't propose legislation but can only amend or rejects bills that have been initiated by one of the 28 officials of the European Commission. These officials are not elected but appointed — one each by each of the 28 European leaders who make up the European Council, the body that decides the EU's overall political direction. The Council meets behind closed doors.

"The European Parliament really isn't a parliament," said Ray Finch, a Brussels lawmaker for the U.K. Independence Party, the right-wing anti-immigration group that backed June's successful vote to exit the EU. "We might as well be in North Korea for all the power we have here."

HOW IT IS WASTEFUL

A common complaint is wasteful spending. One example: One week a month, at an estimated cost of $200 million a year, the entire European Parliament in Brussels — including legislators, aides, support staff, translators and several thousand plastic boxes containing key documents — are transported by truck and train 270 miles away to Strasbourg in northeastern France.The EU says it does this because Strasbourg is the official venue for the parliament's full plenary sessions, and it would take a treaty change to end the practice.

Critics such as the U.K. Independence Party's Finch say the reason is that France insists on it — and makes a lot on money on hotel rooms.