This paper examines the roles of political authorities and independent regulatory authority in the design of the French electricity market. The electricity sector is concerned with a liberalization process involving the performativity of a market model and executed by a specific environmental and industrial policy, implying different market devices. In order to understand how these two dynamics are intertwined in the market design, we conducted a comprehensive analysis of the trajectory of new rules concerning the integration of demand side response services in the wholesale market. This analysis reveals that the performativity of economics and the politicization of markets are embedded in an institutional configuration where the power is distributed between the political authorities and the independent regulatory authorities. These authorities are competing for legitimacy in the area of market design, but they are also dependent on each other. Our paper contributes to the debate about the institutional condition of the performativity of economics.