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Is the European Union democratic? Much has been written claiming that the EU's institutions and policymaking processes are insufficiently accountable to, and representative of, the European electorate. In Democratic Deficit?, Thomas D. Zweifel offers a provocative new treatment of the concept of democracy in the EU. The work provides a rigorous, comparative examination of the European Union and the federal democracies of Switzerland and the United States. Drawing upon established, quantifiable scales of democracy, the study demonstrates that the EU's decision-making and regulatory processes do not show a democratic deficit greater than that of the bureaucracies of most liberal democracies and finds that in certain policy areas liberal democracies may even benefit from adopting EU practices. Supported by two case studies comparing regulatory policymaking in action across the three polities, Zweifel's work will prove to be a valuable and thought-provoking addition to the debate about European governance and the increasingly important role of transnational and supranational organizations.
This work provides a rigorous, comparative examination of the European Union and the federal democracies of Switzerland and the United States.
An assessment of EU communications policy judged against democratic and normative criteria within the framework of the question of the need for a European-wide public sphere. It argues that the EU should proceed through the mass media, with a policy based on a public service philosophy.
There has been much talk of the democratic deficit in the European Union, but little understanding of the problems of constructing a transnational democracy. This book seeks to remedy these defects by looking at democratic authorization, and representation of Union power.
Taking as its starting point the major issues of democracy which are the ongoing concerns of every liberal Western political system, this volume offers a wide-ranging review of democracy in the European Union. It treats the EU as a new type of political system within the tradition of parliamentary democracies, a system which is neither federal nor intergovernmental, and which consequently has unique problems of how to handle democratic requirements. Part One deals with the two major challenges of interest articulation in the EU, political parties and lobbying. The second part discusses how democracy becomes the key element in the linkage between the EU and its member states, focusing on France, Italy and Belgium where the r
This book examines accountability in the EU from different perspectives and considers whether EU citizens have real opportunities for holding decision-makers accountable. This book critically analyses five arguments which claim there are sufficient means for holding decision-makers to account in the Union. The main conclusion is that the current institutional set-up and practice of decision-making in the EU is one that merely creates an illusion of accountability. Using a strict framework focusing on the difference between formal mechanisms and actual opportunities for accountability, this highly coherent volume will be of interest to students and scholars of European politics, especially those interested in the democratic foundations of the European political system. Chapter 1 of this book is freely available as a downloadable Open Access PDF under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 3.0 license. https://s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/tandfbis/rt-files/docs/Open+Access+Chapters/9780415480994_oachapter1.pdf
This eagerly awaited volume, from a leading scholar on Europeanization, explores the impact of European integration on national democracies. Focusing on the case studies of France, Britain, Italy, and Germany, this is an exciting contribution to work on the implications of European integration for democratic government.
A contradictory creation indeed, the European Union has most of the institutions of a modern democracy, yet it does not function as one. Moreover, its growing scope of activity and supranational decision making processes are undermining the legitimacy of democracy in its member states. Much has been written about this double "democratic deficit," but surprisingly little thought has been given to what to do about it--short of drafting and ratifying a new federal constitution. In this provocative book, Philippe C. Schmitter explores both the possibility and the desirability of democratizing the EU. He argues that as a "non-state" and a "non nation" it will have to invent new forms of citizenship, representation, and decisionmaking if it is ever to democratize itself. The author also contends that the timing and political context work against a full-scale constitutionalization of the process. He proposes a number of modest (and some less modest) reforms that could improve the situation in the near future and eventually lead to a genuine Euro-democracy.
Scientific Study from the year 2018 in the subject Politics - Topic: European Union, grade: 1, University of Catania, language: English, abstract: The European Union has always been alleged of institutional democratic deficit with the claim that the main institutions of the Union suffer from democratic accountability. The debate on democratic deficit in the EU led to the Spitzenkandidaten system in 2014 in which European political parties nominated candidates for the president of the European Commission. The nomination of the candidates for the position of president of the Commission is considered as one of the important ways to make the institution accountable to EU voters through their representatives in the European Parliament. This paper examines the extent at which the introduction of Spitzenkandidaten influences voting behavior of the EU citizens in the 2014 European parliamentary elections, especially in the Member States of the two leading candidates nominated by the two major or largest, in terms of number of MEPs, European political parties in the EP. On the other hand, the paper critiques the claim on democratic deficit which largely borders on lack of accountability in the institutional framework of the EU in relation to decision making by adopting a teleological interpretation of the Treaties. The aim of this paper is in three folds, first, to analyze the result of the 2014 parliamentary election turnout (with special attention on the countries of the two leading candidates proposed by the political parties for the president of the Commission) with the introduction of Spitzenkandidaten. Second, to examine representation and accountability among the three main decision making EU institutions with respect to Treaties' provisions in other to provide answers to the questions bordering on democratic unaccountability raised in many studies. And third, to adopt the intertwined responsibilities and competences enshrined in the foundation of the Union (i.e. the Treaties) to explain the reason for multiple and sometimes, overlapping agenda-setting processes in the European Union. Then, I will conclude that the democratic deficit claim in the European Union is a myth as the EU is constructed in such a way that allows for checks and balances amongst the main decision-making institutions which make them accountable to one another with the extensive powers of National Parliaments of Member States, as well as EU citizens, to exercise control over the European Commission, European Parliament and the Council.
The idea of the integration we live in today was born after World War II. At the outset of the European integration there were only six countries establishing the European Coal and Steel Community and their aim was to maintain peace and prosperity. In order to fulfil this aim, supranational institutions were established. With the development of the European Community more and more power has been delegated to the supranational institutions and therefore from the 1980s articles, studies, books started to be published dealing with the European Community from a democratic point of view. A number of critics were written stating that the integration suffers from a democratic deficit. The question raised in this book is the following: Is there a democratic deficit in the EU? In order to receive an answer, first the term democratic deficit itself is focused on (what is meant by it and how it relates to the European Union) and then the EU Institutions and the Constitutional Treaty of the European Union are concentrated on. This work should especially be useful for anyone who is interested in politics and wants to study the system of the EU more deeply.