Legitimacy Of EU Research Articles

The EU ‘Stress Tests’: The Basis for a New Regulatory Framework for Nuclear Safety

Among the constitutional tensions at the heart of the European integration process, the relationship between ‘mainstream’ EU Law (framed by the Treaty on European Union) and Euratom Law has often been overlooked. Nonetheless, the EU's response to the nuclear power plant accident in Fukushima provides an opportunity to revisit this relationship. This article specifically aims to highlight the dysfunctions of the prevailing understanding of the Euratom's provisions on nuclear safety matters as well as to identify, under a joint interpretation of all EU Treaties, how to develop a European nuclear safety regime that reinforces the compensatory role of EU law and contributes to enhance the EU's legitimacy.

The struggle for EU legitimacy: public contestation, 1950-2005

This award-winning book answers some of the big questions on the legitimacy of the European Union. Specifically, it looks at what it would mean for the EU to be considered a legitimate body and where our ideas on this question come from. The Struggle for EU Legitimacy traces the history of constructions and contestations of the EU's legitimacy, in discourses of the European institutions and in public debate. Through an interpretive, non-quantitative textual analysis of an eclectic range of sources, it examines both long-term patterns in EU-official discourses and their reception in member-state public spheres, specifically in the German and French debates on the Maastricht and Constitutional Draft Treaties. The story told portrays the history of legitimating the EU as a continuous contest over the ends and goals of integration, as well as a balancing act—which was inescapable given the nature of the integration project—between 'bringing the people in' and 'keeping them out'. In addition, it was a balancing act between actively politicizing and deliberately de-politicizing the stakes of EU politics.

Implementing Social Europe in Times of Crises: Re-established Boundaries of Welfare?

This volume examines the state of social Europe when European Union principles and policies have to be implemented in the member states while the EU legitimacy crisis and the Great Recession prevail. The volume explores diverse processes, stages and subjects of implementation in a variety of social policies to identify different institutional dynamics and actor behaviours at play. The individual contributions examine the transposition of the patients’ rights directive to the Europeanisation of pension reforms; the role of national parliaments in transposing social Europe; judicial Europeanisation; and the multi-level enforcement of EU decisions. Theoretically, the volume highlights that implementation is often conditioned by domestic politics or comes as a ‘random walk’ due to organisational and cognitive constraints. Empirically, the volume has three main findings. First, the constitutive components of the EU tend to have a contradictory impact on the EU’s social policies and the national welfare systems. Second, crises influence the implementation of social Europe, at times leading to a modification of fundamental principles and content, but not across the board. Third, as a result, there is evidence of differentiated Europeanisation.

European Elections in Croatia

This text discusses the results of European elections in Croatia. It reaches the conclusion that voters, unhappy with the economic situation, punished the ruling social democratic coalition which suffered a heavy defeat. On the other hand, election results prove the recovery of HDZ, the opposition, centre-right party. It is also obvious that most Croatian citizens do not believe that European elections are important enough to warrant voting. Euroscepticism in Croatia is on the rise because citizens see no obvious benefits from joining the European Union. On the contrary, it is becoming increasingly clear that, in its first year as a member, Croatia will pay more funds into EU budget than it will receive from it. It is evident that direct elections of European Parliament members did not succeed in strengthening EU's legitimacy in the eyes of Croatian voters, and that European elections are actually of secondary importance. Key words: European elections, Croatia, European Union, Euroscepticism

Book reviews

Books reviewed in this issue International Relations theory The vulnerable in international society. By Ian Clark. Liberty abroad: J. S. Mill on International Relations. By Georgios Varouxakis. Wronged by empire: post-imperial ideology and foreign policy in India and China. By Manjari Chatterjee Miller. Interpreting international politics. By Cecelia Lynch. International organization, law and ethics The Routledge companion to alternative organization. Edited by Martin Parker, George Cheney, Valérie Fournier and Chris Land. Conflict, security and defence The gamble of war: is it possible to justify preventive war? By Ariel Colonomos. NATO in Afghanistan: fighting together, fighting alone. David P. Auerswald and Stephen M. Saideman. Just war: authority, tradition, and practice. Edited by Anthony F. Lang Jr, Cian O’Driscoll and John Williams. Counterinsurgency in crisis: Britain and the challenges of modern warfare. By David H. Ucko and Robert Egnell. Arguments that count: physics, computing, and missile defense, 1949–2012. By Rebecca Slayton. The discourse trap and the US military: from the war on terror to the surge. Jeffrey H. Michaels. Political economy, economics and development The dollar trap. By Eswar Prasad. Austerity: the history of a dangerous idea. By Mark Blyth. Development aid confronts politics: the almost revolution. By Thomas Carothers and Diane de Gramont. Energy, environment and global health The future is not what it used to be: climate change and energy security. By Jörg Friedrichs. The politics and institutions of global energy governance. Thijs van de Graaf. International history The new Cambridge history of American foreign relations, vol. 4: challenges to American primacy, 1945 to the present. By Warren I. Cohen. The Holocaust, fascism, and memory: essays in the history of ideas. By Dan Stone. Europe Britain in global politics, volume 1: from Gladstone to Churchill. Edited by Christopher Baxter, Michael L. Dockrill and Keith Hamilton. Britain in global politics, volume 2: from Churchill to Blair. Edited by John W. Young, Effie G. H. Pedaliu and Michael D. Kandiah. Transitional justice in post-communist Romania: the politics of memory. By Lavinia Stan. Europe's deadlock: how the euro crisis could be solved—and why it won’t happen. By David Marsh. The struggle for EU legitimacy. Public contestation, 1950–2005. Claudia Schrag Sternberg. Russia and Eurasia Russia 2025. Scenarios for the Russian future. Edited by Maria Lipman and Nikolay Petrov. Middle East and North Africa Toppling Qaddafi: Libya and the limits of liberal intervention. Christopher Chivvis. The Syria dilemma. Edited by Nader Hashemi and Danny Postel. Party politics and the prospects for democracy in North Africa. By Lise Storm. Sub-Saharan Africa A poisonous thorn in our hearts: Sudan and South Sudan's bitter and incomplete divorce. By James Copnall. Liberation movements in power: party and state in southern Africa. By Roger Southall. South Asia Magnificent delusions: Pakistan, the United States, and an epic history of misunderstanding. By Hussain Haqqani. No exit from Pakistan: America's tortured relationship with Islamabad. By Daniel Markey. The warrior state: Pakistan in the contemporary world. By T. V. Paul. East Asia and Pacific Contestation and adaptation: the politics of national identity in China. By Enze Han. North Korea in transition: politics, economy, and society. Edited by Kyung-ae Park and Scott Snyder. North America The Kennan diaries. Edited by Frank Costigliola. The empire trap: the rise and fall of U.S. intervention to protect American property overseas, 1893–2013. By Noel Maurer. What changed when everything changed: 9/11 and the making of national identity. By Joseph Margulies. Latin America and Caribbean Democratic Chile: the politics and policies of a historic coalition, 1990–2010. Edited by Kirsten Sehnbruch and Peter M. Siavelis. Política externa e democracia no Brasil: ensaio de interpretação histórica. By Dawisson Belém Lopes. In search of the Amazon: Brazil, the United States and the nature of a region. By Seth Garfield.

What kind of deficit?

We are still unable to correctly identify the true crisis in Europe: whether it is a question of a lack of a demos or cratos; whether it is the democracy, legitimacy, or justice that is inadequate; whether we are facing a problem of intelligibility or of too little politicization. The article begin the analysis with three hypotheses: (1) none of the attempts to explain the crisis that focus on a single deficit or weakness seems satisfactory, so the discussion should focus on the way these types of deficiencies are expressed and the extent to which each one of them is involved. For this very reason, it makes no sense to entrust the entire solution to the strengthening of one single criterion (participation, effectiveness, or communication, for example). (2) Polarizing the legitimacy framework around two possibilities (input and output) seems to be a simplification that does not do justice to the intricate way in which the results and the procedures, effectiveness and consent are related in a democracy. (3) The resulting description cannot be less complex than that which it is attempting to describe, so the task of repairing EU legitimacy should be carried out through a sophisticated division of labor (between institutions, criteria, and values). The process of European integration may be one of the most interesting manifestations of a general problem in today’s societies: how to reconstruct political authority to confront the new challenges of communal life.

A “Win-Win-Win” Scenario – Reaping the Benefits of an EU Law on Administrative Procedure

A Law on Administrative Procedure (LAP) is an essential institutional feature of democratic and effective governments. It is a general law on executive law-making, setting out how laws and regulations should be made. The need for a LAP at EU-level is growing – to counter the EU's legitimacy deficit and to make the regulatory process more predictable and robust. At the same time, the EU regulatory “machine” faces new challenges and pressures, as it seeks to implement highly complex (risk management) regulation. Greater regulatory effectiveness depends on more transparency, evidence quality standards and participation. As such, an EU LAP appears to be the natural culmination of the EU Smart Regulation agenda. Since the European Parliament in 2013 called for the Commission to adopt a LAP-related legislative proposal, the debate has gained in visibility and political salience. This article makes the case for an EU LAP for the EU institutions, citizens and businesses – provided the Law enshrines the four key principles of good administration (transparency and consistency; public participation; public record; and accountability); it establishes clear and legally binding procedural standards; and it covers as a principle also rule-making and adjudication decisions by all EU institutions and bodies involved in the preparation, adoption, implementation and repeal of secondary legislation.

Challenging or Enhancing the EU's Legitimacy? The Evolution of Representative Bureaucracy in the Commission's Staff Policies

This article presents an analysis of the European Commission’s staffing policies. It focuses in particular on the extent to which, over time, the Commission has taken the criterion of nationality into account. The theoretical framework of this study is the theory of representative bureaucracy. The article shows that, although the Commission does not use a quota system, its staffing policies have evolved from a limited practice of representation to a complex, explicit, but flexible strategy of representation, which satisfies the criteria of representative bureaucracy. However, due to the duty of loyalty to which civil servants of the European Union submit, these policies only satisfy the criterion of passive representation. The article ends on an explorative note, with the hypothesis that a third type of representation exists. It suggests the creation of a third concept, linkage representation, to account for this.

Democratic Legitimacy of the European Union: A Diagnosis and Some Modest Proposals

Debates and controversies about the democratic legitimacy of the EU have of course accompanied the Union from the very beginning. The “democratic paradox” of the EU exists because while committing itself to promote and scrutinize democracy in its member states, in candidate states, and in third states with whom it enters into contact, it does not display equivalent democratic features in its own functioning. Some commentators tried to define the problem out of existence; by pointing out that the EU is not a state-like polity, they argued that state-specific criteria of legitimacy, such as representative, participatory or deliberative democracy, do not apply. They postulated outcome-based or, at best, public reasons based, conceptions of legitimacy as applicable to the EU, and concluded that it satisfies those standards. But this argument is based on a non sequitur: from the statement that the EU is not a state (not even a quasi-federation or federation in statu nascendi) it does not follow that it should not be judged by the standards of democratic legitimacy. The EU is a complex, untidy polity which amalgamates inter-governmental and supranational elements in its constitution, and therefore this article postulates a bifurcated approach to democratic legitimacy. In so far as the EU contains inter-governmental elements, indirect legitimacy is all that is required, i.e., democratic legitimacy of governments representing their respective states in the Council. The second face of the EU – its supranational character – calls for democratic legitimation of its institutions, in particular, in accordance with the promise contained in Article 10 TEU, proclaiming representative democracy in the institutional setup of the EU. This requires changes to the electoral system of the EP in order to provide incentives for a more trans-European electoral process; strengthening of the supervisory role of the EP over the Commission; the strengthening of the role of the EP with regard to legislation, and endowing it with the competence of legislative initiative. Overall, the idea is for the institutional setup to resemble a canonical model of separation of powers and inter-institutional accountability, with the EP in a dominant position. Additionally, the first gesture towards direct democracy in the EU, the European Citizens’ Initiative, should be strengthened, both by upgrading the status of successful initiatives and by lowering thresholds and administrative requirements.

The legitimation of the European Union in the news media: three treaty reform debates

The news media is a major forum for the discursive legitimation of the EU. This article analyses media debates in the context of three attempts at reforming EU primary law in the past decade: the Nice Treaty; the Constitutional Treaty; and the Lisbon Treaty. Focusing on four member states – the United Kingdom, Ireland, Germany and Austria – our study shows that the EU's legitimacy is discursively constructed according to distinct patterns, most of which are remarkably similar across countries and stable over time. In the context of the EU Constitution, legitimation debates became more intensive and more critical; however, these developments were largely reversed when the Lisbon Treaty was debated. This suggests that, in the media arena, the much-discussed politicization of European integration is an episodic occurrence, rather than a unidirectional trend.

The EU's civilian/power dilemma

This article exposes the dilemma between the EU's civilian geopolitical model and its role as a dominant geoeconomic power. While the success of the European model for political-economic organisation and for overcoming war is appealing, the EU's external relations frequently fail to avoid the traps of Europe's imperial past (and present), thus undermining the EU's credibility and legitimacy in international development policy. This article therefore argues for a critical engagement with views on the EU from the outside. It draws on qualitative fieldwork on EU development policy in East Africa and illustrates how such external perceptions sometimes differ considerably from dominant European ones articulated in official EU geopolitical discourse.

Democracy and Legitimacy in the European Union Revisited: Input, Output and ‘Throughput’

Scholars of the European Union have analyzed the EU's legitimacy mainly in terms of two normative criteria: output effectiveness for the people and input participation by the people. This article argues that missing from this theorization is what goes on in the ‘black box’ of governance between input and output, or ‘throughput’. Throughput consists of governance processes with the people, analyzed in terms of their efficacy, accountability, transparency, inclusiveness and openness to interest consultation. This article defines and discusses this third normative criterion as well as the interaction effects of all three normative criteria. It does so by considering EU scholars' institutional and constructivist analyses of EU legitimacy as well as empirical cases of and proposed solutions to the EU's democracy problems. The article also suggests that unlike input and output, which affect public perceptions of legitimacy both when they are increased or decreased, throughput tends to be most salient when negative, because oppressive, incompetent, corrupt or biased practices throw not just throughput but also input and output into question.

How to Negotiate Under Co-Decision in the EU: Reforming Trilogues and First-Reading Agreements

The Constitutional Affairs Committee is currently reviewing the European Parliament’s Rules of Procedure to increase the effectiveness, transparency and inclusiveness of first-reading agreements under co-decision. This policy brief takes a stand as to which rules should be adopted to achieve these objectives. Given the steep rise of early agreements and Parliament’s role as a guarantor of EU legitimacy, the authors place a premium on inclusiveness and transparency. The rules suggested are designed to maintain efficiency for technical proposals, facilitate effective decision-making on urgent files and increase the overall legitimacy of legislative decision-making in the EU.

Developing Administrative Principles in the EU: A Foundational Model of Legitimacy?

AbstractThis paper argues that administrative legitimacy has been neglected as having the potential to provide a foundation for the legitimacy of the EU institutions. The development of the administrative law‐type mechanisms within the EU is almost exclusively focused on the activities of the Member States as the main implementers of Union law. This has left an administrative gap at the level of the EU institutions, with little evidence of determinative horizontal administrative principles to be found in either the Treaties or the case‐law of two European courts. Where the courts have acted, they have adopted a sectoral and highly circumscribed approach to the development of administrative norms. The paper examines whether administrative principles can be harnessed as a mechanism for increasing the EU's legitimacy and, if so, how these principles fit with the institutions' approach to the legitimacy question. Post Lisbon, can evidence be found within the Treaties that the administrative route to legitimacy has not been entirely foreclosed? This paper proposes a model of administrative legitimacy for the EU level of administration that provides a foundation for the interconnected concepts of good governance and political legitimacy.

The Stockholm solution? Papering over the cracks within the area of freedom, security and justice

In 2010, the EU agreed its third five year programme for internal security, with the Stockholm Programme building on pre-existing arrangements from Tampere and The Hague. This article seeks, firstly, to highlight the nature of the problem that has confronted the EU in the area of internal security, by exploring a range of thematic concerns regarding both the institutional and conceptual construction of the EU's internal security regime, from the lack of an effective statistical analysis into the nature of the problem confronting the member states to the continued fragmentation of the European level as a practical venue for policy-making. Having considered the consequences of these continuing structural flaws, in terms of both the EU's wider credibility and legitimacy as an actor in this key security field, the second half of the article proceeds to critically appraise the solutions contained both within the 2010 Stockholm Programme and the Treaty of Lisbon. Having considered both, it will be argued that, at best, the ‘Stockholm solution' simply papers over pre-existing cracks, leaving the EU with a continued credibility gap in this important and developing area of co-operation.

The Charter of Fundamental Rights: History and Prospects in Post-Lisbon Europe

The EU Charter of Fundamental Rights has been incorporated into European constitutional law ten years after it was adopted by the EU institutions. In that time the Charter developed from a ‘solemn proclamation’ to a persuasive authority before the European Courts and now a binding Charter for the EU. It has been referred to in the case-law of both the European Court of Justice and the European Court of Human Rights. However, the Charter’s history and future are the subject of political contest and academic debate. Along with the accession to the European Convention on Human Rights, it is likely to provide much scope for debate in coming years. This paper assesses the Charter’s development from a proposal to increase EU legitimacy to its current status as the Union’s own Bill of Rights. It examines the rights protected by the Charter, their sources and how they may be interpreted in light of the ‘Explanations’ in the Official Journal. The case-law of the European Courts on the Charter is cataloged and analyzed to determine the Charter’s likely value in human rights litigation. Finally, the chapter analyses the application of the Charter across the EU and considers its implications in the Member States that have limited its effect. Three related themes are woven throughout the analysis: the conflicting motivations of the Member States and the EU institutions, the potential for broadening and strengthening human rights protection in the EU and the Charter’s relationship with the European Convention on Human Rights.

The Limits of the ‘Conflicts Approach’: Law in Times of Political Turmoil

Over the last decade, Christian Joerges has elaborated a theory of law, or ‘conflicts law approach’, which is argued to be appropriate to the legal governance of the European Union. Built upon a primary constitutional prescription—the notion that the EU's legitimacy derives from its ability to compensate for the ‘democratic deficit’ posed by the exclusionary characteristics of the nation state—the conflicts law approach demands that EU law promote deliberative democratic processes within Europe that can balance the interests of member states against each other and against the supranational interests of the Union. Predictably, the approach has accordingly also attracted criticism, in particular from those who argue that its procedural mission of balancing technocratic against political interest is at best misguided and at worst impossible. In reviewing the conflicts law approach and tracing it back to its heritage within critical legal thinking, this article both rebuts such critique—the conflicts approach is necessarily modest in its efforts to promote ‘deliberate supranationalism’—but also highlights areas where the theory must still be modified if it is to survive in an unprecedented era of social dynamism. Processes of European integration and globalisation have also called into question the integrative functions of nation states. To this degree, the conflicts law approach must widen its horizons in order to address new conflicts between established political orders and novel political communities, some of which may have yet to be formed.

Climate Change and the European Union's Leadership Moment: An Inconvenient Truth?

AbstractThis article examines the nexus between the EU's goal of being a leading actor on the world stage in devising a global solution to the threat of climate change and the performance of its Member States in meeting their climate change obligations. In doing so the article will discuss the concept of EU leadership, examine the modes of leadership the EU has employed in pursuing its climate protection objectives, scrutinize the extent to which EU Member States are actually living up to their Kyoto obligations and analyse how the EU's own performance, credibility and legitimacy in this area affects its aspirations to be a key norm‐entrepreneur in the establishment of a post‐2012 climate change agreement. The article concludes with a balance sheet of some of the Union's key successes and failures and closes by highlighting some potentially inconvenient truths that might frustrate the EU's climate protection aspirations.

Input and output legitimacy: synergy or trade-off? Empirical evidence from an EU survey

Since the breakdown of the ‘permissive consensus’ in the early 1990s we have witnessed an input turn in the debate on EU legitimacy. Many scholars have been arguing for enhancing the input legitimacy of the EU through promoting stakeholder participation and deliberation on important European issues. Yet, others warn that this strategy might not help in increasing overall legitimacy of the EU, since increased input legitimacy could be thought to undermine its output legitimacy by making decision-making less efficient. This article assesses, empirically, the relationship between input and output legitimacy within the context of the EU chemicals policy overhaul. Contrary to what some scholars suggest, we find evidence from a survey that measures aimed at increasing the input legitimacy of the EU also hold the promise of increasing its output legitimacy.

Does Co‐Regulation Strengthen EU Legitimacy?

Abstract: Within the Better Regulation programme of the EU, co‐regulation is promoted as an important strategy to improve the regulatory environment within Europe. It is assumed that co‐regulation can enhance the legitimacy of EU governance in the field where this strategy is used. The purpose of this article is to assess the truth of this premise and to analyse whether co‐regulation strengthens the legitimacy of EU governance. To this end, the criteria of input and output legitimacy are applied to the European social dialogue as a form of co‐regulation in the EU policy area of social law. In this article, a link is made between the tendency to prescribe co‐regulation as a specific regulatory strategy in EU legislative policy and the existing knowledge on the purposes and effects of co‐regulation and the conditions under which co‐regulation can function as a regulation strategy.