Can the Euro-crisis Poison the Well of
European Demoi-cracy?
Vihar Georgiev
Paper prepared for the 24th IPSA World Congress of Political Science, Poznań (Poland), 2328 July 2016
Work in progress. Please do not quote without the author’s permission.
Contact details:
Vihar Georgiev
European Studies Department, Sofia University “St. Kliment Ohridski”.
Address: 125, Tsarigradsko Chausee, bl. IV, fl. 4, Sofia 1113, Bulgaria.
E-mail: [email protected]
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Can the Euro-crisis Poison the Well of
European Demoi-cracy?
Vihar Georgiev
Abstract
In the early 2000s the European Union was celebrated as the desired model for the
impending new world order. Today, the mantra that the European Union is an area of
solidarity and prosperity has waned. The European integration project is not so attractive
anymore and public trust in the institutions of the Union is at a record low. Going beyond
the standard concept of input and output legitimacy, this paper uses the analytical
framework of the vertical dimension of demoi-cracy developed by Cheneval, Lavenex &
Schimmelfennig 2015, to study the impact of the Euro-crisis on the perceived democratic
deficit of the European Union, and European identity. The paper argues that the institutional
praxis of “saving the Eurozone” has created deep, structural setbacks for the enhancement
of the notion of solidarity among European citizens and therefore demoi-cratic European
identity-building. The most problematic institutional vectors in solving the Euro-crisis appear
to be those of the European Central Bank, the European Council, the Council of the
European Union and, to some extent, the European Commission. The paper outlines a
number of methodological and empirical questions for further investigation.
Keywords: European identity, legitimacy, solidarity, Eurozone, institutional balance,
democratic deficit
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Introduction
The European Union is currently engulfed in a poly-crisis, encompassing diverse issues from the debt
crisis in the Eurozone periphery, a surge of irregular migration, and the potential exit of one of its
largest Member States – the United Kingdom. This paper attempts to shed more light on the first of
those crises – the Euro-crisis, which followed the sub-prime financial crisis in the United States.
The first section of this paper provides an overview of the interdependent aspects of the democratic
deficit of the European Union, its institutions and policies, the role of legitimacy of both EU
institutions and policies as a related qualitative phenomenon, and the resulting (impossible)
formation of European identity. The second section presents the demoi-cracy model as a relevant
toolbox for assessment of institutional and policy developments in the European Union, and
develops the assessment framework, using the concepts of institutional vectors, policy success and
failure. The third section applies the assessment framework to the institutional vectors of five EU
institutions during the Euro-crisis: the European Council, the Council of the European Union, the
European Parliament, the European Commission, and the European Central Bank, evaluating their
institutional vectors in terms of input and throughput legitimacy. The assessment of output
legitimacy is presented as an aggregate of the institutional vectors of all five institutions. The
Conclusion presents a summary of the main findings, and outlines various methodological and
empirical questions for further investigation.
1. Setting the stage: the nexus of democratic deficit, legitimacy and
identity
Two main issues continue to invigorate the academic debate on the institutional mechanism of the
European Union: what are the drivers and what is the impact of the European integration process. A
corner stone of the debate remains the notion of democratic deficit of the European Union, its
institutions and policies. Two other phenomena are problematized based on this notion: the role of
legitimacy of both EU institutions and policies, and the resulting (impossible) formation of European
identity. These three phenomena are treated as an interdependent community without further
discussion of the direction of causality (for a detailed review of the different schools of thought see
Weiler, Haltern & Mayer 1995, Cederman 2001, Herrmann & Brewer 2004, Eriksen2009, Olsen 2010,
Beetham & Lord 2014, Piattone 2015).
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1.1. The democratic deficit – a known unknown
The standard version of the notion of democratic deficit is linked to the gradual transfer of more
powers from the Member States to the integration community. The volume, complexity and timing
of the Community decisional process makes national parliamentary control, especially in large
Member States, more an illusion than a reality. The power of national parliaments to affect
outcomes in the Council of Ministers is further reduced. The European Parliament does not offer an
effective substitution. On this reading, Union governance results in a net empowerment of the
executive branch of the States (Weiler, Haltern & Meyer 1995: 6–10).
EU democratic deficit accentuates the lack of an effective majoritarian institution participating in the
decision-making process. This conceptual misfit therefore requires a transition from the traditional
democratic deficit critique to a new theoretical conception of democracy in the European Union,
hinting on the possible use of compound democracy as a reference model (Coultrap 1999, Fabbrini
2007, Georgiev 2013).
Some authors are even more assertive of the breadth and depth of this phenomenon. Etzioni 2007
explores the notion of community deficit, claiming that the level and scope of EU’s integration
activities far exceed the degree of community that it sustains. Majone 1998, on the other hand,
notes that the term “democratic deficit” is much more meaningful if we consider the legitimacy
problems of non-majoritarian institutions with limited (implying conferred) competences, such as the
European Union. Follesdal 2014 notes that discussions about the democratic deficit often target the
wrong problems, and that this is either because the alleged problems are misinterpreted, or because
they are in fact not problems at all. Nevertheless he agrees that the EU is insufficiently
democratically accountable. Majone 2010 claims that the origin of the democratic deficit is the
failure to convert a majority of voters to the cause of political integration. This failure forced
integrationist elites to sacrifice democracy on the altar of deeper integration in the hope of ‘making
Europe without Europeans’. In connection with this hypothesis, Bartl 2015 distinguishes two levels of
the expression of the democratic deficit - narrowing the range of topics open to democratic debate
(horizontal substantive democratic deficit) and de-politicisation of EU goals, underpinned by a
massive accumulation of allegedly apolitical expert knowledge (vertical substantive democratic
deficit).
Not everyone agrees with the notion of structural and operational democratic deficit. Moravcsik
2002 has delivered a powerful criticism of the concept of democratic deficit, claiming that the
division of labour in the European Union gives observers the impression that the EU is undemocratic,
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whereas it is simply specializing in those functions of modern democratic governance that tend to
involve less direct political participation. According to Menendez 2009 there are six main sources of
democratic legitimacy of the EU, namely (1) the national ‘enabling’ constitutional clauses on the basis
of which nation states became Member States of the Union; (2) the secondment of national
constitutions as the collective ‘deep’ constitution of the EU; (3) the institutional actors and decisionmaking set up characteristic of the two standard law-making processes of the Union; (4) the
comitology procedures to draft regulations and statutory instruments; (5) the expansion of the
breadth and scope of the right to equality resulting from the review of the European constitutionality
of national laws by reference to Community fundamental rights and economic freedoms; and (6) last
but not least, the procedural subjective rights through which citizens influence the process of
application and adjudication of Community norms.
Looking at recent empirical research, democratic deficit does appear to be the main de-legitimizing
frame of thought for European citizens. Van Ingelgom 2015 reports that in 24 focus groups in
Belgium, France and the United Kingdom, the EU was depicted as opaque, remote, inefficient, ill
adapted and paralysed by national egos, eroded by corruption and obsessed with insignificant
regulation. The distance between European institutions and citizens is also widely condemned.
To summarize, the democratic deficit reveals itself as a field of contention of the transfer of more
powers from Member States to the European Union. The transfer itself is considered problematic
since there are no procedural and/or substantive instruments for interest representation and
intermediation akin to the parliamentary democracy at national level. Indeed, the EU’s multi-level
decision-making mechanism does not provide an equal venue for effective interest representation
since national interest groups depend on variable resources, as well as the domestic national
institutional contexts, to successfully Europeanize their lobbying strategies (Klüver 2010). The result
is unequal representation of interests at the supranational level due to the varying access of interest
groups to policy-makers and their influence on EU policymaking, leading to the danger that better
organized and resourced interest groups might dominate the EU policy arena (Eising 2008,
Greenwood 2011, Chalmers 2013).
1.2. Legitimacy of the European Union and its institutions: linking the theoretical bridges
Legitimacy and legitimation are usually problematized in the discussion about the democratic deficit
of the European Union, its institutions and policies (Majone 1998, Føllesdal 2006, Etzioni 2007,
Beetham & Lord 2014, Piattone 2015). Schmidt 2013 and Piattone 2015 provide a detailed review of
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recent studies of the problem of legitimacy and legitimation of the European Union. The different
perspectives have actually little in common, outside of the division of input and output legitimacy as
proposed by Scharpf 1970 and further developed in Scharpf 1999 and Scharpf 2009. A review of
recent literature on legitimacy as a psychological, social, organizational, and political phenomenon
(Hurd 1999, Stryker 2000, Tyler 2006, Deephouse & Suchman 2008, Rothstein 2009, Gaus 2011)
provides some clarity on the common threads that link different theoretical perspectives.
First, legitimacy is understood above all as a psychological property of an authority, institution, social
arrangement or policy that leads those connected to it to believe that it is appropriate, proper, and
just (Hurd 1999, Tyler 2006). Second, legitimacy is socially constructed and emerges only in relation
to rules, norms, values and cognitive frameworks in a larger social system (Deephouse & Suchman
2008:54). The sources of legitimacy are actually the audiences who observe the respective subjects
and make legitimacy assessments (ibid). (De)legitimation is construed as the process by which
legitimacy of a subject changes over time (Deephouse & Suchman 2008:57). However, Hurd 1999
considers that the operative process in legitimation is the internalization by the actor of an external
standard when the actor’s sense of its own interests is partly constituted by a force outside itself,
existing at the intersubjective level.
Turning the attention to the division of input and output legitimacy as proposed by Fritz Scharpf,
Rothstein 2009 notes that that political legitimacy is more dependent on the output side of the
political system than on the input side. Scharpf 2013 disagrees and claims that specifically in the case
of the Euro-crisis, the legitimacy of a technocratic-authoritarian regime that depends exclusively on
output-oriented promises, and whose exercise of governing powers interferes massively and visibly
with the interests and life chances of millions of citizens, must be considered extremely fragile. Gaus
2011 correctly points out that the distinction between input- and output-oriented legitimacy has not
been established by substantive and comprehensive empirical analysis. In addition to input and
output legitimacy, Wimmel 2009 and Schmidt 2013 introduce the notion of throughput legitimacy
that should be judged in terms of the efficacy, accountability and transparency of the EU’s
governance processes along with their inclusiveness and openness to consultation with the people.
There is significant psychological research supporting the claim that those authorities that exercise
their authority openly and inclusively are more likely to be viewed as legitimate and to have their
decisions accepted (Tyler 2006:380). This perspective is particularly important for the qualitative
assessment of the institutional dynamics of the Euro-crisis presented in this paper.
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Gaus 2011 proposes four potential objects of analysis in relation to legitimacy: the expression of
individuals’ beliefs on legitimacy, legitimation acts and processes, society’s normative orders
(including taking-for-granted-ness as described by Stryker 2000 and Deephouse & Suchman 2008),
and the historical transformation of those normative orders.
Based on the presented multidisciplinary insights, it can be concluded that legitimacy processes not
only help explain institutionalization and stability, but also help explain deinstitutionalization and
change in institutions and institutional fields (Stryker 2000:180). Therefore, for the purposes of this
paper, legitimacy is construed as immediate and tacit agreement, ensuring doxic submission to the
established order (Bourdieu, Wacquant & Farage 1994:14-16).
1.3. Integration and identity – tying the knot
The democratic deficit of the European Union and its institutions is often explained by the lack of
distinctive and consistent European identity. An essential condition for the existence of a stable
political community is the creation of a collective “people”, supported by the relevant myths and in a
position to establish and exercise control over the political power (Canovan 2005: 138). On the other
hand, the formation of states (and later nations) was contingent on the ideational construction of
“the interests of the country”, including the requirement of territorial defense (Bourdieu, Wacquant
& Farage 1994) and the intensification of the political economy (Johnson & Earle 2000).
However, given the specificity of the integration process the potential for the development of a
European demos has been consistently challenged from various perspectives in social science
(Weiler, Haltern & Mayer 1995, Grimm 1995, Piattone 2015). The no-demos thesis focuses on the
lack of a transnational political relationship between individuals and is related mainly to the
legitimacy of the EU's decision-making processes (Jolly 2005).
Typically a demos is considered as both a cultural and political phenomenon. Thomassen and Schmitt
2004 observe that the requirement for shared common identity in ethno-cultural sense to precede
the constitution of a political community of citizens is not supported by historical data, since in many
European countries the formation of the state preceded the development of a nation. This
observation is very important for the research framework of this paper since it allows us to consider
the construction of European identity as a result (outcome) of the integration process. European
identity can be construed as the result of an open-ended process that gives space to actors pursuing
their specific political (and cultural) projects (Checkel & Katzenstein 2009:3). Another important
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insight is that identity is both multidimensional and inclusive (typically, persons have 5-10 stable
identities in their psychological repertoire – Ashmore et al 2004).
Cederman 2001 considers that there are at least four possible trajectories for studying identity at the
supranational level – ethno-nationalism, pan-nationalism, bounded integration and post-nationalism,
depending on the logic of identity formation (essentialism or constructivism), and the viability of
identity formation beyond the nation state (retention or supersession of national identity). He
emphasizes the utility of bounded integration given the relative stability and inertia of national
identities, locked in their “power containers”. However, it remains to be seen whether ethnonationalism could also become a viable trajectory. Follesdal 2014 rightly underscores that the details
of the requisite European identity remain contested.
In terms of values orientation as a tool to support identity building, Fuchs & Klingemann 2002 note
that there is little difference between Member States in the political values and behaviours that are
essential to a democracy. The authors therefore reflect that there is considerable potential for
Europeans in Western, Central, and Eastern Europe to consider each other as democrats, and to
integrate this understanding in their collective identity. Jollly 2005 considers that initiatives based on
common values can support the creation of a civic, political European identity. Lehning 2001
proposes the normative concept of shared liberal citizenship identity as a model for building a true
European identity.
European identity is intertwined with the issue of European solidarity. According to the generic view,
collective identity signals that one is not alone but can count on the social support and solidarity of
other in-group members so that, as part of a group, one is a much more efficacious social agent
(Simon & Klandermans 2001). One way to explore this nexus is through the distinction, proposed by
Castells 2011, between resistance and project identities. In this way the European identity may be
understood as a project identity, i.e. as a transformative identity that reshapes the social order. Wine
2011 suggests that the sense of shared predicament before common problems may be a promising
way to conceptualise the collective bond necessary for political community. Indeed, as Walkenhorst
2009 notes, the notion of European identity often reflects the idea of a non-hierarchical social
framework which merges the political aim of an ‘ever closer union’ with that of a ‘people’s Europe’.
However, many authors believe that the European identity is or should be developed along the
model of resistance identities – using cultural materials inherited by common history.
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Kohli 2000 delivers an in-depth sociological review of the concept of European identity and claims
that its further development depends on finding a viable social contract to the new European level.
This conclusion is complemented by the research of Easterly, Ritzen & Woolcock 2006 who find that
social cohesion is the bedrock for better institutions and economic growth, provided that a common
identity exists. Where such a common identity is lacking, opportunistic politicians can and do exploit
ethnic differences to build up a power base. It only takes one such opportunistic politician to
exacerbate division, because once an ethnic group is politically mobilized along ethnic lines, other
groups will. In addition, Norris 2011 finds that nationalism has remained strong and relatively stable
in the European Union, even in Member states in Western Europe that are long-standing Member
States. This argument, linking identity, social cohesion and opportunistic division based on ethnicity,
will be used later in the research framework of the paper.
Risse 2014 however notes that the gradual Europeanization of identities and public spheres is leading
to increased politicization of debates about the EU. Therefore if lively public spheres are constitutive
parts of a democratic polity, politicization would almost inevitably strengthen European democracy
and the emerging demos. On the other hand Risse 2014 rightly points out that politicization can lead
to a transnational community of communication, but it can also bring about de-Europeanization of
public spheres and their re-nationalization.
In conclusion, the notion of European identity can be considered as a multidimensional construct
that is more the outcome of, rather than a precondition for, legitimacy of the European integration
process. While national identities remain stable “power containers” and there is no European demos,
elements or symptoms of common identity are already visible. This identity is not exclusionary or
complementary, but it may provide a venue for conflict resolution and interest intermediation on the
supranational level. The nexus of the three phenomena – the implied democratic deficit, the
European identity, and legitimacy of the Union and its institutions develops itself on the broad
canvass of the presumed European public sphere(s) and the emerging elements of European identity.
2. The demoi-cracy model: an ample framework for analysing the
impact of EU policymaking on identity
This section aims to present the elements of the demoi-cracy model that will be used in the
qualitative assessment framework in the following sections.
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2.1. Demoi-cracy as a model for studying the European integration process
In a series of publications (Nicolaïdis 2003, 2004а, 2004b, 2006, 2012, 2013), Calypso Nicolaïdis has
outlined a new approach for studying the nexus of European integration, identity and legitimacy that
she calls demoi-cracy. The model rests on the premise that if the EU is indeed a new kind of
democracy-in-the-making, its democratic character cannot be recognized and developed based on
the conventional paradigm of statehood (Nicolaïdis 2004a). Demoi-cracy is understood as a distinct
alternative to the national organizing principle of the political community. Philosophically, demoicracy is based on the recognition and appreciation of the limits imposed by the Other (other demoi)
in the integration process. At the same time demoi-cracy allows the building of connections with the
Other(s) beyond and above the limits of national borders.
The qualitatively new element introduced by demoi-cratic theory is the institutionalization of the
ethos of acknowledging and accepting the Other(s) through the supranational legal order. In this
political and legal order decisions are taken in, but not by Brussels (Nicolaïdis 2006).
Demoi-cracy explores legitimacy beyond the typical distinction of “input” and “output” perspectives.
The model proposes that any assessment of the EU’s democratic order must be based on the balance
between, and interaction of, the political rights of individuals and those of the democratically
constituted demoi (Cheneval and Schimmelfennig 2013). Demoi-cracy allows for introducing novel
discursive forms of political debate and decision-making, taking into account the transformation of
the networked societies of EU Member States (Ansell 2000).
Pettit 2010 and Bellamy & Castiglione 2013 further develop the elements of the demoi-cratic model,
proposing two criteria for the successful construction of a demoi-cratic order. The first criterion
explores whether the citizens of each member state can continue to be part of a representative
democracy based on a shared conception of the public interest. This requirement is quite important
given the disparity of democracy and rule of law ratings among EU Member States. Second, an
association of demoi must be under the equal control of the component democratic polities, which
categorically excludes domination of some Member States over others.
Based on Piattoni 2015 three potential foundations for the legitimacy of a demoi-cratic community
can be outlined – lack of domination, tolerance and justice. These three foundations are the key to
understanding the model of demoi-cracy as a very useful theoretical instrument for the study of
European integration.
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Demoi-cracy as lack of domination
Bohman 2007 proposes a working definition for democracy, which in fact is totally compliant with
the value orientation of the demoi-cratic model – a set of institutions by which individuals are
empowered as free and equal citizens to form and change the terms of their common life together,
including democracy itself. In this way democracy (and indeed demoi-cracy) is primarily an ideal of
self-determination, it is a set of reflexive procedures.
However, the lack of explicit domination is not sufficient. One of the most frequent attempts to
dominate the policy discourse in the European Union has been the narrative of the “objective market
forces”. Thus the market economy is used as an argumentative strategy to justify policies linked to
the so-called neoliberal consensus (McNamara 2006, Schulten and Müller 2013). In addition, the
impact of the integration policies does not correspond with the territory of the integration
community itself. These considerations require the establishment of a second foundation of demoicracy – tolerance.
Demoi-cracy as tolerance
The European Union is based on what Weiler 2001 calls constitutional tolerance, where national
constitutions and constitutional jurisdictions cohabitate without needing a supranational
constitution. According to Nicolaïdis 2004а, the European demoi-cracy is founded on the mutual
recognition, confrontation and ever more demanding sharing of identities -- not on their merger. The
European demoi-cracy therefore requires informed curiosity about the political lives of our
neighbours and mechanisms for our voices to be heard in each other’s forums. However, as
Nicolaïdis 2013 points out, this value field of tolerance experiences many tensions. The author
suggests one possible way of achieving a balance is to exploit the pluralist philosophy of EU
constitutional law to address the tensions of a multiplicity of competing legal orders with overlapping
supremacy claims. In support of this claim, Maduro 2010 makes a distinction between
constitutionalism (where individual interests are directly aggregated and deliberation is based on the
promotion of universal rules guaranteed, ex-ante, by their generality and abstraction and, ex-post, by
nondiscrimination) and intergovernmentalism (where interests are aggregated through the State and
deliberation does not aim at universal rules based on the individual status of citizens but reflects the
bargaining power of States and generates accommodating agreements between their perceived
conflicting interests).
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Therefore, as Weiler et al 1995 suggest, from this perspective the EU Treaties should be viewed not
as a classical intergovernmental agreement (a Union of states), but as a "social contract" among the
nationals of those states that they will (in the areas covered by the Treaty) regard themselves as
associating as citizens in this civic society. To some, this notion of civic tolerance goes well beyond
the actual character of the integration process which could be better construed as ‘statehood
without government’ and a new form of ‘governmentality’ (Shore 2006).
However, tolerance is not an empty gesture – it requires transparency, reliability and trust among
partners (Piattoni 2015). This critical field will be examined below in relation to the dimensions of
demoi-cracy.
Demoi-cracy as justice
Forst 2012 recognizes three approaches to ensuring justice in international cooperation. The etatist
approach is based on the organization of polities into states who participate as representatives of
their citizens in international relations. The globalist approach is linked to the introduction of
universal human rights after XVII century. However, in the globalist approach justice is mediated by
the sanction of states, and states may effectively limit the implementation of international law on
their territories. In the third, transnational approach, international governmental and nongovernmental organizations participate on their own in the process of international legal regulation,
based on the relevant international agreements. This approach obviously is most evident in the
European Union due to the prerogatives of its supranational institutions.
Demoi-cracy, understood as justice, should establish real political and legal autonomy of the
individual in and towards the states, a new value field supported by the instruments of the rule of
law. In the European Union the construction of this value field depends on many independent actors
– the citizens, their organizations, the administrative and judicial institutions of the Member States.
However, this mechanism for delivering justice on the supranational level still appears
underdeveloped and leads to hidden dismissal of individual rights, frustrates the European citizens,
and therefore contributes to the democratic deficit (Conant 2002:6).
2.2. Democracy as structure – the vertical and the horizontal dimensions
Cheneval and Schimmelfennig 2013 suggest that any assessment of the EU’s democratic order must
be based on the balance between, and interaction of, the political rights of individuals and those of
the democratically constituted statespeoples. This two-dimensional model is further developed
systematically in Cheneval et al. 2015. The two dimensions are differentiated by the instruments
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used in the integration process – a vertical dimension, which represents the supranational, multilevel regulation, and horizontal dimension, which represents the co-ordination and approximation of
national policies and legislative frameworks.
In this analytical framework, the vertical dimension practically overlaps with the notion of Type I
governance, and the horizontal dimension – with Type II governance, as suggested by Hooghe &
Marks 2001. A summary of the two dimensions based on the frameworks proposed by Cheneval et
al. 2015 and Hooghe & Marks 2001 is presented on Table 1.
Vertical dimension
According to Cheneval et al. 2015, the vertical dimension of demoi-cracy is about the principles of
making and implementing common legislation. In a multi-level perspective, it refers to the
competences and interactions of legislative, executive and judicial organs situated at the
supranational as well as the national (and, potentially, subnational) levels. The framework is systemwide; the functions are bundled; and the levels of government are multiple but limited in number
(Hooghe & Marks 2001).
The defining principle of the vertical dimension is ‘equal legislative rights of citizens and demoi at the
supranational level (Cheneval 2011: 144– 8). Both statespeoples and citizens need to be represented
at the supranational level and participate in law-making on an equal footing (Cheneval et al. 2015).
Put differently, any demoi-cratic agreement must fulfil two sets of conditions. First, an international
agreement requires ’fair dealing’ among states in their relations with one another as the
representatives of their peoples. Second, states must ensure the general acceptability of the
agreement to their respective peoples and be able to justify their international commitments,
including any provisions for side payments, as being a reasonable way of advancing their joint and
several common interests (Bellamy & Weale 2015). This qualitative requirement should not be
underestimated, given the propensity to focus on the intergovernmental perspective in
supranational governance.
The vertical dimension of the demoi-cracy model will be used as the principal lens for the study of
the Euro-crisis in the following sections.
Horizontal dimension
The horizontal dimension of demoi-cracy describes the horizontal, decentralized cooperation policy
interaction of member state institutions, in which national rules are co-ordinated and approximated.
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Examples of instruments that promote horizontal demoi-cracy include horizontal non-discrimination,
the Open Method of Co-ordination and mutual recognition (Cheneval et al. 2015).
At the horizontal level multiple, independent jurisdictions fulfil distinct functions. This leads to a
governance system where each European citizen is served not by ‘the’ government, but by a variety
of different public service industries (Hooghe & Marks 2001).
Table 1. Vertical and horizontal dimensions of the demoicracy model1
Vertical dimension
Instruments


Principles

Transfer of
powers


Interaction

Key players

Objectives

Supranational legislation
Harmonized common
policies
Equal representation and
legislative rights of citizens
and statespeoples
Common political values
From the demoi to the
supranational level
Across national and
supranational levels
Legislators, representative
actors, judiciary
Output-oriented
Horizontal dimension

Coordination of national policies


Mutual recognition
Non-discrimination

Horizontal, transnational transfers (if
required)
Overlapping powers
Across Member States




Regulators, executive actors, local
government
Process-oriented: coordination of
national policies
2.3. Connecting the dots: the vertical dimension of demoi-cracy, institutional vectors,
legitimacy and identity in the Euro crisis
Based on the review in the previous sections, the following assumptions are made in order to outline
the analytical framework of this paper:

The democratic deficit reveals itself as a field of contention of the transfer of more powers
from Member States to the European Union. There are no procedural and/or substantive
instruments for interest representation and intermediation similar to the parliamentary
democracy at national level;
1
Adapted from Cheneval et al 2015 and Hooghe & Marks 2001.
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
Legitimacy and legitimation processes not only help explain institutionalization and stability,
but also deinstitutionalization and change in institutions and institutional fields;

Throughput and output legitimacy significantly impact the perception of democratic deficit
of the European Union and its institutions;

The notion of European identity can be considered as a multidimensional construct that is
more the outcome of, rather than a precondition for, the legitimacy of the European
integration process;

A comprehensive assessment of the EU’s democratic order and its transformation should be
based on the balance between, and interaction of, the political rights of European citizens
and of the democratically constituted European demoi.
But how can actual policy interventions in a particular policy domain be assessed within the
proposed qualitative analytical framework of demoi-cracy? Two additional concepts are proposed to
operationalize the analytical framework.
First, the notion of institutional vectors is used, borrowed from sociological and organizational
research frameworks. In this sense, institutional vectors can be understood as the actual expression
of an institution’s power and direction of policy preferences2. Institutional vectors situate and orient,
but do not determine policy or policy agency (Orihuela 2013). While conceptually linked to path
dependency as originally proposed by Pierson 2000, institutional vectors allow taking into account
the role of on-the-path and off-the-path strategic issues, as well as issues that conform to or deviate
from the policy context (Koch 2011, Seo & Creed 2002).
Second, in order to operationalize input, throughput and output of the institutional vectors of EU
institutions during the Euro-crisis, a framework for assessing policy (and its perceived success or
failure) is needed. McConnell 2010 has developed a comprehensive assessment framework designed
to capture the bundles of outcomes or impacts that indicate how successful or unsuccessful a policy
has been. In this framework, there are three main analytical categories – policy as politics (which
mainly connects to the notion of input legitimacy), policy as process (which can be attributed to the
field of throughput legitimacy), and policy as programs (which relates to the field of output
legitimacy). In this way a comprehensive and methodologically sound assessment framework can be
2 For the importance of the distinction between power and influence in institutional analysis see Golub 1996.
15
developed as proposed on Table 2. The framework is intended to study policies mainly developed
across the vertical dimension of the demoi-cracy model.
In this framework, a qualitative assessment is made across a spectrum of Success, Resilient Success,
Conflicted Success, Precarious Success, and Failure, which relate to Strong positive, Positive, Mixed or
neutral, Negative and Strong negative impact on legitimacy. McConnell 2010 outlines three cases
where there may be particular tensions across the three types of legitimacy. First, throughput
legitimacy is no guarantee of output legitimacy. Policymaking without sufficient checks and balances
is prone to producing flawed policies because goals and/or instruments have not been refined in
order to produce workable policies through incremental bargaining. Second, the strive for input
legitimacy sometimes necessitates policy output that leave much to be desired in terms of tackling
the actual policy problems. Third, output legitimacy does not always result in political success, i.e. it
may not lead to (subsequent) input legitimacy.
16
Table 2. Policy legitimacy assessment framework3
Success
Strong
positive
impact
Resilient
Success
Positive
impact
Conflicted
Success
Mixed or
neutral
impact
Input legitimacy
Throughput legitimacy
Output legitimacy
 Enhancing electoral prospects or reputation of
Member States’ governments and leaders.
 Controlling policy agenda and easing the business
of governing.
 Sustaining the broad values and direction of EU
governance.
 Opposition to political benefits for Member States
and target groups is virtually non-existent.
 Favourable to electoral prospects and reputation
enhancement, with only minor setbacks.
 Despite some difficulties in agenda management,
Member States’ capacity to govern is unperturbed.
 Some refinements needed but broad trajectory
unimpeded.
 Opposition to political benefits for Member States
and target groups is stronger than anticipated, but
outweighed by support.
 Preserving EU policy goals and instruments.
 Conferring legitimacy on the policy and EU
institutions.
 Building a sustainable coalition of policy
actors.
 Symbolizing innovation and influence.
 Opposition to process is virtually nonexistent.
 Policy goals and instruments preserved,
despite minor refinements.
 Some challenges to legitimacy but of little or
no lasting significance.
 Coalition intact, despite some signs of
disagreement.
 Not ground breaking in innovation or
influence, but still symbolically progressive.
 Opposition to process is stronger than
anticipated, but outweighed by support.
 Preferred goals and instruments proving
controversial and difficult to preserve. Some
revisions needed.
 Difficult and contested issues surrounding
policy legitimacy, with some potential to taint
the policy in the long-term.
 Coalition intact, although strong signs of





 Policy obtains strong support and opposition,
working for and against electoral prospects and
reputation of Member States’ governments and
leaders in fairly equal measure.
 Policy proving controversial and taking up more
political time and resources in its defence than was
expected.
Implementation in line with objectives.
Achievement of desired outcomes.
Creating benefit for the target group(s).
Meets policy domain criteria.
Opposition to policy aims, values, and
instruments them is virtually non-existent.
 Implementation objectives and outcomes
broadly achieved.
 A few shortfalls and possibly some
anomalous cases, but intended target group
broadly benefits.
 Opposition to policy aims, values, and
instruments is stronger than anticipated, but
outweighed by support.
 Mixed results, with some successes, but
accompanied by unexpected and
controversial problems.
 Unwanted results, generating substantial
controversy.
 Partial achievement of goals, but
accompanied by failures to achieve, with
3 Adapted from McConell 2010 and Schmidt 2015.
17
 Direction of EU governance very broadly in line with
goals, but clear signs that the policy has promoted
some rethinking, especially behind the scenes.
 Opposition to political benefits for Member States
and target groups is equally balanced with support.
Precarious
Success
Negative
impact
Failure
Strong
negative
impact


 Despite small signs of benefit, policy proves an
overall electoral and reputational liability.
 Clear signs that the EU institutions and Member
States’ governments are struggling to suppress a
politically difficult issue.
 Entire trajectory of EU governance is being
compromised.
 Opposition to political benefits for EU governance
outweighs small levels of support.

 Damaging to the electoral prospects or reputation
of Member States’ governments and leaders, with
no redeeming political benefit.
 Policy failings are so high and persistent on the
agenda, that it is damaging Member States’
governments’ capacity to govern.
 Irrevocably damaging to the broad values and
direction of EU governance.
 Opposition to political benefits for government is
virtually universal and/or support is virtually nonexistent.









disagreement and some potential for
fragmentation.
Neither innovative nor outmoded, leading at
times to criticisms from both progressives
and conservatives.
Opposition to process and support are
equally balanced.
EU institutions’ goals and preferred policy
instruments hang in the balance.
Serious and potentially fatal damage to policy
legitimacy and legitimacy of EU institutions.
Coalition of policy actors on the brink of
falling apart.
Appearance of being out of touch with viable,
alternative solutions.
Opposition to process outweighs small levels
of support.
Termination of EU policy goals and
instruments.
Irrecoverable damage to policy legitimacy.
Inability to produce a sustainable coalition.
Symbolizing outmoded, insular or bizarre
ideas, seemingly oblivious to how other
jurisdictions are dealing with similar issues.
Opposition to process is virtually universal
and/or support is virtually non-existent.
possibility of high profile examples.
 Opposition to policy aims, values, and
instruments is equally balanced with support.
 Implementation beset by chronic failures,
proving highly controversial and very difficult
to defend.
 Likely to generate high profile stories of
unfairness and suffering.
 Unwanted media attention, e.g. examples of
wastage and possible scandals.
 Opposition to policy aims, values, and
instruments, outweighs small levels of
support.
 Implementation fails to be executed in line
with objectives and desired outcomes.
 Damaging a particular target group.
 Clear inability to meet the criteria.
 Opposition to policy aims, values, and
instruments is virtually universal, and/or
support is virtually non-existent.
18
A caveat must be made at this point: the complexity of supranational governance, even in the case of
the vertical dimension of demoi-cracy, requires a nuanced approach to any policy legitimacy
assessment exercise. As Schmidt 2015 points out, policy making at the EU level can be characterized
as policy without politics, which in turn makes for national politics without policy, as increasing
numbers of policies are transferred from the national political arena to the EU However, it may be
assumed that from the perspective of perceived legitimacy, the proposed framework is sufficiently
detailed in order to capture most of the complexity of the input, throughput and output of EU
decision-making.
The proposed framework is suitable for evaluating policymaking as a resultant vector of the
institutional vectors of EU institutions. However, in the next section a more detailed approach will be
used, studying separate institutional vectors of the EU institutions in order to capture their specific
contribution to input, throughput and output legitimacy of both the European Union and its
economic and monetary policies. This exercise is particularly relevant for the scholars and decisionmakers interested in the functioning of the high-level institutional model of EU governance and its
relation to the already discussed notions of democratic deficit and European identity.
3. Examining the impact of the Euro-crisis on the European demoicratic model
This section will attempt to implement the proposed qualitative assessment framework developed in
the previous two sections in order to evaluate the potential impact of the institutional vectors of
decision-making EU institutions on the European demoi-cracy model and consequently – on the
notion of European identity.
The analysis has many limitations. The institutional vectors of five institutions are taken into account
– the European Council, the Council of the European Union, the European Parliament, the European
Commission, and the European Central Bank. The role of the European Court of Justice is not
considered, given the specificity of its functions and the limited impact it has had on the Economic
and Monetary Union so far. The time frame of the analysis is set between January 2010 and June
2016. However, only major policy developments and events that can be defined as crisis response of
the five EU institutions during this period are taken into consideration. The analysis is focused on the
vertical dimension of demoi-cracy, i.e. within the legal framework of the EU Treaties, and excludes
classic forms of intergovernmental cooperation and policy coordination. This limitation is very
important as will be shown below. The input of the analysis relies heavily on existing academic
19
research on the institutional responses to the Euro-crisis, and is based on publicly available
information obtained through desktop research. A number of venues for expanding and deepening
the empirical research based on this framework are proposed in the conclusion remarks.
To the extent possible, institutional vectors of the five EU institutions during the Euro-crisis are
examined separately in terms of input and throughput legitimacy. The findings for output legitimacy
are presented in aggregate for all institutions based on the understanding that it is difficult to discern
the perceived legitimacy of policy output. An important consideration on the impact of this
specificity of output legitimacy is also offered.
3.1. European Council
Interestingly, the role of the European Council is not considered separately in many perspectives on
the Euro-crisis. Perhaps due to the understanding that the European Council is a de facto format of
the Council of the EU, it’s not typically scrutinized separately. However, as is shown below, the
European Council has emerged as the leading policymaking EU institution during the Euro-crisis,
encroaching on the powers of both the European Commission and the Council of the European
Union.
Input legitimacy
Typically, the input legitimacy of the European Council is derived indirectly from the demoi via the
leaders of the Member States. The dominant legitimating relationship runs between citizens and the
national governments, and national governments must generally bear the full burden of political
accountability for unwelcome policy (Scharpf 2012).
The input legitimacy of the European Council is somewhat problematic. As Guerot 2015 points out,
the central role of the European Council in the EU's governance system is a systematic obstacle to
finding European solutions due to the invocation of national interests. Schmidt 2015 rightly notes
that leaving the bulk of decision-making to the intergovernmentalism of the European Council and
EU Summits was actually the least input legitimate of processes. Schmidt 2015 further outlines two
specific arguments in that direction – that indirect input can confer legitimacy only on decisions to
which leaders agree for their own citizens, not those that they would impose on other memberstates’ citizens, and that the European Council is not a representative arena as such. The second
argument is much more substantial. For practical purposes European Council deliberations are a
black box, save for the occasional leaks that reach the public (but must always be analysed with
20
caution due to the uncertainty of their factual validity). There is no public account of who is
defending what interests and how.
The development of the governance framework of the Eurozone has deepened the problematic
nature of decision-making process in the European Council. Since 2008, leaders of Member states in
the Eurozone started meeting informally in what was called the Euro Summit. The Treaty on Stability,
Coordination and Governance in the Economic and Monetary Union (TSCG), which entered into force
on 1 January 2013, formalized the Euro Summit. Notably, during the negotiation of the TSCG, Poland
took a firm stance on the participation of Contracting Parties whose currency is not the euro in the
Euro Summits (Kreilingeris 2012). In the end a compromise was reached, where Member States
outside the Eurozone “shall participate in discussions of Euro Summit meetings concerning
competitiveness for the Contracting Parties, the modification of the global architecture of the euro
area and the fundamental rules that will apply to it in the future, as well as, when appropriate and at
least once a year, in discussions on specific issues of implementation of this Treaty on Stability,
Coordination and Governance in the Economic and Monetary Union” (Article 12, para. 3 TSCG). This
institutional development obviously follows the format of the Eurogroup as a decision-making body
under Protocol No 14 to the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union on The Euro Group.
However, this institutional development was made through an intergovernmental treaty, and not
through an amendment of the EU Treaties (see for more details Baratta 2012). The United Kingdom
and the Czech Republic (both outside the Eurozone) decided not to participate in this treaty. This fact
has hardly contributed to the representativeness of this new, quasi-legal format of the European
Council.
In addition, a repeating pattern during the Euro-crisis has been the use of the so-called “minisummits”, typically organized by one or few Member States prior to a European Council meeting.
Wivel 2005 provides a case study with the European Security and Defence Policy in the early 2000s
and concludes that mini-summits are excluding small Member States from the decision-making
process, and, correspondingly, deny excluded Member states an equal status in the negotiation
process. In this way, the European Council has to some degree become a formal institution, used
only to rubber-stamp decisions taken elsewhere. Coremans & Adriaensen 2016 note that the
Member States’ preference for informal meeting formats suggest firmer control over the
implementation of the Euro-crisis policy instead of less.
This is particularly evident in the account of the dramatic negotiations on the Greek debt bailout in
2015, provided by Traynor 2015. Faced with internal disagreement and weak negotiation position,
21
Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras called a referendum 'whether to accept the outline of the
agreement submitted by the European Union, the European Central Bank and the International
Monetary Fund at the Eurogroup of 25 June 2015’. 61.31% voted against the agreement, while
38.69% voted for accepting it, with a total voter turnout of 62.5%. The outcome of the referendum
was to be discussed during a Euro Summit meeting on 12 July 2015.
Prior to the Euro Summit meeting, the German Chancellor Angela Merkel organized a mini-summit,
including the President of France (Francois Hollande), the European Commission President, JeanClaude Juncker, the President of the European Central Bank, Mario Draghi, and Christine Lagarde, the
Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund. This was a very special mini-summit,
including representatives of only two Member States, two heads of EU institution, and the head of an
international intergovernmental organization. Traynor 2015 reports that “Merkel’s main aim was to
resolve any remaining differences between European leaders and the IMF and ensure they were all
on the same page.” However, there were only two leaders of Member States present. There was
obviously no equal representation, as the model of European demoi-cracy requires. Then followed a
Euro Summit, where “(t)hough there were more than two dozen people in attendance, the meeting
essentially revolved around a negotiation between Merkel and Tsipras, mediated by Tusk and
Francois Hollande”. This fragment supports the conclusion that as the financial crisis deepened, the
bilateral leadership of Germany and France was transformed into a compelling directoire of the EU
financial policy (Fabbrini 2013).
In this way the input legitimacy of the European Council appears problematic at best. There is
actually very limited policy input from, and equal representation of, the demoi of the Member States.
Policy is shaped by prevailing policy preferences (and therefore interests) of the “major” EU Member
States.
Throughput legitimacy
De Schoutheete & Micossi 2013 make two very important observations regarding the throughput
legitimacy of the European Council during the Euro-crisis. First, it has reverted to intergovernmental
decision-making and intergovernmental instruments outside the EU Treaties, when this appeared
necessary to overcome the emergency. Second the permanent presidency of the European Council
has played a fundamental role in the process as agenda setter and effective coordinator and power
broker of Union institutions and the Member States – tasks that in the past belonged to the
European Commission. Both observations deserve further investigation.
22
The intergovernmental shift in the work of the European Council is not really news. The functions
actually carried out by the European Council, both before and after the Lisbon Treaty, go well beyond
the prerogatives listed in Article 15 TEU. The European Council has been gradually transformed into a
forum for ongoing top-level policy dialogue that no longer gathers only to make long-term decisions
about the future of the Union but plays a decisive role in managing the day-to-day operation of core
EU policies (Puetter 2013 and Puetter 2014). The main difference has been the encroachment on the
monopoly over legislative initiative by the European Commission, and to some extent – on the
decision-making powers of the Council of Ministers (De Schoutheete 2012). In that way the European
Council is emerging as the de facto decision maker, especially in the domain of economic
governance.
This institutional spill-over of decision-making powers to the European Council has been
accompanied by the intensification of the work process inside the institution. Starting from 2008,
there have been a number of ad-hoc meetings, informal meetings and orientation dialogues during
and around the European Council meetings. The increasing operational workload has actually been
used to substantiate the introduction of the figure of permanent President of the European Council
in the Treaty of Lisbon. During the Euro-crisis, the European Council president has reacted to the
increased workload of the institution by scheduling more regular European Council meetings. The
President has also organized single-issue or special summit meetings in order to focus discussion on
topics that require more attention. Additionally, the agenda of regular European Council meetings is
very often subject to last-minute changes due to unforeseen policy developments (Puetter 2013).
In fact, the proliferation of additional decision-making powers of the European Council through crisis
management has resulted in a shift from ‘economic governance’ in the sense of a rules-based
normative system to ‘economic government’ entailing discretionary executive decisions (Curtin
2014). However, the European Council still lacks the unity and continuity of direction required by a
true executive (De Schoutheete & Micossi 2013). Looking at the process of decision making in the
European Council, and its immediate consequences, it is quite easy to explain this gap. As discussed
above, important decisions are often pre-packaged in mini-summits and/or parallel closed meetings
with variable political and institutional geometry, without any measure of transparency or
accountability. The political salience of decisions taken by the European Council has led to
repercussions at the national level, in particular in debtor states, in the shape of governmental crises
and political downfalls (Curtin 2014). To make things worse, European Council meetings during the
Euro-crisis have been overshadowed by disruptive and antagonizing narratives by both Member
States’ leaders, and national media. In addition, the shield of legitimacy intermediation has been
23
pushed aside as citizens are directly confronted with the massive impact of European policies forged
by the European Council – and with their manifest lack of input and throughput legitimacy (Scharpf
2012). It is not an exaggeration to conclude that the throughput legitimacy of the European Council
has been seriously undermined by its own procedural and deliberative deficiencies, and drift towards
ad-hoc, operational decision-making.
3.2. Council of the European Union
The Council of the EU has also played an instrumental role in the policymaking process during the
Euro-crisis. The Council of the EU has a double hat – both a legislator (together with the European
Parliament), and a residual executive (under the European Council and together with the European
Commission). Recently the Council has been more and more involved in non-legislative decisionmaking, influenced by the so-called poly-crisis of economic governance and migration (Puetter 2014).
Input legitimacy
The input and throughput legitimacy of the Council are influenced by its developed institutional
structure. A number of administrative and preparatory bodies ensure co-ordination, coherence and
continuity in the Council’s work. The Council General Secretariat functions as a bridge between
various chairs. The preparatory bodies such as the Committee of Permanent Representatives
(COREPER) and the various working groups are involved in the everyday policymaking process and
ensure policy input at various levels from different national perspectives (Curtin 2014, Puetter 2014).
The rotating Council Presidency provides national governments with the opportunity to influence the
political priorities of the EU (Curtin 2014). The Council also benefits from a working relationship with
the European Commission and the European Parliament under a series of inter-institutional
agreements based on shared values and mutual interests (Cini 2013) and early agreements on
particular legislation (Reh et al 2013). Through the requirement for agreement by at least a qualifiedmajority vote for all legislation, all interests that have access to the national ministries in charge will
also have access to the European level (Scharpf 2012). In this way the Council of the EU appears
relatively more input-legitimate. However, a number of issues remain problematic in this respect.
As already discussed above, the European Council has diminished the operational field of actual
policymaking in the Council, especially during the Euro-crisis. Due to its short duration (6 months),
the policy horizon for the Council Presidency is relatively limited, even taking into account the troika
format with the preceding and following Member States. This time limit naturally enhances the
24
position of the permanent President of the European Council (with a mandate of two and a half
years) who can barely be considered legitimate from the perspective of the Member States’ demoi.
The Eurogroup format of the Council of the EU is often cited as an achievement of the institutional
reform of the Treaty of Lisbon that contributes to the efficiency of the European Monetary Union
(EMU) (Puetter 2014). However, the allocation of certain decision-making powers to a limited,
exclusive configuration of Member States is deeply problematic from the perspective of input
legitimacy. Once again, some demoi are denied the right to be heard in the policymaking process. In
addition, the European Parliament is also not included in meetings of the Eurogroup, nor informed of
its deliberations, thus practically discounting crucial policy input and feedback (Fabbrini 2013). De
Schoutheete & Micossi 2013 object that for the Eurozone countries the policy guidance under what is
now the European Semester has transformed into strict obligations which tightly constrain national
budgetary polices, with strong, early and quasi-automatic sanctions for non-compliance. The authors
conclude that therefore to submit the review of such constraints to the European Parliament would
politicise the debate, making the system less automatic, and therefore less predictable and less
credible. This claim is objectionable given the politically charged and biased process of development
of the policy guidance itself, as will be shown in the section on the European Commission below.
Throughput legitimacy
There is some agreement in the literature on the Eurozone crisis that Germany has predominated the
decision-making process in a politically fragmented Council during the Euro-crisis. The result was ‘one
size fits one’ governance, in which the response to the fast-burning crisis largely focused on
reinforcing the rules-based, numbers-targeting approach of the Stability and Growth Pact, with a
discourse centred on the need for ‘stability’ (Schmidt 2015). Schmidt 2015 further points out that the
Council has largely followed the ECB’s demands on austerity-oriented policy measures, mainly
because Germany and its coalitional allies have largely been able to impose their preferences.
The German Chancellor Angela Merkel is often presented as a paragon of consensus-building, thus
explaining the extraordinary influence of her government in the Council. However, analysis of Council
decision-making shows that policy consensus often emerges endogenously as an unintended byproduct of the coalition building behaviour of negotiators that seek to form blocking minority
coalitions (Haege 2013). Formal consensus in the Council sometimes results from a strategy of blame
avoidance that conflicts with throughput legitimacy (Novak 2013). What this may mean is that, in
fact, Germany (often working together with France) has been able to dominate the decision making
process in the Council through potential threats to block certain decisions during the Euro-crisis, as
25
was the case in the fragment on the negotiation of the Greek bailout in 2015, provided by Traynor
2015 and discussed in the previous sub-section. The use of veto power as a mechanism to force
Germany’s position is even more evident in the intergovernmental decision-making process devised
for the European Stability Mechanism, where Germany has 27% of the shares, and may formally
block decision-making.
Furthermore, the Council has witnessed a surge of informal inter-institutional negotiation practices
that seem to decrease the transparency of the decision-making process and the accountability of
Member States’ representatives (Haege & Naurin 2013). This meta-legal approach was very evident
in the controversial decision in 2003 to disregard the Commission’s recommendation to subject
Germany and France to the Excessive Deficit Procedure (EDP), and has been used to benefit big and
Eurosceptic Member States (Baerg & Hallerberg 2016).
The Council was also used as a laboratory to forge and test classical intergovernmental approaches to
the Euro-crisis where veto power misfired. As Fabbrini 2013 and De Schoutheete & Micossi 2013
point out, with the deepening of the euro crisis, the EU has more and more shifted toward an
intergovernmental direction. An interesting proposition that has not been looked into is whether the
representatives of Member States preferred to engage in intergovernmental diplomacy since the
administrative capacity of Council administration is somewhat inferior compared to the
administrations of the European Commission and the European Parliament (Scherpereel & Perez
2015).
In addition, governments with a sound budget did not want to pay for the difficulties of indebted
countries whose governments expected help for the sake of their own political survival (Fabbrini
2013). This dynamic, if looked carefully into, resembles a zero-sum intergovernmental politics
dilemma – it’s either your government or mine, and something has got to give. Not surprisingly, the
narrative of political blackmail has been used by both sides in order to substantiate and strengthen
their relative negotiation positions. In their political discourse during the Euro-crisis, European
politicians have focused on the morality tale, which attributes the crisis to profligate southern
Member States that refused to abide by the strictures of the Stability and Growth Pact (Tsoukala
2013). Even the potentially catastrophic EU-wide contagion unleashed by the potential fiscal
insolvency of Greece and subsequent financial crisis, could not dislodge the view that national
problems of fiscal profligacy and weak competitiveness were the source of the problem (Wren‐Lewis
2013; Matthijs & McNamara 2015).
26
3.3. European Commission
The European Commission has been a key institutional player during the Euro-crisis. It has a long
history of contested legitimacy (HHH). Its relative position in agenda setting has been somewhat
weakened by the institutional activism of the European Council, the repositioning of the European
Parliament, and its own inability to build consensus around viable policy options for crisis
management. However, the generalization of reverse qualified majority voting in the monitoring and
sanctioning procedures of the European semester has resulted in a major empowerment of the
Commission, and thus of the effective constraining power of the supranational level of government
over the national (Menendez 2013, Fabbrini 2015).
Input legitimacy
The input legitimacy of the European Commission has been contested from the very beginning of its
existence due to the lack of any substantial link to the European demoi. After the Treaty of Lisbon it
appeared that the Commission has acquired the attributes of a de facto executive at the expense of
the Member States and national stakeholders (Georgiev 2012).
Probably due to this, with the deepening of the Euro-crisis, the Commission sought more and more
“leadership and decision-making at the highest political level, which has contributed to the
strengthening of the position of the European Council” (Leino and Salminen 2012: 864). In this
dynamic, the Commission has proven to be a technocratic structure in support of the European
Council’s deliberations, rather than the institution with the capacity to set the political agenda of the
EU (Fabbrini 2015).
On the other hand the European Commission has been positioned as an independent institutional
actor that could act as a supervising and sanctioning body in the European Semester (very close to its
initial role in the European Communities). Thus the Commission has seen an increase in its technical
role as an independent bureaucracy in charge of guaranteeing respect of the EMU rules (Fabbrini
2015). Unfortunately, the Commission has not fully delivered on those expectations, as will be shown
in the next sub-section.
In order to somewhat mitigate the problem of input legitimacy of the Commission, a new approach
to nominating political candidates for Commission President was pushed by the European political
parties in 2014. The so-called Spitzenkandidaten did not play a major role in the election campaigns,
except in a handful of countries, and thus had a limited impact on voter participation and vote
choices (Hobold 2014).
27
Throughput legitimacy
In terms of throughput legitimacy, the institutional vector of the European Commission during the
Euro-crisis has been particularly problematic.
As regards policy formulation and legislative initiative, the European Commission was caught by
surprise by the Euro-crisis. A timely and appropriate response to the Euro-crisis would have required
a preparedness by the Commission to face the “unknown”, which it apparently lacked (Camisao
2015). The very failure to adequately forecast the crisis and propose adequate mitigation measures
may mean that the Commission did not have a well-developed system of consultation and data
exchange with stakeholders. In fact, the lack of transparent procedures for collecting input from
stakeholders during the drafting of legislative acts is a serious impediment to the throughput
legitimacy of the Commission (Georgiev 2013). This failure has further problematized the
institutional response during the legislation drafting process for the EMU crisis management
legislation in the period 2010-2015.
More specifically, the European Commission had not developed a proper impact assessment of the
European Semester Six Pack. It relied heavily on the guidance of the European Council and the Task
Force on economic governance chaired by its President and established in March 2010. According to
the Commission “(a) constructive relationship developed between the Commission and the Task
Force. The Commission contributed to the work of the Task Force through the Communications
referred to above and through ad hoc contributions”4. This fact is especially problematic, given the
composition of the Task Force on economic governance – it consisted of the finance ministers of the
Member States, the Presidents of the European Council, the European Commission, the European
Central Bank, and the Eurogroup. It is quite evident that this was in essence an intergovernmental
format for negotiations and decision-making, and not an expert group, or a gathering of diverse
stakeholders that would be impacted by the proposed reform. Indeed, individual contributions to the
Task Force were made only by the Member States themselves, the ECB, and the Commission. By not
engaging with the relevant national stakeholders, the Commission has basically failed to perform a
proper consultation process on one of the most far-reaching proposals in European economic
governance.
4
Proposal for a Regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council on the effective enforcement of budgetary surveillance in the
euro area (COM/2010/0524 final).
28
In terms of policy implementation, the European Commission’s throughput legitimacy has also been
seriously dented. Even prior to the Euro-crisis, it was subject to criticism due to its implied bias
towards larger Member States (Germany, France and Italy in particular) in its monitoring function
under the Stability and Growth Pact. Baerg & Hallerberg 2016 found that big Member States and
states with Eurosceptic populations regularly undermined the “watchdog” function of the
Commission. More recently, Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker reportedly answered
questions regarding the alleged differential treatment of France’s budgetary deficit by the
Commission in the following way: “Because it’s France.” This reply prompted the President of the
Eurogroup, Jeroen Dijsselbloem to conclude that “if the Commission President says that things apply
differently for France, then this really damages the credibility of the Commission as guardian of the
pact” (Karnitschnig et al 2016).
There is also the issue of transparency and accountability of the Commission’s work on the European
Semester. Schmidt 2015 quotes an unnamed Commissioner saying that “DG ECFIN works out the
numbers on its own, largely in secret, makes its decisions and then informs the Commission, often
sending word out to the other members of the Commission on a Monday night for a Wednesday
meeting, with little or no explanation of those decisions, no possibility to overturn them, and
sometimes making them public even before informing the other Commissioners, thereby potentially
putting them in an embarrassing position vis-à-vis their own Member State governments, which
might expect to be forewarned”.
The lack of a unitary, unbiased and transparent approach for assessment of macroeconomic
imbalances under the European Semester may be a particularly serious issue given the actual
discretion of the Commission. Scharpf 2013 notes that the regulations on the European Semester5
provide no rules for the Commission’s substantive policy choices. Therefore, unlike the original
Stability Pact, the Excessive Imbalance Procedure is not, and cannot be, a rule-based regime. Schmidt
2015 warns that the Commission’s power to vet national budgets before governments submit them
to national parliaments not only challenges national governments’ sovereignty, but also undermines
one of the main pillars of national parliaments’ representative power—control over national
budgets—and thereby principles of representative democracy, in which elected governments are
5
In particular, Regulation (EU) No 1173/2011 on the effective enforcement of budgetary surveillance in the euro area – sanctions
regulation; Regulation (EU) No 1174/2011 of 16 November 2011 on enforcement measures to correct excessive macroeconomic
imbalances in the euro area; and Regulation (EU) No 1176/2011 of 16 November 2011 on the prevention and correction of macroeconomic
imbalances.
29
responsible to those who elected them. In this way the European Semester exposes the European
Commission to both input and throughput legitimacy challenges.
3.4. European Parliament
The Treaty of Lisbon continued the path of relative parliamentarisation of the integration
community, increasing the decision-making powers of the European Parliament vis-à-vis the Council
and the Commission (Georgiev 2011). This dynamic has, however, been counter-balanced by the use
of a predominantly intergovernmental approach for managing the Euro-crisis, led by the European
Council. In addition, economic and financial policies continue to be reserved territories of the Council
(in its configuration as ECOFIN, see Fabbrini 2013).
Input legitimacy
The European Parliament is the only institution of the European Union that can claim direct input
legitimacy since its members are directly elected by the European demoi, although some authors
believe that true European electoral and party systems need to be developed in order to ensure
genuine input legitimacy (Follesdal & Hix 2006; Calossi 2015). Therefore the Parliament’s
participation in the decision-making process during the Euro-crisis is of particular importance for the
perceived overall legitimacy of the relevant crisis mitigation policies. Indeed, the European
Parliament attempted to influence the drafting of the ESM Treaty and the Fiscal Compact Treaty,
mainly by using legitimation claims (Fabbrini 2013). The Banking Union can be considered an
example where the European Parliament has managed to extract institutional concessions from the
Commission and the Member States (Rittberger 2014).
Throughput legitimacy
The European Parliament has been perhaps the only institution that entered the Euro-crisis with a
clear, comprehensive set of own decision-making procedures that ensured participation of various
stakeholders in the process, and applied them quite rigorously. However, it reverted to first-reading
trialogues with the Council and the Commission for negotiating both the Six Pack and the Two Pack
packages of legislation. Curtin 2014 considers that the manner in which the European Parliament has
allowed itself to be sucked into the secretive vortex of closed door trialogue negotiations means that
the Parliament is not engaging with the EU level executive actors in a manner that challenges their
domination or that is truly leading. In addition, in both cases the European Parliament largely voted
to give the Commission exclusive power to apply the rules, denying itself the ability to oversee the
30
Commission’s decisions even though it limited Commission discretion by specifying numerical targets
for intervention (Schmidt 2015). Kohler 2014 also criticises the throughput legitimacy of the
European Parliament, noting that big party groups mainly vote like a singular bloc in the plenary
because decisions had already been made in the parliamentary committees.
Some authors think that the limited participation of the European Parliament in the response to the
Euro-crisis is justified because it would be extremely controversial to separate (in its internal
deliberative process) representatives coming from no euro-area and euro-area member states, thus
allowing only the latter to have a say on the decisions taken by the Euro Summit and Euro Group
(Hefftler and Wessels 2013; Fabbrini 2016).
3.5. European Central Bank
Throughout the Euro-crisis, the European Central Bank (ECB) has been forced to take key decisions
that have saved the euro but that go beyond its mandate and for which it has no democratic
legitimacy, placing it in an impossible position (Schwarzer 2015). A technocratic, practically unknown
institution of the European Union was put centre-stage and had to quickly adapt its institutional
vector to the new challenges. Adriaensen & Coremans 2016 detect a covert competence creep of the
ECB in the EU’s response to the Euro-crisis.
Input legitimacy
The ECB practically has no direct or indirect input legitimacy. Schmidt 2015 notes that the ECB has
generally been seen as legitimated by its output policy performance and, arguably, its throughput
processes, with good rules-based output seen as a trade-off for any deficiencies in political input.
Still, the ECB, more or less, operates in a political vacuum, while its exclusive commitment to
monetary stability further undermines the legitimacy of the EU (Majone 2010).
As Scharpf 2013 notes, there are still no serious proposals to subject the exercise of ECB’s potent
governing powers to input-oriented democratic accountability. At the same time concentrating too
many financial stability responsibilities, including macro-prudential and micro-prudential regulation,
in the ECB risks undermining the independence of the central bank where it is likely to be useful -the conventional monetary policy roles (Buiter 2012). The ECB had adopted a range of extraordinary
measures that have diluted its mandate, politicized its actions and given them unprecedented
salience (Hoegenauer 2016). This politicization of the institutional vector of the ECB is extremely
problematic from the perspective of input legitimacy.
31
Throughput legitimacy
Eijffinger & Geraats 2006 have developed an index for transparency of central banks, focused on four
types of transparency – economic, procedural, policy and operational transparency. In their
evaluation, the ECB suffers from the following deficiencies related to throughput legitimacy: it does
not provide comprehensive minutes and actual voting records; there is lack of an explicit policy
inclination; and it does not discuss past forecast errors. Meanwhile, the ECB has started publishing
the minutes from their monetary policy meetings but the attributed voting records are not released
because of concerns that they might undermine pro-euro area wide behaviour (Horvath &
Katuscakova 2016).
The lack of transparency of the ECB decision-making process is especially problematic. Given the
implied political independence of the ECB, it is very important to be able to scrutinize its internal
policy debates. Most of the important decisions in the ECB are made by its Governing Council.
Giavazzi & Wyplosz 2015 claim that within the ECB Governing Council the views of the national
governors are invariably shaped by national interests and prejudices. This claim is an eerie reminder
of the decision-making process at the European Council, where national leaders meet behind closed
doors to shape policy. However, Henning 2015 notes that the Governing Council of the ECB has
responsibility for the euro area as a whole and is not hostage a German veto, unlike decisions of the
Eurogroup and Euro Summits. This allowed the Governing Council to act more decisively at several
junctures during the crisis, for which it won enthusiastic applause among markets and relieved
observers.
Horvath & Katuscakova 2016 find that mistrust in the ECB increased during the crisis, and more
respondents expressed an opinion about the ECB. Their research confirms once more that
transparency is one of crucial determinants of trust and therefore, it helps central banks build and
maintain reputation and credibility of their policies.
Looking at specific policy developments can further enrich the picture of the throughput legitimacy
of the ECB and its policies. What is interesting in existing academic accounts is that the authors
typically focus on the actual or implied policy output, and not so much on the decision-making
process itself. Fabbrini 2013 notes that the ECB actually induced a reduction of the spread between
Italian, Portuguese, and Spanish public bonds and German bonds, with the declaration of its
president Mario Draghi in London on July 26, 2012 that he was “ready to do whatever it takes” for
saving the euro. Looking at this vignette more critically, however, would lead us to doubt that Mr.
Draghi actually did something spectacular in this case. The euro is the raison d'être of the ECB, and it
32
is quite normal that the institution would attempt to save it, thus saving itself. However, this could
also mean that the ECB was ready to sidestep its own policies and decision-making procedures to do
just that. Another episode that is often cited as a policy success of the ECB institutional vector was
the introduction of the program of Outright Monetary Transactions (OMT) in 2014, which reportedly
helped to close the acute phase of the crisis in sovereign debt by the beginning of 2014 (Henning
2015).
However, looking at the institutional vector of the ECB through the lens of the most serious debt
crisis – Greece’s, paints a very different picture. When faced with the unfolding Greek crisis, the euro
area governments and the ECB displayed slowness, division and ineptness (Featherstone 2011). Blyth
2015 rightly observes that the decision by the ECB to freeze Emergency Liquidity Assistance to Greek
banks on June 26th 2015, which built upon their prior refusal to accept Greek debt for routine
liquidity operations four months earlier, stood in complete contradiction to its mandates to maintain
smoothly running payments systems and support economic cohesion. It also had the effect of
rationing the cash ordinary Greeks had access to until they agreed to more austerity, as the price of
staying in the Eurozone.
In conclusion, the throughput legitimacy of the ECB during the Euro-crisis appears very problematic
mainly due to the opaque decision-making process of its Governing Council.
3.6. Output legitimacy: common threads
As stated above, the output legitimacy of the institutional vectors of the reviewed EU institutions will
be reviewed here as an aggregate, given the specificity of citizens’ perceptions on policy output. In
fact, the policy output of the institutional response of the Euro-crisis is probably perceived by
European citizens in combination with the output of national fiscal and economic policies of the
Member States.
Scharpf 2013 concludes that EMU’s claim to acceptance depends on the output-oriented and
uncertain promise that the policies pursued by the ECB and imposed by Council and the Commission
will, in the foreseeable future, facilitate the economic recovery of the crisis countries. Jones 2009
believes that output-oriented legitimation will play an important role particularly for the ECB’s
institutional success. However, Torres 2013 rightly warns that output legitimacy is not sufficient to
sustain EMU, given its substantial throughput legitimacy problems, as was also shown above in this
paper.
33
In terms of the impact on national budgets, tight austerity was imposed on the debtor countries
while the creditor countries continued to follow policies aimed at balancing the budget. This has led
to an asymmetric adjustment process where most of the adjustment has been done by the debtor
nations, which have been forced to reduce wages and prices relative to the creditor countries (an
“internal devaluation”) without compensating wage and price increases in the creditor countries
(“internal revaluations”) (De Grauwe 2013).
Scharpf 2013 also notes that the institutional response to the Euro-crisis has been forcing Member
States to play a negative-sum game of competitive “internal” or real devaluation when they have to
deal with external deficits or with a domestic recession and rising unemployment.
In general, the output legitimacy of the institutional response to the Euro-crisis has been explained as
a result of the Eurozone’s poor economic performance (Schmidt 2015). To illustrate this, the most
drastic case – that of Greece, is particularly relevant. As Featherstone 2011 points out, in 2010, a
fringe economy representing just 2.7 per cent of the Eurozone GDP almost wrecked the system. In
terms of the impact of the crisis response on the debt sustainability and the real economy, the view
from Greece is dismal. Greece was forced to attempt one of the most drastic programmes of fiscal
austerity in modern history aimed at reducing its budget deficit by eleven percentage points of GDP
within three years (Hall 2012). The outcome of the austerity measures was that unemployment
skyrocketed, with youth and long-term unemployment particularly high, and the economy collapsed,
leaving the Greek economy contracting severely during this time (Verdun 2015). In its most recent
assessment of Greece’s public debt sustainability, the International Monetary Fund clearly states that
“serious implementation problems caused a sharp deterioration in sustainability, raising fresh doubts
about the realism of policy assumptions, especially from mid–2014”6. In terms of political output, the
Greek crisis has shown that the exercise of democracy in an imperfect monetary union that lacks a
fiscal union is only possible by resorting to national sovereignty, the prime example so far having
been the Greek referendum (Schwarzer 2015).
The assessment of output legitimacy of EU institutions can be complemented by relevant
assessments of public opinion in the Member States. Hooghe and Marks 2005 outline three
preconditions for successful use of the economic approach to public opinion: when economic
consequences are perceived with some accuracy, when they are large enough to matter, and when
6
Greece: Preliminary Debt Sustainability Analysis—Updated Estimates and Further Considerations. IMF Country Report No. 16/130, May
2016.
34
the choice a person makes actually affects the outcome. The authors further claim that if these
conditions are not present, attitudes may be sensitive to group identities. In support of this claim,
Hobolt & Wratil 2015 find that citizens in the Eurozone clearly relied less on identity heuristics when
forming their views on the euro as the crisis unfolded.
Debomy 2016 notes that the opinion indicators related to the EU legitimacy reached a positive peak
in 2007, had a low point somewhere in 2011-2012, and recovered until the autumn of 2015, when
the indicators started to decline again. Numbers must be interpreted carefully. Debomy 2016 further
underlines that in the euro zone alone, 68% of respondents showed their support for the single
currency at the end of 2015 – very close to its pre-crisis level in the spring of 2007 (70%). However, if
looked further into, these results also show a large discrepancy between Member States. Hobolt &
Wratil 2015 find that the Euro-crisis has not led to reduced support for the euro inside the euro area,
however, it has precipitated a sharp decline in support for the single currency outside the euro area.
These results also suggest that for citizens in the Eurozone there was a relatively widespread
perception that the EU can deliver the most effective solution to the crisis.
In one of the most recent public opinion polls7 the results are quite unequivocal. About nine-in-ten
Greeks (92%) disapprove of how the EU has dealt with the ongoing economic crisis. Roughly twothirds of the Italians (68%), French (66%) and Spanish (65%) similarly disapprove. (France and Spain
are the two nations where the favorability of the EU has recently experienced the largest decline.)
Majorities in Sweden (59%) and the UK (55%), including 84% of UKIP supporters, also disapprove of
the EU’s job in dealing with economic challenges. The strongest approval of Brussels’ economic
efforts is in Poland and Germany (both 47%). The results also show the skepticism of European
citizens towards additional transfers of power to the European Union as an instrument for improving
economic governance. Only 6% of the public in the UK 8% in Greece favor the transfer of more power
to the Union. The strongest backing for an ever closer Europe is only 34%, in France, followed by just
26% in Germany. In most countries a quarter or more of the public prefers to keep the current
division of power between the European Union and the Member States.
7
Pew Research Center, June, 2016, “Euroskepticism Beyond Brexit”.
35
3.7. Summarizing the institutional vectors: a broad picture emerges
Based on the assessments in the previous sub-sections, a composite picture of the institutional
vectors of decision-making EU institutions during the Euro-crisis through the lens of the horizontal
vector of the demoi-cracy model emerges. The summarized results are presented on Table 3 below.
Table 3. Institutional vectors of selected EU institutions during the Euro-crisis from the perspective of the
horizontal dimension of the demoi-cracy model
Input legitimacy
Throughput legitimacy
European Council


Council of the EU


European Commission
=

European Parliament
=

European Central Bank


Output legitimacy

Legend:
 - Strongly positive impact  - Positive impact
= - Mixed or neutral impact
 - Negative impact  - Strongly negative impact
The following main observations can be made based on this assessment:

The most problematic institutional vectors in “solving” the Euro-crisis appear to be those of
the European Central Bank, the European Council, the Council and, to some extent, the
European Commission;

The only institutional vector that appears to have impacted positively the legitimacy of the
European Union and its EMU policies during the Euro-crisis is the European Parliament,
mainly due to its throughput legitimacy;

During the Euro-crisis, throughput legitimacy of the European Union has been impacted the
most by the institutional vectors of the reviewed EU institutions, and this impact is
moderately to strongly negative;

The perception of output legitimacy is relevant but contributes to internal divisions among
Eurozone and non-Eurozone Member States.
36
Going back to the conceptual framework presented in the first three sections of this paper, a few
implications emerge:

As suggested above, throughput and output legitimacy probably impact to a greater extent
the notion of democratic deficit of the European Union and will continue to be decisive for
the definition and mitigation of that social construct;

The empirically observed elements of European identity are probably negatively impacted by
the institutional vectors of the European Council and the ECB in particular, since they have
enhanced the perceived opportunistic division based on ethnicity (nationality), particularly in
their throughput decision-making process;

The value field of tolerance in the demoi-cracy model appears increasingly compromised by
the institutional vectors of the five EU institutions during the Euro-crisis, notably by failing to
take into account the differences in national varieties of capitalism and political economies of
Member States (Hall 2012).
Conclusion
This paper has outlined a qualitative assessment framework based on the European demoi-cracy
model as proposed by Calypso Nicolaidis and further developed by Cheneval, Lavenex &
Schimmelfennig 2015. The main objective has been to evaluate the potential impact of the
institutional vectors of decision-making EU institutions on the European demoi-cracy model and
consequently – on the notion of European identity.
Based on a careful definition of the demoi-cracy model itself, the notion of institutional vectors and a
comprehensive framework for assessing policy (and its perceived success or failure) adapted from
McConnell 2010 were used to operationalize the qualitative assessment framework. The framework
was applied consecutively to the institutional vectors of five EU institutions that participated in the
decision-making process during the Euro-crisis – namely the European Council, the Council of the
European Union, the European Parliament, the European Commission, and the European Central
Bank.
The main findings are focused around the importance of throughput and output legitimacy of EU
institutions and policies in particular. The composite picture that emerges is problematic. It appears
that the negative tendencies for the throughput legitimacy of the European Central Bank, the
European Council, the Council and the European Commission have probably contributed the most to
37
the overall notion of democratic deficit in the European Union. These tendencies have most likely
opened space for opportunistic division based on ethnicity and/or nationality in the European Union,
especially between Member States in and outside of the Eurozone. This division has been also
impacted by the perceived lack of output legitimacy of EMU policies during the crisis.
A number of limitations apply to the findings. First, there is little consensus on legitimation dynamics
in the academic literature on the European Union. Some of the assumptions in the methodological
framework are derived from empirical research on lower-level social phenomena and may therefore
be somewhat compromised or dampened due to emergent supranational effects. However, the
limited application of those concepts in International Relations and European Union studies show
that the framework is most likely robust. Second, the paper has relied on academic assessments for
many of the decision-making episodes and policy outputs during the Euro-crisis due to limitation of
space and resources. A broader review of empirical material would result in more conclusive and
comprehensive results.
Various methodological and empirical questions can be raised based on the findings in this paper.
The European Union studies literature can only benefit from a very detailed empirical assessment of
the sociological and psychological aspects of legitimation and legitimacy as related to the integration
community and its institutions. The interpretation and reinterpretation of Eurobarometer polling
results is simply not sufficient in order to fully understand the actual impact of institutional vectors of
EU institutions on various social phenomena. While it has not been discussed in detail in the paper, it
appears that effective public relations and gathering of diverse policy input from all policy
stakeholders are disproportionately important for the perception of throughput legitimacy (Jann&
Wegrich 2006).
In more practical terms, comprehensive and very detailed accounts of the institutional vectors of EU
institutions are needed in order to reap both the qualitative and quantitative benefits of the
proposed assessment framework. The role of the European Court of Justice, the International
Monetary Fund, and the impact of rapidly changing governments in the Eurozone periphery deserve
special attention and may contribute to a more comprehensive account of the Euro-crisis. The
literature on the media discourses and narratives during the Euro-crisis can also be complemented by
more detailed and comprehensive comparative studies in order to accentuate and grasp the
opportunistic division based on ethnicity or nationality. Last, but not least, correlations with the
emergent migration crisis in the European Union, and the so-called Brexit (the potential exit of the
38
United Kingdom from the EU), are also very important in order to take into account interdependent
EU policy dilemmas and trade-offs.
Finally, a caveat must be made. Fabbrini 2015 warns that the EMU has ended up becoming a
centralized, technocratic and judicialized policy regime. As Lindseth 2014 has pointed out, the danger
today is that numerous distinguished advocates call for the complete subordination of the nationstate to a European political union. Based on the findings in this paper, before deficiencies in the
throughput legitimacy of EU institutions are addressed, such an approach would contribute to, rather
that solve, the Euro-crisis.
39
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