Representation of citizens by the EP

2004 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 73-78 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jörg Gerkrath
Keyword(s):  
National Level ◽  
Parliamentary Democracy ◽  
European Level ◽  
Member States ◽  
Democratic Representation ◽  
Constitutional Principle ◽  
Union Democracy ◽  
The People ◽  
Multi Level ◽  
Political Decisions

As it is obviously impossible for the modern ‘demos’ to assemble in order to take political decisions, democratic representation is an inevitable tool in large democracies. Representatives have to stand for and to act for the people as a whole. Accordingly, the principle of representative or parliamentary democracy is a fundamental constitutional principle shared by all the Member States of the Union. Democracy doubtlessly works on the national level; the Member States' decisional powers, however, are fading with the constant transfer of competences towards the European level. This leads to a system of European ‘multi-level governance’ with wide consequences for the linkage between the represented peoples of the Member States and their representatives on both national and European levels.

Turnout in Multi-Level Systems

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sona N. Golder ◽  
Ignacio Lago ◽  
André Blais ◽  
Elisabeth Gidengil ◽  
Thomas Gschwend
Keyword(s):  
National Level ◽  
The Body ◽  
Political Community ◽  
The Political ◽  
European Level ◽  
National Elections ◽  
Political Issues ◽  
European Elections ◽  
Multi Level ◽  
Different Levels

Voters face different incentives to turn out to vote in one electoral arena versus another. Although turnout is lowest in European elections, it is found that the turnout is only slightly lower in regional than in national elections. Standard accounts suggest that the importance of an election, in terms of the policy-making power of the body to be elected, drives variation in turnout across elections at different levels. This chapter argues that this is only part of the story, and that voter attachment to a particular level also matters. Not all voters feel connected to each electoral arena in the same way. Although for some, their identity and the issues they most care about are linked to politics at the national level, for others, the regional or European level may offer the political community and political issues that most resonate with them.

The politics of European integration: A European labour movement in the making?

2002 ◽  
Vol 26 (3) ◽  
pp. 39-60 ◽  
Author(s):  
Graham Taylor ◽  
Andy Mathers
Keyword(s):  
European Integration ◽  
National Level ◽  
European Level ◽  
Member States ◽  
Labour Movement ◽  
The Social ◽  
National Boundaries

This paper explores the logical and historical determinants of European integration and reflects on the potential and dangers this presents for labour movement renewal. Through the principle of ‘subsidiarity’ a regulatory gap has been established between political mobilisation at the national level and neo-liberal regulation at the European level. The historical determination of this form is traced through an exploration of the social struggles against neo-liberalism that have developed within member states and transnational mobilizations that bridge this regulatory gap by linking resistance across national boundaries.

The Referendum and Political Change

1975 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. 294-305 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gordon Smith
Keyword(s):  
European Community ◽  
Political Change ◽  
Party Systems ◽  
Democratic Politics ◽  
Parliamentary Democracy ◽  
Political Democracy ◽  
The People ◽  
The Future ◽  
Political Decisions

AS A WAY OF REACHING IMPORTANT POLITICAL DECISIONS, THE referendum is usually regarded as a clumsy and unsatisfactory instrument and quite unimportant as a contribution to political democracy. Yet widespread demands for more participation ‘by the people’ have brought the referendum into new-found favour. Interest has been rekindled too by its application to the issue of membership of the European Community, with the clear possibility of directly comparing the referenda in the four countries involved. This new interest in the referendum comes at a time when many party systems, the traditional supports of a purely parliamentary democracy, appear to be in disarray, and there are signs of increasing volatility within electorates which can foreshadow basic realignments in party systems. Questions now are naturally being raised about the future ordering of democratic politics, and for this reason it seems justifiable to focus an examination of the referendum especially on the problem of political change.

scholarly journals Europeanisation and German Public Administration

2021 ◽  
pp. 53-60
Author(s):  
Hans Hofmann
Keyword(s):  
Public Administration ◽  
National Level ◽  
The European Union ◽  
European Level ◽  
Member States ◽  
The Public ◽  
Eu Member States ◽  
Legal Remedy ◽  
Administrative Procedures ◽  
The Eu

AbstractThis chapter discusses how public administration in Germany is influenced by the making and implementation of law by the organs of the European Union (EU). Although the public administrations of the EU Member States are, in principle, responsible for enforcing the laws made by the EU, the EU’s influence on the public administration of Germany as EU Member State is constantly growing. This is true, not only of those areas in which the Member States have transferred to the EU the authority to make laws, but increasingly also of those areas in which the Member States have retained such authority. At the same time, however, there is no systematic codification of the law on administrative procedures at European level and no system of legal remedy for Union citizens equivalent to those at national level.

scholarly journals Steven Blockmans and Sophia Russack (eds.): Representative Democracy in the EU: Recovering Legitimacy.

2021 ◽  
Vol 56 (1) ◽  
pp. 131-137
Author(s):  
Vanessa Horler
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
National Level ◽  
Representative Democracy ◽  
Parliamentary Democracy ◽  
National Parliaments ◽  
Member States ◽  
The World ◽  
National Governments ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
The Eu

Representative democracy is beset by a crisis of legitimacy across the world, but in Europe this crisis is compounded by the inadequacy of national governments to address citizens’ frustrations and to achieve transnational unity on common issues. How representative are national parliaments in their decision-making on EU matters? This volume investigates the relationship between the democratic institutions of the member states and those of the EU. With a focus on polity rather than policy, it looks at voting and decision-shaping mechanisms in selected member states, in particular the ‘Europeanisation’ of representative democracy at national level. It also assesses the state of parliamentary democracy at the EU level. Expert analysts share their insights into the changing nature of our political eco-systems and the (dis)connections within and between them.

The Challenge of Mass Democracy

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Benjamin A. Schupmann
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Liberal Democracy ◽  
The State ◽  
Parliamentary Democracy ◽  
The People ◽  
State And Society ◽  
Mass Democracy

Chapter 1 analyzes Schmitt’s assessment of democratic movements in Weimar and the gravity of their effects on the state and constitution. It emphasizes that the focus of Schmitt’s criticism of Weimar was mass democracy rather than liberalism. Schmitt warned that the combination of mass democracy, the interpenetration of state and society, and the emergence of total movements opposed to liberal democracy, namely the Nazis and the Communists, were destabilizing the Weimar state and constitution. Weimar, Schmitt argued, had been designed according to nineteenth century principles of legitimacy and understandings of the people. Under the pressure of mass democracy, the state was buckling and cannibalizing itself and its constitution. Despite this, Schmitt argued, Weimar jurists’ theoretical commitments left them largely unable to recognize the scope of what was occurring. Schmitt’s criticism of Weimar democracy was intended to raise awareness of how parliamentary democracy could be turned against the state and constitution.

Constitutional Pluralism and Transnational Justice

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alec Stone Sweet ◽  
Clare Ryan
Keyword(s):  
National Level ◽  
Legal Order ◽  
Rights Protection ◽  
National Courts ◽  
European Court ◽  
Transnational Justice ◽  
Multi Level ◽  
Constitutional Pluralism ◽  
Combined Impact ◽  
Proportionality Principle

In Europe, a cosmopolitan legal order was instantiated through the combined impact of Protocol no. 11 of the ECHR (1998), and the incorporation of the Convention into national legal systems. As a result, two processes—(i) the evolution of constitutional pluralism at the national level; and (ii) the development of rights protection at the transnational level—became causally connected to one another. The first undermined traditional models of domestic orders wherein the notions of constitutional unity and centralized sovereignty reinforced one another. The second process created a multi-level legal system whose effectiveness depends on the extent to which the European Court is able to induce and sustain the cooperation of national courts and officials. The constitutionalization of the proportionality principle, at both the domestic and transnational levels, provided a doctrinal interface for inter-jurisdictional dialogue, and the collective enforcement of the UPR.

scholarly journals Normative Aspects of Nudging in the International Sphere

AJIL Unbound ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 115 ◽  
pp. 263-267
Author(s):  
Doron Teichman ◽  
Eyal Zamir
Keyword(s):  
Energy Consumption ◽  
Organ Donation ◽  
Low Cost ◽  
National Level ◽  
The Past ◽  
The People ◽  
Posthumous Organ Donation ◽  
Regulatory Problems

The use of nudges—“low-cost, choice-preserving, behaviorally informed approaches to regulatory problems”—has become quite popular at the national level in the past decade or so. Examples include changing the default concerning employees’ saving for retirement in a bid to encourage such saving; altering the default about consent to posthumous organ donation to increase the supply of organs for transplantation; and informing people about other people's energy consumption to spur them to reduce theirs. Nudges are therefore used to promote the welfare of the people being nudged, and of society at large. However, the use of nudges has sparked a lively normative debate. When turning to the international arena, new arguments for and against nudges can be raised. This essay focuses on the normative aspects of using nudges in the international arena.

Adapting the European System of Financial Supervision (ESFS) to the EEA Two-Pillar Structure – A Workable Solution?

2019 ◽  
Vol 16 (5) ◽  
pp. 557-591
Author(s):  
Andri Fannar Bergþórsson
Keyword(s):  
Financial Crisis ◽  
Global Financial Crisis ◽  
National Level ◽  
Financial Supervision ◽  
Member States ◽  
Eu Member States ◽  
European System ◽  
Pillar Structure ◽  
The Global Financial Crisis ◽  
The Eu

In response to the global financial crisis, the European System of Financial Supervision (ESFS) was created in 2010. Supranational bodies were established for different financial sectors to act as supervisors of sorts for national-level supervisors in EU Member States. This article focuses on how the system was adapted to three EFTA States that are not part of the EU but form the internal market along with EU Member States through the EEA Agreement – Iceland, Norway and Lichtenstein (EEA EFTA States). The aim is to clarify how ESFS has been incorporated into the EEA agreement and to discuss whether this a workable solution for the EEA EFTA States that have not transferred their sovereignty by name in the same manner as the EU Member States. One issue is whether the adaptation has gone beyond the limits of the two-pillar structure, as all initiative and work stem from the EU supranational bodies and not the EFTA pillar.

scholarly journals The Role of Spatio-Temporal Information to Govern the COVID-19 Pandemic: A European Perspective

2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. 166
Author(s):  
Hartmut Müller ◽  
Marije Louwsma
Keyword(s):  
European Union ◽  
Spatial Distribution ◽  
Spatial Information ◽  
National Level ◽  
Temporal Information ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Member States ◽  
Heavy Burden ◽  
Spatio Temporal

The Covid-19 pandemic put a heavy burden on member states in the European Union. To govern the pandemic, having access to reliable geo-information is key for monitoring the spatial distribution of the outbreak over time. This study aims to analyze the role of spatio-temporal information in governing the pandemic in the European Union and its member states. The European Nomenclature of Territorial Units for Statistics (NUTS) system and selected national dashboards from member states were assessed to analyze which spatio-temporal information was used, how the information was visualized and whether this changed over the course of the pandemic. Initially, member states focused on their own jurisdiction by creating national dashboards to monitor the pandemic. Information between member states was not aligned. Producing reliable data and timeliness reporting was problematic, just like selecting indictors to monitor the spatial distribution and intensity of the outbreak. Over the course of the pandemic, with more knowledge about the virus and its characteristics, interventions of member states to govern the outbreak were better aligned at the European level. However, further integration and alignment of public health data, statistical data and spatio-temporal data could provide even better information for governments and actors involved in managing the outbreak, both at national and supra-national level. The Infrastructure for Spatial Information in Europe (INSPIRE) initiative and the NUTS system provide a framework to guide future integration and extension of existing systems.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document