A Critical Analysis of the Democratic Deficit in the European Union

This essay critically examines the persistent debate surrounding the democratic deficit within the European Union (EU). It begins by defining the concept of a democratic deficit and outlining the key principles of democracy. The essay then explores the various factors contributing to the perception of a democratic deficit within the EU, including the lack of a shared cultural and historical foundation, issues of deliberative and representative democracy, and the challenges related to participatory involvement. It further analyzes the impact of the Euro crisis on this deficit, highlighting issues of transparency, accountability, and the weakening of judicial control. The paper also discusses the absence of a unified European political stage and the lack of a cohesive European identity. Finally, the essay considers potential solutions to address the democratic deficit, emphasizing the need for greater legitimacy and credibility among EU leaders, strengthening economic policy making, and enhancing the accountability of European institutions, including the European Parliament. The essay concludes by acknowledging that the solutions may reside at the supranational level and that the issues are quite complex.

Running head: DEMOCRATIC DEFICIT IN EU
Democratic Deficit in EU
Name of the Student:
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The question over the legitimacy of the Europe Union (EU) has been a nearly
continuous debate and many politicians of EU appear to agree that Europe Union suffers
from a serious ‘democratic deficit’ (Karanikolos et al. 2013). There are many varied reasons
for why this perception is such a widespread issue. EU, being a multinational body, lacks the
grounding in common culture and history on which most of the individual policies could
draw. However, it should not mandatorily disqualify EU from being treated as a
democratically legitimate body. The recent euro crisis has worsened this problem even more.
Most of the critics have overlooked the comparatively optimistic conclusion as they assess
the European Union in isolated and idea terms, hence drawing in comparisons in between a
utopian and the EU democracy (Gerhards, Lengfeld and Hauberer 2016). Such use of
standards that are idealistic in nature has led many of the analysts like Sweet (2017) to
neglect the extent to which insulation and delegation have become widely spread trends in the
modern democracies. This paper will elaborate on arguing on the question of- “does the EU
suffer from a democratic deficit” and, if so, how can this be resolved. Furthermore, it will
also shed light on if the solution provided resides only at the supranational level or not.
Does the EU suffer from a democratic deficit?
There is consistency to the contention of the “democratic deficit” when one assesses
the independent beginnings of the several bodies that are engaged in the current formation of
policies for the European Union. However, before elaborating on this subject, it is very
important to gain in-depth knowledge of what is democratic deficit is true terms. A
democratic deficit is a deficit that takes place when the democratic organizations fail to
achieve what are credible to be the key principles of democracy (Majone 2010). The basis of
contemporary democracy and good governance relies on the rights of the people to have their
opinions heard and valued, which in turn would influence the enforcement of numerous
measures and policies of legislation (Williams 2018). Within the domestic sphere, the

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liability of the government at the local level, to its citizens or voters is conserved through the
parliament of the very nation. The voters could only fulfill democratic legitimacy when there
is a favorable and high amount of trust in the political system as well as its institutional
measures. These measures perform as a system for checking and balancing the authority of
the ones who governs with the multitude contribution of people (Majone 2010). However, the
deficit takes place when the citizen of the country perceives that the institutions of decision-
making are maintained, in a way that is far off their influence but still has the ultimate power
to implement and draft the policies that directly influences every citizen (Yami et al. 2018).
Hence, the deficit has a perception problem. The system of checks and balance might prevail
in some or the other formats but they are very far detached from the common citizen, so
much so that they are literally ineffective and incapable to persuade the way of business and
its future’s directional projection (Greskovits 2015).
It is indeed that there does exist a democratic deficit in the EU and the reasons behind
this saying are numerous. The detractors of the self-governing authority of the European
Union be likely to point out three fundamental areas of the democratic liability and they are
deliberative democracy, representative democracy and the participatory involvement (Curtin,
Mair and Papadopoulos 2010). The deliberative democracy argues on all the issues among
the citizen of Europe and the representative democracy is the national and European
parliamentary involvement (Funk and McCombs 2017). There are number of factors that are
consistent enough to support this argument on the presence of democratic deficit in the
Europe (Sabel and Cohen 2017). It is an evident that the EU is very unresponsive to the
democratic pressures present within the Europe (Dotti Sani and Magistro 2016). It is
considered to draw strengths from the public opposition to the mass immigration and the
cultural liberalization. It is one of the fundamental features of democratic regimes that the
voters have the right to change their government but within the EU, the case is quite different.

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Hence, in case if a resulting election in Europe is to transform the structure or arrangement of
the parliament, it would then led to major changes in the policy in Europe because the
parliament is amongst the three pillars that makes the legislation and the legislative power is
been distributed among the parliament, the commission and the council.
It is also to be noted that the European integration has meant a decrease in the national
parliamentary control and an increase in the executive power (Winzen 2013). In the domestic
level, parliament could keep a trace of the executive but it is also not the issue in European
standard. As per The Regional dimension of the European Union, the ministers’ council in
the European level is not held to comprise for its activities in the European stage by their
individual domestic parliaments and hence, exercise a much superior control on the Council
of Ministers than they would be capable to do at a domestic level (Kelemen 2017). The
institutions of the EU often deal with the unclear technicalities.
It is also to be noted that there is transparency and complexity issue in the EU
(Follesdal and Hix 2006). As per Abazi and Hillebrandt (2015), the council of ministers in
Europe has failed to conduct their negotiation in a transparent and open manner. In a place
where openness and transparency does exist in the European commission form, such a
complex procedure which is adopted in this process results in all but the experts in situations
of uncertainty. In turn, this results in isolation of the citizens because of ignorance of the
complex system of procedural. With the same, there is also an existence of substantive
imbalance issue (Runciman, Merry and Walton 2017). The broadening of the market in
European region has left the EU commentators like Sevki Acuner and Daniel Hannan with a
lots of leftist views and argument on the shortage. This also circumscribes the imbalance in
between the capital and labor that is further worsen up by the independence of the above
mentioned European market. Furthermore, there is also an issue of weakening of judicial
control in the EU (Cheneval and Schimmelfenning 2013). There are many legal systems that

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possess the courts that have significant control and power for deciding the authority of the
primary legislation of the country.
With the same, there is also a shortage of European political stage in Europe Union
and this a very important issue to take in consideration in this context (Williams 2018) as
because of the fact that there is no trace of Europe wide political parties that could, like any
other democratic nation, take the initiative to compete with one another in the elections
conducted in Europe. Such a political gap possibly results in the European citizens voting for
the ones belonging from their very own domestic state that generally holds the much alike
political ideals just like the government of the day (Matsuda 2018). This issue in no way
serves the citizens of Europe because every individual state here elects a candidate from the
domestic level for the parliament in Europe, which is representing or reflecting the best
benefits of their own nations. However, one of the most significant points that maintain the
dispute of existence of the deficit in EU is that no European Demos is there (Risse 2014). The
populace of the EU is not a union of people as it is in the other countries such as in United
States. Instead, it is a union of many people. A total number of 11 official European
languages are there that are not taking account of the dialects and are also some of the very
less spoken languages by the European minorities. Hence, they argue further for how is it
possible to establish a democracy in the Europe Union when there is a lack of general
community. They are of such an importance because of the fact that these general community
are capable enough for particular structure of communication that comprise of most used
means of informative media.
It is also to note that the political institutions usually gain legitimacy either from the
“inputs” or the “outputs”. The inputs refers to the elections through which the ones who are
exercising the power are held for accounting, while the output refers to the benefits that the
institutions are supposed to deliver (Geddes, Wright and Frantz 2014). The output legitimacy

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is hardly impressive and the Euro crisis in the country has weakened both of these sorts of
legitimacy (Nicolaidis 2013). With the same, the economic growth in the country is also
negative and the rate of unemployment in eurozone is more than 12%, while that of in Greece
and Spain is more than 50% (Orbie 2016). It is of no evidence that whether the euro or the
EU is delivering great deal in terms of benefits. The complexity of the decision making
system along with the power that is distributed among many of the institutions, the
accountability lines in the Europe Union is never been clear enough. The perception of
democratic deficit at present is a growing issue for the highly indebted countries belonging
from the Eurozone (Karanikolos et al. 2013). As per the report of The European Union and
Welfare State Reform, the European Central Bank, the European Commission as well as the
Monetary Fund have forced the nation’s parliaments for accepting the budget cuts along with
the structural reforms. The finance ministers of the eurzone and the heads of the government
have taken big decisions on the issue of Europe Union bailout programs (Fernandez-
Villaverde, Garicano, and Santos 2013). Hence, it is clear from the above evident that EU
does suffers from a democratic deficit.
How can it be resolved?
Here comes the question of how can this be resolved. In this context, it is to be noted
that until and unless the leaders of the European Union become more legitimate and credible
in the views of the voters, the parts of union can start to collapse. Like, for example, at some
of the points, the European government might want to strengthen the European currency by
initiating major steps towards more united and un-segregated economic policy making
system but those of their taken steps could be blocked by the general election or a national
parliament, hence threatening the future of the Euro (Abeyratne 2017). With the same, the
leaders of Europe should hurry on establishing a banking union in order to make the financial

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system of the country strong. Beside this, Germany must encourage demand which would
help in making the Southern European economies to grow and develop.
It is also important for the Europe Union leaders to make the power more
accountable. For many of the Members of the European Parliament (MEPs), the solution is
simple (Geddes, Wright and Frantz 2014). However, it is also true that despite its good work
on some of the legislations, the European parliament has failed to persuade many of the
people that it represents their interests (Van Dijk 2015). Many of the MEPs have very less
connection with the national political systems of Europe. Many of the times, the priority of
the parliament appears to be encouraging its very own powers (Orbie 2016). The parliament
always seek for bigger European Union budget along with a larger role for the part of Europe
Union but there is no evidence that many of the voters thinks in this same way. The reason
behind it is that although the power of the parliament have grown heavily right from the very
first direct elections in the year 1979, the total turn-out have significantly fall or declined in
every succeeding election that are conducted. According to the statistics, it is 43% in the year
2009 which is much less than 63% in the year 1979 (Geddes, Wright and Frantz 2014).
Another reason for the failure of European parliament to be the key democratic check
on the decision making of the eurozone is that maximum of the money for the bailouts as
well as the conditions that are been applied to them are considered at the EU level by the
finance ministers (Scharpf 2015). However, it is also true that their decision needs to be
executed by the national parliaments that this therefore plays a very important part in both the
recipient as well as in the donor countries- the Cyprus and the Bundestag respectively. One of
the other possible solutions of this issue of democratic deficit is that to increase the
engagement of the national parliamentarians in the governance of eurozone. The national
parliamentarians can play a major role in making the European Unions more accountable in
two ways. Firstly, the relationship or the link in between the national parliaments must be

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made strong. The treaty of Lisbon has created the procedure of “Yellow card”, in accordance
with which if 1/3rd or more of the total members in national parliaments believe that any
proposal of the commission breaches the subsidiary, they have the right to ask from withdraw
(Cooper 2013). This procedure could be made a “red card” procedure which would allow the
national parliaments to pressurize the commission for withdrawing a proposal. A similar
system can also play a great role in enabling the national parliaments to group together in
order to make the commission proposal the withdrawal of an unnecessary law. Hence, the
national parliaments should be given the right to veto the Commission proposals. Secondly,
national parliamentary forum must be developed in the Brussels in order to monitors the
European Council and to challenge the decisions made on the defense and foreign policy and
counter terrorism.
With the same, it can also include that of directly electing the Commission President.
Direct elections would be the most effective solutions of all as because of the fact that there is
high need for bringing transparency to the council of ministers. They need to be open up to
the common public and should also publish all the documents while acting in legislative
capacity. It is also to monitor that negotiations are being conducted to the highest level by the
national ministers instead of the diplomats. It will help in democratizing the Europe Union
through a well-developed of the elected ministers and would further aid to media inspection
of its decision via this light of openness and transparency. With the same, the voting system
prevailing in Europe follows a closed list system (Hix et al. 2000). It has resulted in
disconnection in between the voters and the politicians as the voters in this system are not
allowed to choose their individual candidates. This system needs to get changed with the
open-listed system or with the single transferrable votes that is at present being used in
Ireland (Farrell. Suiter and Harris 2017). It would give the voters to choice to select their
individual candidates and would hence establish a democratic link.

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Does the solutions reside only at the supranational level?
The EU has supra-national institutions like the EP (European Parliament), the ECJ
(European Court of Justice), the European Commission and the European Central Bank.
Hence, this is why the EU is far away from being a nation-state formation. The solutions
provided for resolving the democratic deficit in EU has made keeping this aspect of EU in
mind. Hence, it can be said that the solution reside at the supranational level rather than
limited to national level.
Hence, after examining the above topic, it is to be concluded that Europe Union is
suffering from serious democratic deficit. The paper has provided an in-depth understanding
of the different dynamics and complexity with which the EU operates. The idea of
democratic deficit is a poor result of the effort made by the European Commissions and
Council of Ministers in order to establish such a platform for governance, which would be far
away from the influence of the countrymen. However, this has resulted in such a condition of
the country where most of the citizens feel like there is a deficit of democracy in the country
and the government that is governing them is not transparent enough to trust. This has made
Europe alleged by its people to be intricate enough and therefore now it is high time for
accountability, clarity and transparency in order to govern the day in the future development
of the country.

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