Eilert Sundt lecture 2006

European Democracy: Why bother with it? What might it look like?

Professor Philippe C. Schmitter,
European University Institute, Firenze, Italy

Date: 26. October 2006
Time: 14.15
Location: Eilert Sundt building, Auditorium 1


At some point, the "democracies in Europe" will need a "democracy of Europe." Unless the integration of the region were to collapse or to encapsulate itself as a mere free-trade area in the future, the European Union will have a increasingly complex and multi-layered impact on the practice of democracy within its member states. As it stands, the expansion of its decision-making scope combined with the spread of qualified majority voting has had the effect of undermining long-established national institutions of citizenship, representation and accountability without replacing them with effective supra-national ones. It is this "double bind" that provides the dominant motive for political reform -- not the so-called "democracy deficit" of the EU alone. What is much less evident is how this gap should and could be filled. For this author, the answer begins with an understanding of the unprecedented scale, scope and diversity of the Euro-polity and, hence, the need for reformers literally to re-invent the institutions of democracy in order to govern it legitimately.

The lecture is public and open to all.