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241. And Never the Twain Shall Meet ? The EU's Quest for Legitimacy and Enlargement

Author:
Lykke Friis and Anna Murphy
Publication Date:
08-1999
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Danish Institute for International Studies
Abstract:
The European Union in the 1990s is a contested, open-ended polity. It regulates almost as many policy-issues as nation-states and has been accepted by politicians, interest groups and many parts of the public as an appropriate framework for policy-making. Despite the increasing importance of the EU there is however no consensus about what the EU actually is, yet alone where it is heading. The ever-expanding agenda of integration in the 1990s has also led to considerable public scepticism towards the EU-project. Indeed, legitimacy crisis and democratic deficit have become the codewords in the literature and practice of European integration in the 1990s.
Topic:
Politics and Treaties and Agreements
Political Geography:
Europe

242. EU and Legitimacy - The Challenge of Compatibility: A Danish Case Study

Author:
Lykke Friis and Anna Murphy
Publication Date:
07-1999
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Danish Institute for International Studies
Abstract:
Since the difficulties of ratifying the Maastricht Treaty legitimacy has topped the EU's agenda. Departing from the dominating trend in the literature that the EU's legitimacy problems are largely due to the EU's inability to develop a common identity, which can compete or even replace national identities, this article shifts the focus to compatibility. The core legitimacy test is whether the EU and its member states – as a multidimensional governance system, in which nation states persist alongside supranational institutions – can develop identities, which are compatible. Based on this approach the article analyses the ratification debate on the Treaty of Amsterdam in one Member State, namely Denmark. Its core conclusion is that it is indeed important to abandon the traditional conceptualisation of EU legitimacy. As the Danish case shows legitimacy can be enhanced if member states are able to (re)construe the EU as being compatible with national identity.
Topic:
Nationalism and Treaties and Agreements
Political Geography:
Europe