Sixth Scholarly Panel : Cultural Identity in the New Europe
Chair : Prof. Dr. Boguslawa Bednarczyk
Democracy as a Fundamental Principle of the European Union Institutional Order
Xenophon Contiades
Scientific Director, Centre for European Constitutional Law (CECL), Athens and Professor, Democritus University of Thrace, Greece
Democracy in the European Union is described in scientific debate with the term “democratic deficit” and few contradict the fact that until now the democratic legitimization of the European order is insufficient. It would be more accurate to state that in the European Union there is no democracy at least in the terms it is cognizable within national states.
Concerning the democratic organization of the European Union there is an impressive (and constantly increasing) volume of literature analyzing the democratic deficit or proposing alternative models of democratic governance for the Union having as a starting point different choices concerning the character, the status and the form of political unification. At least fifteen different theoretical constructions concerning European unification can be identified in international literature, each proposing a different approach on democracy in the European Union.
The difficulties identified in the task to describe the basic rules and principles for the democratic organization of the European Union concern the content of the term democracy within the European institutional order, the extent to which state-centered notions of democracy, especially those of federal states, can prove useful for the governance of a unique institutional entity like the European Union which combines elements of national states with elements of international cooperation, which claims the creation of a common public sphere without a new nation and above all which makes constant reference to a still not clearly identified common European legal and political culture.
Taking into account all the above the paper will focus on:
• proposals for overcoming the democratic deficit especially regarding the normative content of the democratic principle at European level
• scientific tools and concepts for analyzing democracy at European level especially taking into account the prospect of federalization of the European Union
• the consolidation of the democratic principle in the Treaties and in the Draft Constitutional Treaty
• proposals for a “new” concept and function of democracy in the European Union.
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Circumventing the State? The Demands of Stateless Nations, National Minorities, and the Proposed European Constitution
David Landau and Lisa Vanhala
European Politics and Society Oxford University, United Kingdom
In multinational states, constitutions play an important role in defining state-minority relations. They provide primitive frameworks for shaping the objectives of minority groups while offering codified guidelines for expressing their demands. European debate over the inclusion of specific minority provisions in the proposed European Constitution, however, challenges state constitutions as the primary determinants of state-minority relations. The constitution, if ratified, will mould supranational-minority relationships by either narrowing or increasing the scope of minority rights debates. Using the cases of Basques and Catalans in Spain and ethnic Hungarians in Romania and Slovakia , this paper analyzes critical aspects of the European constitutional debate relevant to the formation of basic state- and supranational-minority relationships. Even though greater EU competences have already restructured some minority groups' objectives, it is the drafting process of the proposed Constitution alone that can reorganise fundamental political relationships between minorities and their host-states . The Spanish and Hungarian cases show that different constitutionally defined state-minority relationships are shaping various minority demands on the proposed EU Constitution. While stateless nations are generally seeking increased state-level autonomy through supranational means, national minority groups are seeking expanded individual and group rights through supranational constraints on state-level policies.
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Sovereignty, Stateless Nations and the European Order: Seeking Statehood
Lisa Vanhala
European Politics and Society, Oxford University (Hertford College), UK
The situation of stateless nations in Europe has been greatly shaped, in the last half century, by two parallel processes: the emergence of sub-state nationalist movements in several Western European countries and the deepening of European integration. The evolution of these phenomena is forcing us to change the way we think about both nationalism and federalism: new notions of sovereignty and statehood are emerging. Gellner's definition of nationalism, “the political principle which holds that the political and national should be congruent” is no longer as simple in its implications as it once was within the European context. The meaning of “the political” is evolving with the establishment of supranational institutions, the pooling and sharing of sovereignty and the phenomenon of multi-level governance.
Two related questions are made apparent by this incongruence between the political and national within Europe . First, have these changes at the European level increased or decreased the desire for statehood among the populations of stateless nations? As long as political nationalists continue to see the state as the dominant constituent of international society then their primary goal will be the creation of their own state. If, on the other hand, political nationalists adopt a “post-sovereigntist” perspective in which they embrace transnational integration as a process within which they can maximize the degree of autonomy and influence open to the nation, then the importance of statehood will be diminished.
The second issue that is raised, once the question of the desirability of independence has been addressed, is whether the political and economic structure of the European Union increases or decreases the feasibility of secession. New channels of influence for stateless nations within the European Union can be regarded as a form of institutional accommodation and may diminish the legitimacy of secessionist claims. These opportunities allow stateless nations to gain additional resources, to assert autonomy and to influence the integration process all without becoming independent. Another factor which may diminish the feasibility of secession is that stateless nations that seek independence would not only have to negotiate secession with the central government of their respective host state, they would also have to reach agreements with the European institutions.
In addressing these issues I begin with an examination of the situation of stateless nations in Europe . This discussion is based upon three dimensions: the construction of collective identity and the formulation of perceptions about a group's own security and survival; the institutional and economic relationships between the stateless nation and the central state; and the strategies and objectives of political nationalists. In the second section I situate stateless nations within the institutional architecture of the European Union and present two observations about the net effects of the European institutional structure on the motives and objectives of political nationalists. I contribute to the debate between those who claim that we are witnessing the “end of territories” as the basis for political organization and are entering into an era of “post-sovereignty” and those who argue that states will continue, for the foreseeable future, to be the dominant frame of reference for the institutions and politics of the European Union.
