Christopher Lord - Böcker

Most of the contemporary debates about the European Union - about its role, its institutional arrangements, its development dynamic, its expansion and possible futures - revolve around the issue of political legitimacy. Legitimacy and the European Union addresses the fundamental issues at the heart of the debates on Europe and examines such key questions as:- -What is the scope of the EU's authority -Is there a legitimacy deficit? If so, how much does it matter -Does political legitimacy only reside in the nation state? Using a multi-dimensional conception of political legitimacy, the text analyses the character and problems of the European Union's authority in respect of democracy, political identity and governmental performance. Its distinctive claim is that political legitimacy can now only be understood as a process of interaction between the state and EU levels, and that this interaction impacts differentially on different member states.

This book examines and investigates the legitimacy of the European Union by acknowledging the importance of variation across actors, institutions, audiences, and context. Case studies reveal how different actors have contributed to the politics of (re)legitimating the European Union in response to multiple recent problems in European integration. The case studies look specifically at stakeholder interests, social groups, officials, judges, the media and other actors external to the Union. With this, the book develops a better understanding of how the politics of legitimating the Union are actor-dependent, context-dependent and problem-dependent. This book will be of key interest to scholars and students of European integration, as well as those interested in legitimacy and democracy beyond the state from a point of view of political science, political sociology and the social sciences more broadly.

This book examines and investigates the legitimacy of the European Union by acknowledging the importance of variation across actors, institutions, audiences, and context. Case studies reveal how different actors have contributed to the politics of (re)legitimating the European Union in response to multiple recent problems in European integration. The case studies look specifically at stakeholder interests, social groups, officials, judges, the media and other actors external to the Union. With this, the book develops a better understanding of how the politics of legitimating the Union are actor-dependent, context-dependent and problem-dependent. This book will be of key interest to scholars and students of European integration, as well as those interested in legitimacy and democracy beyond the state from a point of view of political science, political sociology and the social sciences more broadly.

This book examines Norway’s affiliation to the EU and systematically assesses the potential suitability of this arrangement for the UK as a viable EU affiliation post-Brexit.Framing the book within the framework of the broader European context, the authors ask how much autonomy and room to manoeuvre tightly integrated non-member states have under this arrangement. They present an in-depth assessment of Norway’s close EU affiliation and provide insight into what this may reveal to us about the post-Brexit European political order. The book’s analytical framework centred on autonomy under complex interdependence has relevance well beyond the confines of the Norway case. This includes the UK, not least since the EU–UK Trade and Cooperation Agreement (TCA) leaves considerable uncertainty. It contains transitory elements; there will be implementation reviews, and there may be many more bilateral and multilateral agreements before the trade relationship is fully defined.This book will be of key interest to scholars and students of European Union politics, Norwegian politics, British politics, European integration, and, more broadly, to European studies and international relations.

This book examines Norway’s affiliation to the EU and systematically assesses the potential suitability of this arrangement for the UK as a viable EU affiliation post-Brexit.Framing the book within the framework of the broader European context, the authors ask how much autonomy and room to manoeuvre tightly integrated non-member states have under this arrangement. They present an in-depth assessment of Norway’s close EU affiliation and provide insight into what this may reveal to us about the post-Brexit European political order. The book’s analytical framework centred on autonomy under complex interdependence has relevance well beyond the confines of the Norway case. This includes the UK, not least since the EU–UK Trade and Cooperation Agreement (TCA) leaves considerable uncertainty. It contains transitory elements; there will be implementation reviews, and there may be many more bilateral and multilateral agreements before the trade relationship is fully defined.This book will be of key interest to scholars and students of European Union politics, Norwegian politics, British politics, European integration, and, more broadly, to European studies and international relations.

The notion of Differentiated Integration is increasingly used in the literature on European integration. Often employed interchangeably with the notion of "flexible integration, diverging views on its nature have led to the emergence of various definitions and, to some extent, a semantic confusion. A lack of consensus characterizes the academic literature; some authors even avoid putting an explicit definition on the term.The main objective of this book is to seek answers for the following questions: How can one define Differentiated Integration in the European Union? Should Differentiated Integration be considered as a process, a concept, a system or a theory? Should it be seen as a temporary or a well-established phenomenon? How is this field of study likely to develop in the future? In order to do so, all chapters, written by leading experts in the field, offer a state-of-the-art analysis of the study of differentiated integration, from theoretical and practical perspectives. In addition, this book is not a collection of isolated papers: all chapters are interconnected and gravitate towards the aforementioned central questions, but approach these from different perspectives.This book was published as a special issue of the Journal of European Public Policy.

This title was first published in 2001. This stimulating and well-written text is particularly suitable as a subsidiary text for courses in politics, sociology and ethnic studies.

This title was first published in 2001. This stimulating and well-written text is particularly suitable as a subsidiary text for courses in politics, sociology and ethnic studies.

The notion of Differentiated Integration is increasingly used in the literature on European integration. Often employed interchangeably with the notion of "flexible integration, diverging views on its nature have led to the emergence of various definitions and, to some extent, a semantic confusion. A lack of consensus characterizes the academic literature; some authors even avoid putting an explicit definition on the term.The main objective of this book is to seek answers for the following questions: How can one define Differentiated Integration in the European Union? Should Differentiated Integration be considered as a process, a concept, a system or a theory? Should it be seen as a temporary or a well-established phenomenon? How is this field of study likely to develop in the future? In order to do so, all chapters, written by leading experts in the field, offer a state-of-the-art analysis of the study of differentiated integration, from theoretical and practical perspectives. In addition, this book is not a collection of isolated papers: all chapters are interconnected and gravitate towards the aforementioned central questions, but approach these from different perspectives.This book was published as a special issue of the Journal of European Public Policy.

Behind the façade of democracy are a number of unanswered questions, foremost among them how to relate democracy beyond the state especially at the EU level to democracy within the state. This important new text provides a wide-ranging assessment of the theory and practice of democracy at all levels in Europe today.

Behind the façade of democracy are a number of unanswered questions, foremost among them how to relate democracy beyond the state especially at the EU level to democracy within the state. This important new text provides a wide-ranging assessment of the theory and practice of democracy at all levels in Europe today.

Just thirty years ago, it was widely believed that democracy had triumphed as the only legitimate form of political rule; and that representative democracy was, in turn, the only feasible form of democracy in modern mass societies. Yet, representative democracy is now thought to be in crisis. Populism is, above all, a crisis in representation. Populists question how far the views of the people can ever be authentically represented, least of all by ‘representatives’ made unrepresentative by the very fact of devoting their careers to representation. The crisis in representation is a double crisis. First, it is a crisis in democratic political systems. How should publics govern themselves as equals if not through representatives they elect to parliaments and governments? And how should they elect representatives to parliaments except through political parties that frame policy choices and select would-be representatives for competitions for the people’s vote? How, indeed, can mass democracy work without filling in the long gaps between competitions for the people’s vote with the more informal representation of civil society interests, and without the daily impertinence of some people claiming to be able to represent the views of others in public debate? Second, any crisis of representation is one of democratic political thought. As this volume shows, much political thought, ancient and modern, has been shaped by the question of when some can rightfully claim to ‘stand in for’ or ‘speak up for’ others.If, indeed, representation is in crisis, we need to know what is in crisis. After, then, an introduction setting out the main possibilities and problems of representation, this reader organises core attempts to understand representation into 7 thematic sections. The first on ‘Grasping Representation’ includes several courageous attempts to ‘grasp’ what is notoriously one of the most slippery concepts in the study of politics. The second section on ‘descriptive representation’ brings together discussions of the idea that representatives should somehow resemble the represented. The third section on ‘representation, democracy, accountability and legitimacy’ includes discussions of the relationship between representation and other qualities of democratic government. The fourth section on the ‘representative claim’ turns to one of the most striking innovations in recent debates: namely, that much of what we call representation is itself constructed through the process of some people making claims to represent that are then accepted or rejected by others. A fifth section brings together contributions that attempt to look ‘beyond electoral representation’ to more informal ways in which some people can ‘stand in for’ or ‘speak up’ for others . A final section on ‘challenges to political representation’