All the talk about the “democracy deficit” of the EU is nothing new. In fact, it started in the late ‘70s and has been the topic of an ongoing debate for more than forty years now. Starting with the question whether the “deficit” is real or is just “perceived” to exist.
There have been numerous changes since then to strengthen the Union’s democratic underpinnings, starting with the first ever direct European Parliamentary elections in 1977 and continuing with all the steps taken to give a more influential and real role to the Parliament. Think: giving stronger legislative powers to the assembly; the various attempts to increase citizen-involvement (like the European Citizen’s Initiative), or the Spitzenkandidate system introduced in 2014, that was hoped to establish a direct connection between the voters and the “government of the EU”, a.k.a. the European Commission.
Yet, the European Parliament of today might still not (and should not) serve as a role model for parliaments elsewhere.
The EU, naturally, is not (and probably will never be) a super-sized nation state, is in fact, a unique institution on its own, neither will it ever have a unified “European nation”. Its organizations, though resemble a parliament-government-judiciary separation of powers, are working differently.
Furthermore, for quite a while, it seemed that said “demos” itself was not interested in the institution, after all. Electoral turnout has been continuously on the decline, starting from the historic 61.99 percent on the first elections right until 2014, when barely 42.61 percent of the voters thought that their word mattered.
A factor clearly considered as a proof of weak democratic legitimacy of the European Parliament. (The issue, of course, is not this simple as voter turnout at European parliamentary elections varies greatly between old and new member states and is also influenced by several factors like general trust in politics and parties, domestic electoral cycles and alike.)
Many have argued, that the EU’s democratic deficit is, in fact, largely rooted in the inadequateness of a “euro-demos”.
In 2024, European voters proved that the European parliamentary elections matter. Voter turnout was the highest (51.05 percent) since 1994, challenging the notion that the European Parliament lacks legitimacy.
Yet, their votes and will still doesn’t matter the way it should.
Take the Spitzenkandidate system: it turned out to be, above everything else, more like a set of guidelines rather than a rule set in stone, as the re-election of Ursula von der Leyen for a second term at the helm of the European Commission has just proved it. (Well, the system was already ditched in 2019, when Manfred Weber was not elected to the same post despite being the Spitzenkandidate of the EPP.) Rather, the leader of the most powerful institution of the EU was (again) elected thanks to backroom deals and promises everybody knows will never materialize.
While some argue that the President of the Commission has legitimacy, as (s)he is elected by the democratically elected parliament, the reality is that the Parliament has not much control over the workings of the Commission. It is true that the Commissioners have to go through an assessment by the Parliament and the latter can put forward a motion to censure the Commission as a whole via a supermajority vote, there aren’t many tools in the MEPs hands to control what the Commission is doing. Though most legislation is now passed through the co-decision procedure, there are still many issues where laws are passed under “consultation” – in cases like those, the Parliament has only the power of delay.
In lack of proper checks and balances, Queen Ursula can continue what she did before and can push programs and initiatives “through the legislative cycle with little to no consultation beyond her closely-knit circle of advisors” (mostly native Germans, just like her).
As there is only minimal accountability on the side of the Commission, it is always up to reporters and investigative journalists to uncover, how, for example, the 14,379 meetings (and this number is only for the period between 2019 and 2022) between Commissioners and lobbyists influence those politics. (The recorder was, by the way, the Juncker Commission, that held 27,090 such meetings during its five years of tenure.) It is maybe a telling sign, that von der Leyen herself has met business representatives 84 times and NGOs only 17 times.
It probably also doesn’t help with the image of “lacking democratic legitimacy”, that MEPs themselves often feel lost and confused over how the “Brussels Bubble” works and find that it is a challenge in itself to get a MEP badge, let alone the rest.
In the internal power-dynamics of the EU, the Parliament and the Commission have repeatedly clashed as the former tried to assert its role like the heart and/or pillar of European democracy and rule of law. For example, by repeatedly suing, or at least threatening to do so, the Commission for its decisions. In 2021, for example, when it decided to sue the Commission for not enforcing the rule of law mechanism against Hungary and Poland. Or in 2024, for unfreezing Hungary’s euro-billions.
And indeed, both cases were seen more as a power struggle between the two institutions than a well-founded and legally solid case. And, at least in 2021, the Commission took a few hesitant steps to appease the parliament, instead of testing the uncharted waters of a legal proceeding over political decisions. Thus, that lawsuit was withdrawn.
The 2024 lawsuit will be heard by the Court of Justice of the European Union – the when is likely only in December or later.
And while the Parliament hopes that, as vice-chair of Parliament’s legal affairs committee, Sergey Lagondinsky put it, “a ruling like this will bring more structure and order in how the Commission or a special agency goes about rule of law issues”, even experts admitted that the Parliament needs to build a robust case to convince the judges.
But it will probably be a strong enough political message to Queen Ursula and her Commission to be more transparent in their decision-making process. And hopefully, the Parliament will also not limit its actions only to cases involving member states that are considered “renegade” by some, but also in every other case.
Otherwise, the court will be just a different boxing ring for the same political power struggle, while European voters might once again find that there is nobody to represent them and their political views, in the end.
