Is the EU a Representative Democracy ? The Normative Debate and the Impact of the Euro-crisis

The chapter argues that teh European Union is not a parliamentary representative democracy, hence it cannot be assessed with the criteria that would apply to national parliamnetary democracies. As such it it bound to confound and disappoint the citizens of the member states. This peculiarity has become all the more apparent during the euro crisis since it induced citizens to expect from national parliaments activities that they could not perform, while they did not ask the European parliament to perform those same tasks. The functions of advocacy and dialogue must therefore be sought at different levels of representation