Democracy and Accountability in Twenty-First-Century Europe

My contention is that the coventional notion of democracy as 'delegation with accountabilit' promises a degree of direct correspondence between the needs and preferences of the national citizenries and the decisions of their legislators that cannot be delivered in a world of increased interconnectedness. I trace the roots of the increasing disaffection towards democracy in two developments, one empirical and the other theoretical. The empirical development is the apparent loss of control experienced by the national citizenries as a consequence of European integration and globalization, with European integration increasingly perceived as the handmaiden of globalization. The theoretical development is the streamlined notion of democracy as ‘delegation with accountability’ characterized by the existence of a chain of delegation that runs from the sovereign national citizenries through elected politicians to decision-makers ideally paired by a matching chain of accountability flowing in the opposite direction. The conventional notion of democracy must be superseded if we want to avid inevitable disappointements with real democracies that cannot deliver on what they promise.