Democracy and the European Green Deal

The European Union’s European Green Deal (EGD) was announced as an ambitious endeavour to achieve a just transition, address climate change, biodiversity loss and more. Importantly, it expresses the desire to tackle these challenges in a democratic way. Indeed, the scale of the changes required to meet the EGD’s goals mean that without democratic consent it is likely to fail, with disastrous consequences. With this introduction to the Special Issue on the European Green Deal and democracy we sketch the contours of this wide-ranging debate through a focus on aspects of democracy that are central to the EU and the EGD: representation, participation and deliberation, justice and the just transition, and expertise. The different contributions to this Special Issue examine democratic elements in the EGD and surrounding governance structures by exploring alternative sources of democratic innovation, including deliberative mechanisms and social movements, as potential avenues for transformative change.