Evolution Of The Eu's Democratic Legitimacy From The European Parliament's Powers

The issues of the EU's"Democratic deficit"and"Legitimacy deficit"have been considered as the main reasons for the frustration of European Constitution-building. The EU's"Democratic deficit"refers to this phenomenon: The legislative power of EU, which was transferred by democratically elected national parliaments of the EU member states, is not exercised by European Parliament, the only democratically elected institution of EU, but by the Council of the European Union which represents the national interests of the member states and European Commission which is short of the power conferred by EU citizens. Considered from the point of the traditional parliamentary democracy, the import of EU's democracy is insufficient. At the same time, the EU decision-making depends on inter-governmental bargains which are not transparent and democratic. So exists the insufficiency of the export of EU's democracy. The Maastricht Treaty was rejected by Danish voters in the 1992 referendum, and afterwards the Nice Treaty, the EU Constitutional Treaty and the Lisbon Treaty were rejected by some EU member states. The EU's"Democratic deficit"and"Legitimacy deficit"issues become more and more critical in the European Integration. This paper focuses on these issues.This paper consists of four parts. The first part makes a brief introduction to the common standards of western democracy and the background of the EU's democracy issue, and establishes a reference standard for the democracy concept at the EU level. The second part, with the clue of the evolution of European Parliament's power, makes a historical review of EU's legitimacy before the Maastricht Treaty came into force. The third part discusses the gradual manifestation of the EU's"Democratic deficit"issue after the Maastricht Treaty, and analyses the measures carried out for the Construction of Democratic Politics, including measures to extend the power of European Parliament. The final part introduces different views of the EU's democracy problems, and discusses the direction and ways to solve them in the new situation.Based on the analyses above, the author comes to the conclusions that (1) EU's"Democratic deficit"do exists; to solve the problem is the key to the further development of EU; (2) The solution of the problem not only involves the extension of European Parliament's power, but also relies on the formation of EU citizenship and identification; (3) The stagnation of European Constitution-building does not mean the stop of the process of building the EU's democratic legitimacy, and the spirit of the constitutional convention characteristic of wide participation, friendly consultation, opening and transparency will be continually taking effect. Furthermore, all kinds of sub-state actors, organizations and individuals besides EU institutions and EU member states governments will make their important and unique contribution at this difficult period.