Explaining democracy in Europe (in Special Review Symposium on Vivien Schmidt’s ‘Democracy in Europe’)

Abstract: This response to the three reviews of Democracy in Europe addresses questions of democracy, institutions, and methodology. It first shows that naming the EU a 'regional state' enables us not only to define a new international form but also to envision new rules by which the EU could operate more effectively and democratically. Next it demonstrates that the book's qualitatively developed typology, which classifies the member-states of the EU along a continuum from simple to compound, yields descriptive inferences that need no quantitative operationalization, although it does not rule this out. It then considers how far we can take the argument about 'institutional fit,' with the causal inference that the EU is more disruptive to simple polities than to compound ones. It concludes with a discussion of the methodological approach of 'discursive institutionalism' by contrast with historical institutionalism, and of the importance of ideas and discourse for democracy in Europe.