The eu’s Legitimacy in the Eye of the Beholders

10.2 – Dealing with the Deficit

Now that we have seen the reasons for the legitimacy deficit how can it be tackled? Thus, we arrive at part two of the central research question:
how can this deficit be overcome?
Understanding is prerequisite if one hopes to overcome any problem. The EU’s policy discourse might mislead one to think that the problem of the EU’s legitimacy is democratic in nature, but as we have seen this is not the case. The first recommendation is concerned with the diversity and the role of personification for the EU’s media policy. The second recommendation focuses on how to legitimise the reality of the EU as a political order of multi-level governance with national identifications.

10.2.1 – Lost in Translation? Or the Facelessness of the EU

In the introduction Joschka Fischer describes the European level of governance as a ‘faceless, soulless Eurocracy in Brussels’ (2000: 1). The quote is somewhat paradoxical, because the problem of the EU’s facelessness is assessed by one of its few public faces. Fischer and the President of the European Commission José Manuel Barroso are the only two public faces of the EU. One might expect the Swedish DG of Communication, Margot Wallström, to be active, but she only made one contribution to the discourses (Le Figaro August 11, 2005).

In all three discourses, the EU is perceived as too far away and people cannot connect with the complex institutions. A more active media policy with its own ‘European faces’ might very well establish a direct form of legitimacy.¹³⁸ Plan D was a policy initiative meant to create such legitimacy in the aftermath of the two no’s to the constitution, but a very recent policy brief indicates such a communication policy is still not in place (EMEDIATE 2009: 1). Luuk van Middelaar’s analysis¹³⁹ further underlines the need for European faces. The EU is searching for a public, but in order to attract a public one needs recognisable actors. Yet, there are no recognisable actors, thus the EU has to put ‘players on stage’, so to say.

There are three main reasons to further favour European faces over of national ones. First, national politicians are not seen as European, thus they will at best provide indirect legitimacy. Secondly, these national politicians could actually have a negative effect on the EU’s legitimacy, like Jacques Chirac. And thirdly, there is no reason to assume national politicians are or will stay pro-European, as we saw with the British Europhobes and French Gaullists.

Then the problem presents itself of a script for these actors. As we saw the perception of the deficit depends on local circumstances. The saying ‘all politics is local’ is once again proven to be true. Therefore the most important element of the script is its adaptability to the national circumstances: the story has to connect with the publics. An intelligent media policy should be developed that takes into account these local differences. The question looming here is what should the crux of this adaptable story be?

10.2.2 – How to Legitimise a Political Order of Multi-level Governance?

The one thing that is clear is that the current discourse is counterproductive for the EU’s legitimacy. The main concern for the European political elites and all others interested in creating legitimacy for the EU is to start influencing/carrying public discourse in a realistic manner.

First, one should try not to represent the EU as either an international regime or a federation (to be), because neither is likely to happen any time soon. One should strive to create support for the current institutional design of the EU for in broad strokes it is the only realistic model. Further democratisation, let alone federalisation, is not a solution, because democratic legitimacy is not the actual problem. On a different note, as Robert Cooper argues, the EU’s ultimate aim should not be the abolishment of the nation-states – by replacing them with a new state¹⁴⁰ – but the taming of those states (2007: 66). The EU will also not devolve back to an economic union – it is more likely to implode. Multi-level governance is thus the system to be sold to the public. One should appreciate this reality and the reality that people have national identities. One cannot simply wish the latter away, think to replace or even combine it with a European identity. For that matter, there is no European (national) identity or ‘demos’ identity. The latter has never existed separately for institutions as ‘far away’ as the EU.

Secondly, there is no silver bullet for the EU’s legitimacy deficit, but introducing the reality of multi-level governance into discourse is good and necessary start (for now). This is not an exercise in informing the public, but in rhetoric and leadership. The introduction of a novel concept into public discourse is not an easy task. As we saw in the Dutch discourse the notion of Network Europe disappeared almost as quickly as it came. The problem is the inherent complexity of the system and the necessity of an attractive and comprehensible message to connect with a passive audience (Perse 2001: 132). The process thus will take time.

Thirdly, another problem lies in the fact that there is no (philosophical fundament for the) conceptualisation of legitimacy for the EU’s system of multi-level governance. Here in lies a task for academics. As Matheson explains legitimacy has a dual task: explaining and justifying authority and the social order. Scholars should not start with an ideal and then come to an institutional design, rather they should analyse the reasons for the EU’s legitimacy deficit (in discourse) and the reality and possible future development of the political system. In order to form a new consensus, reality and theory have to converge once again in people’s perceptions. Therefore they should be active and attentive to the public discourses within the EU. The novel conceptualisation of legitimacy should thus be ‘sellable’. This can lead to a legitimation of the European level of governance for the long run. The European Commission, but also other interested parties, should allocate funding toward this kind of academic research. In order to have something to say, the European political elites will have to put their money where their mouth is (or actually not yet is).