Documents Glencross, Andrew 2 results

"This paper analyses the EU's response to the Eurozone sovereign debt crisis. It examines the background to the crisis and how the threat to the single currency taxed the decision-making capacity of the EU, while also exposing long-standing fears about an absence of democratic legitimacy. In particular, the paper reflects on the democratic credentials of the EU response, examining the important role that continues to be played by democratic politics at the national level. This role will continue to be important since this is the level at which enforcement of debt brakes will occur. In addition, the analysis highlights the political fault lines that became apparent, notably the North/South split and the separation between countries inside and outside the Eurozone. Consequently, the paper concludes that these fault lines will characterize the future of integration, thereby complicating the search for a consensus on how to complete the banking union or pursue a free trade deal with the US."

"Altiero Spinelli believed European integration needed to draw inspiration from the US constitutional founding. The article uses Spinelli's analogy to assess how useful it is to compare the predicament of European integration with US constitutional politics. The analysis reveals both how Spinelli exaggerated the extent to which the US Constitution established and delimited federal political authority once and for all as well the way in which, despite its functionalist non-constitutional origins, the EU has experienced its own brand of constitutional politics. The analogy is thus most useful in showing how both polities faced similar tensions over the process of constitutionalism, restraining unit sovereignty and the institutionalization of popular sovereignty at the federal level."