Enhancing democracy pre and post EU accession – Challenges and its effects on the EU enlargement

The threats of increasing populism and populist nationalism in their various forms were recurring elements of the debates on the challenges for enlargement. This tendency is seriously problematic not only at the doorsteps of the EU, but also within the EU. However, this issue cannot be addressed effectively without examining its possible causes.

The research programme Enhancing democracy pre and post EU enlargement builds on the hypothesis that the origin of these trends is the crisis of representative democracy. Hence, it aims to study different concepts of democracy, analyse the various forms in which the crisis of representative democracy manifests (specially focusing on populism and nationalism and their diverse definition), evaluate its effects on enlargement policy and develop progressive alternatives for reinforcing pluralism.

The outcomes of the research programme will be collected in a book, which is planned to be launched in October 2014.

The workshop organised by the Foundation for European Progressive Studies (FEPS), the European Forum for Democracy and Solidarity (EFDS) and the Karl-Renner-Institut will focus on the topic of defining democracy with view to revitalise the EU enlargement process.

The aim of the seminar is to present the draft articles of this book chapter and give feedback to the authors.