In this paper, we wish to address an aspect of ‘compound representation’ that has not hitherto attracted significant explicit attention, namely that the EU mixes two forms of subjectivity in its ‘system’ of representation: one normative target are individuals, the other are states. We argue that the EU’s ‘system’ of representation meanders between two different visions of democratic representation in and for the EU. Firstly, there are national representative democracies which rest on the political equality of individuals. Here, the democratic rule remains in the hands of individuals who are treated as political equals. Secondly, there is a supranational system which is based on the equality of states that represent their people at EU level. Here, the democratic rule is in the hands of states, and more particularly, governments. Thus, the provisions of EU democracy, as visible in the Lisbon Treaty, cover two divergent visions of the EU. One relates to representation of citizens, the other to the representation of states (demoi). The former points towards an integrated European polity with state-like characteristics, while the latter perceives of the EU as an advanced intergovernmental organization. The former is primarily enacted through electoral, functional and potentially direct representation, whereas the latter is primarily enacted through territorial representation. What the Lisbon Treaty does not provide for is guidance as to how these two different forms of democratic representation are related to each other, whether there is or should be a hierarchy among them, and whether they are compatible at all.
The effects of the different forms of representation on democratic legitimacy in the EU are all but clear: Do they foster the political equality of individuals, and thereby can advance the emergence of a supranational representative democracy? Do they, contrarily, enhance the capacity of states to act in the international realm, in order to defend what is perceived to be their national interest? Can both logics co-exist, and what would their co-existence imply for the EU’s capacity to increase its democratic legitimacy? The mix of these two forms of subjectivity, so our argument, contributes to the blurring of political equality at both levels of government, and has the potential to undermine democratically legitimate politics at domestic level.
The aim of this paper is to theoretically address the two conceptions of political equality that are present in the Lisbon Treaty and to empirically relate them to the different channels of representation as they exist in the EU.
