As we approach the 2029 European elections, the European Union finds itself at a constitutional crossroads. For fifty years—since the first direct elections to the European Parliament in 1979—Europeans have voted for a Parliament that remains structurally constrained by national logics: national campaigns, national media, national parties, and candidates selected largely (and therefore undemocratically) by national leaderships. After half a century of experience, we must confront a simple truth: the European Union continues to suffer from not one but two democratic deficits.
The original democratic deficit referred to the lack of popular election, and powers, of the European Parliament. It was largely corrected in 1979, with the first popular election, and in 2007, with the general extension of legislative powers in the Lisbon Treaty. However, the Parliament still lacks the power of legislative initiative and to vote on taxes and debt, violating the principle “no representation without taxation”. In addition, the requirement of unanimity in the Council for crucial policy areas—foreign policy, taxation, multi-annual budget—gives each Member State a veto power that blocks Europe’s ability to act collectively and decisively.
But there is a second deficit, less visible and yet equally corrosive: a democratic deficit in the way the European Parliament is elected and in its functioning. This deficit arises not from the conduct of the Parliament as an institution, but from the absence of authentic European political parties— parties that are democratic in their internal procedures, accountable to their members and voters, independent from national political leaders, often prime ministers themselves, and truly capable of structuring political competition at European level.
