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EU is as democratic as it gets but I think it failed to market itself as such. There is an elected parliament so what's undemocratic?

ZenoArrow 10y ago
I feel like a broken record at this point, but... The European Parliament has less power than every other parliament that I know of in one crucial way... They cannot propose new laws. Without the power to propose new laws, they cannot set the agenda for the EU. Only the European Commission can propose new laws, and Commissioners are not voted for by the general public. That's the key reason that the EU is not as democratic as the UK's political system, elected representatives do not have the full power to represent your interests, they can only shape what other people propose.
- ropiku 10y ago
  Commissioners are not voted for by the general public directly. Each country appoints one. Why is the general public not annoyed at the undemocratic Prime Minister ? He's not voted for directly either. Same for each member of the cabinet.
  - ZenoArrow 10y ago
    How many times... the Prime Minister IS democratically elected! If you're interested in how it happens, follow the upcoming Conservative leader elections. As for the countries appointing a Commissioner, it doesn't matter as Commissioners have a clear mandate to avoid taking instructions from their own government. In other words, they don't represent the people that appoint them either. If you don't believe me, watch this video from the European Commission's own YouTube channel, see if you can spot the bit about not taking instructions from their own countries... http://youtu.be/nWpgO1EPO_Y http://youtu.be/nWpgO1EPO_Y
    - dragonwriter 10y ago
      > How many times... the Prime Minister IS democratically elected. If you're interested in how it happens, follow the upcoming Conservative leader elections. The upcoming Conservative leader elections will elect the new prime minister, and will not be a direct democratic election of the British populace, so that would seem to support the upthread claim that the PM is not directly, democratically elected.
      - ZenoArrow 10y ago
        I don't know if you're from the UK or not, but I'll assume for the moment that you're not... In the UK system, you vote for members of parliament (MP for short) that represent your local area. The majority of MPs have party affiliations, so in principal you vote based on both the local candidate and the party that you want to rule the country (in practice many people know diddly squat about their local MP and vote purely on party affiliation). So long as a party reaches past a set number of MPs in order to reach a parliamentary majority, the leader of that party becomes the prime minister. In principal, as people are voting for the best combination of MP candidate and party that suits them, there's no need for a new election to decide the new prime minister as the Conservatives still hold the parliamentary majority. In practice, as most people know very little about their MPs and are voting based on the personality and perceived competency of the party leader (and/or identification with the principals of the party), there will be people calling for a new general election. I didn't vote for the Conservatives, and I'd like to see Labour take their place, but now is not the right time to do so. Not only have we got the uncertainty surrounding Brexit, there's also a civil war going on in the Labour party, which is likely to get worse when the report from the Chilcot Inquiry on the Iraq war is released next week. We need stability right now, new UK elections can wait until 2020. Also, the leader of each party is voted for by the members of that party, and anyone can become a member of a party by paying a small membership fee. If you care about who is the leader of a particular party, you do have the choice to have a say in it.
      - deleted 10y ago
        [deleted]
- tremon 10y ago
  they cannot set the agenda for the EU. Only the European Commission can propose new laws That's unfortunately placed. The European Commission does not set the agenda for the EU either (that's done by the European Council, which is directly elected).
  - ZenoArrow 10y ago
    In principal the European Council sets the agenda for the EU, but the European Council cannot propose new legislation. It's the legislation that sets the direction of the EU.
lliamander 10y ago
It is difficult to measure how 'democratic' a particular government is. Some have compared the E.U. favorably to the U.K. government while still acknowledging that it falls short in certain regards [0]. But democracy is about more than just voting. It really comes down to "how much say does the average person have in the rules that govern their lives?". Will the Scottish vote count for as much being a part of the E.U. (where they are only 1% of the population) as it will staying a part of the U.K. (where they are 8% of the population)? Will the Scottish parliament retain as much independence from the E.U. parliament as they do from the U.K. parliament? Will the Scottish government be in a position to protect the interests of its people against political machinations, or will they be too often asked to sacrifice on behalf of "the greater good"? I don't presume to have answers to those questions, so Scotland joining the E.U. may be the smart move. It just doesn't seem obviously so to me. [0] http://theconversation.com/how-democratic-is-the-european-union-59419 http://theconversation.com/how-democratic-is-the-european-un...
- tremon 10y ago
  (where they are 8% of the population)? They may be 8% of the population, but they have 0.15% of the government's power. Scottish law is written mainly in Westminster, in which the conservatives have an absolute majority. 56 of the 59 Scottish seats went to the SNP, only one to the conservatives.
  - ZenoArrow 10y ago
    56 seats out of 650 = 8.6%. Population of Scotland as a percentage of total UK population: 5.3 million people / 64.1 million people = 8.3%. Seems like the Scottish have about the same level of say as the rest of the UK population when it comes to the House of Commons. Plus, they have their own parliament in Holyrood.
    - tremon 10y ago
      I said power, not representation. But you're right, I should have said 0.3% (1/331), not 1/650.
pzh 10y ago
The Comission.
- themihai 10y ago
  This sounds quite democratic to me. Am I wrong? "A new team of 28 Commissioners (one from each EU Member State) is appointed every five years. The candidate for President of the Commission is proposed to the European Parliament by the European Council that decides by qualified majority and taking into account the elections to the European Parliament."
  - ZenoArrow 10y ago
    Commissioners don't represent the people that elected them, they take an oath to put the interests of the EU itself ahead of the wishes of member countries.
    - themihai 10y ago
      Well, the gov cabinet members are not elected either. People elect only key people(i.e. the PM/president etc) that have the power to delegate others to work on their behalf(i.e a chain of command that starts with the vote). I don't see how the interest of the EU would not be the interest of the member countries.
      - ZenoArrow 10y ago
        All cabinet members have a dual role, as they are also their constituent's MP. Furthermore, if they do a bad job in either role, they can be voted out at the next election. The same type of democratic accountability does not exist for EU Commissioners, as the general public can't vote for someone to replace them. > "I don't see how the interest of the EU would not be the interest of the member countries." Perhaps it's worth considering other groups they can be serving, namely themselves and big business. In terms of serving themselves, changes that expand the influence of the EU over member states can be of interest to the Commission even if they didn't serve the individual member states, as the goal could be to create a European super state (there are signs that this is what's planned for the EU, especially the Eurozone countries). As for serving big business, there are over 30,000 lobbyists in Brussels, that number wouldn't be so high if they weren't having some success. I could point out examples of the European Commission pushing forward proposals from big business if you're interested?

ZenoArrow 10y ago

I feel like a broken record at this point, but... The European Parliament has less power than every other parliament that I know of in one crucial way... They cannot propose new laws. Without the power to propose new laws, they cannot set the agenda for the EU. Only the European Commission can propose new laws, and Commissioners are not voted for by the general public. That's the key reason that the EU is not as democratic as the UK's political system, elected representatives do not have the full power to represent your interests, they can only shape what other people propose.

ropiku 10y ago
Commissioners are not voted for by the general public directly. Each country appoints one. Why is the general public not annoyed at the undemocratic Prime Minister ? He's not voted for directly either. Same for each member of the cabinet.
- ZenoArrow 10y ago
  How many times... the Prime Minister IS democratically elected! If you're interested in how it happens, follow the upcoming Conservative leader elections. As for the countries appointing a Commissioner, it doesn't matter as Commissioners have a clear mandate to avoid taking instructions from their own government. In other words, they don't represent the people that appoint them either. If you don't believe me, watch this video from the European Commission's own YouTube channel, see if you can spot the bit about not taking instructions from their own countries... http://youtu.be/nWpgO1EPO_Y http://youtu.be/nWpgO1EPO_Y
  - dragonwriter 10y ago
    > How many times... the Prime Minister IS democratically elected. If you're interested in how it happens, follow the upcoming Conservative leader elections. The upcoming Conservative leader elections will elect the new prime minister, and will not be a direct democratic election of the British populace, so that would seem to support the upthread claim that the PM is not directly, democratically elected.
    - ZenoArrow 10y ago
      I don't know if you're from the UK or not, but I'll assume for the moment that you're not... In the UK system, you vote for members of parliament (MP for short) that represent your local area. The majority of MPs have party affiliations, so in principal you vote based on both the local candidate and the party that you want to rule the country (in practice many people know diddly squat about their local MP and vote purely on party affiliation). So long as a party reaches past a set number of MPs in order to reach a parliamentary majority, the leader of that party becomes the prime minister. In principal, as people are voting for the best combination of MP candidate and party that suits them, there's no need for a new election to decide the new prime minister as the Conservatives still hold the parliamentary majority. In practice, as most people know very little about their MPs and are voting based on the personality and perceived competency of the party leader (and/or identification with the principals of the party), there will be people calling for a new general election. I didn't vote for the Conservatives, and I'd like to see Labour take their place, but now is not the right time to do so. Not only have we got the uncertainty surrounding Brexit, there's also a civil war going on in the Labour party, which is likely to get worse when the report from the Chilcot Inquiry on the Iraq war is released next week. We need stability right now, new UK elections can wait until 2020. Also, the leader of each party is voted for by the members of that party, and anyone can become a member of a party by paying a small membership fee. If you care about who is the leader of a particular party, you do have the choice to have a say in it.
    - deleted 10y ago
      [deleted]
tremon 10y ago
they cannot set the agenda for the EU. Only the European Commission can propose new laws That's unfortunately placed. The European Commission does not set the agenda for the EU either (that's done by the European Council, which is directly elected).
- ZenoArrow 10y ago
  In principal the European Council sets the agenda for the EU, but the European Council cannot propose new legislation. It's the legislation that sets the direction of the EU.

lliamander 10y ago

It is difficult to measure how 'democratic' a particular government is. Some have compared the E.U. favorably to the U.K. government while still acknowledging that it falls short in certain regards [0]. But democracy is about more than just voting. It really comes down to "how much say does the average person have in the rules that govern their lives?". Will the Scottish vote count for as much being a part of the E.U. (where they are only 1% of the population) as it will staying a part of the U.K. (where they are 8% of the population)? Will the Scottish parliament retain as much independence from the E.U. parliament as they do from the U.K. parliament? Will the Scottish government be in a position to protect the interests of its people against political machinations, or will they be too often asked to sacrifice on behalf of "the greater good"? I don't presume to have answers to those questions, so Scotland joining the E.U. may be the smart move. It just doesn't seem obviously so to me. [0] http://theconversation.com/how-democratic-is-the-european-union-59419 http://theconversation.com/how-democratic-is-the-european-un...

tremon 10y ago
(where they are 8% of the population)? They may be 8% of the population, but they have 0.15% of the government's power. Scottish law is written mainly in Westminster, in which the conservatives have an absolute majority. 56 of the 59 Scottish seats went to the SNP, only one to the conservatives.
- ZenoArrow 10y ago
  56 seats out of 650 = 8.6%. Population of Scotland as a percentage of total UK population: 5.3 million people / 64.1 million people = 8.3%. Seems like the Scottish have about the same level of say as the rest of the UK population when it comes to the House of Commons. Plus, they have their own parliament in Holyrood.
  - tremon 10y ago
    I said power, not representation. But you're right, I should have said 0.3% (1/331), not 1/650.

pzh 10y ago

The Comission.

themihai 10y ago
This sounds quite democratic to me. Am I wrong? "A new team of 28 Commissioners (one from each EU Member State) is appointed every five years. The candidate for President of the Commission is proposed to the European Parliament by the European Council that decides by qualified majority and taking into account the elections to the European Parliament."
- ZenoArrow 10y ago
  Commissioners don't represent the people that elected them, they take an oath to put the interests of the EU itself ahead of the wishes of member countries.
  - themihai 10y ago
    Well, the gov cabinet members are not elected either. People elect only key people(i.e. the PM/president etc) that have the power to delegate others to work on their behalf(i.e a chain of command that starts with the vote). I don't see how the interest of the EU would not be the interest of the member countries.
    - ZenoArrow 10y ago
      All cabinet members have a dual role, as they are also their constituent's MP. Furthermore, if they do a bad job in either role, they can be voted out at the next election. The same type of democratic accountability does not exist for EU Commissioners, as the general public can't vote for someone to replace them. > "I don't see how the interest of the EU would not be the interest of the member countries." Perhaps it's worth considering other groups they can be serving, namely themselves and big business. In terms of serving themselves, changes that expand the influence of the EU over member states can be of interest to the Commission even if they didn't serve the individual member states, as the goal could be to create a European super state (there are signs that this is what's planned for the EU, especially the Eurozone countries). As for serving big business, there are over 30,000 lobbyists in Brussels, that number wouldn't be so high if they weren't having some success. I could point out examples of the European Commission pushing forward proposals from big business if you're interested?