Centripetal democracy : democratic legitimacy and regional integration in Belgium, Switzerland and the European Union

Defence date: 29 June 2015 ; Examining Board: Professor Rainer Bauböck, EUI (Supervisor); Professor Philippe Van Parijs, UC Louvain (Co-supervisor); Professor Hanspeter Kriesi, EUI; Professor Nadia Urbinati, Columbia University. ; This dissertation aims to arrive at a model of democratic legitimacy for the European Union. There is, however, a strain of thought pre-dominant in political theory since the nineteenth century that doubts the capacity of political systems constituted by multiple public spheres to have sustainable democratic systems. This view is referred to here as the lingua franca... Mehr ...