ECPR

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ECPR

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EU Free Trade Agreements and Democratic Justice

Democracy
European Union
Political Theory
Tom Theuns
Departments of Political Science and Public Administration, Universiteit Leiden
Tom Theuns
Departments of Political Science and Public Administration, Universiteit Leiden

Abstract

Article 7 of the TEU, which is supposed to protect compliance with EU 'fundamental values', has been much discussed recently, particularly in the context of Polish reforms of the Supreme Court argued to threaten the Rule of Law in Poland, but also with respect to Hungary's self-declared 'illiberal' turn. Many commentators in academia and the media have criticised Article 7 for requiring unanimity of all member states but the state putatively under sanction. This is supposedly the core reason why the Article is not used even in cases where breach seems clearest. Further critical commentary has focussed on the limited sanctions that are available, especially the absence of an option to eventually terminate the membership of a state violating fundamental values. In this article, I critically engage the Article 7 procedure as it currently is codified in the TEU and also three of the main proposals for its reform: 1) diluting the threshold of voting states required to implement article 7; 2) widening the scope of possible economic sanctions against states deemed to be in violation; 3) widening the scope of political sanctions, up to and including expulsion from the Union. Drawing on literature on militant democracy and felon disenfranchisement I explore: i) problems associated with granting the ECJ a larger role in adjudicating the legitimacy of sanctions and; ii) incoherences I argue arise from withdrawing states' voting rights as a 'democracy and rule of law protection' mechanism. I argue that weakening the super-majoritarian demands of instigating Article 7 would be democratically legitimate but ought also be assessed on pragmatist grounds. Further, I argue that political sanctions are often themselves in conflict with EU fundamental values such as democratic equality and should be largely abandoned. In contrast, economic sanctions - particularly the withdrawal of (some of) the benefits of economic integration - are argued to be legitimate, feasible, and plausibly more effective.