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Alternation, Inclusion and the European Union

Document Cited authorities 1 Cited in Related
Vincent
AuthorAndré Kaiser
Published date01 December 2002
Date01 December 2002
DOIhttp://doi.org/10.1177/1465116502003004003
Subject MatterArticles
Alternation, Inclusion and the
European Union
André Kaiser
University of Cologne, Germany
ABSTRACT
Current endeavours to employ the concept of consociational
democracy in European Union research are misleading. This
critique starts from a minimalist concept of democracy with
alternation and inclusion of preferences in government
formation as a parsimonious way to measure the extent to
which political systems are majoritarian, consensual or even
consociational in character. It then presents empirical results
for the current EU member states and examines whether the
European Union can be analysed in a similar way by using
equivalent indicators. Despite a superficial resemblance to
consociational systems, a crucial variable is missing in the
EU: the formation of a stable grand coalition enclosing all
institutions involved in decision-making. What has been
wrongly termed consociationalism at the European level is
best regarded as intergovernmentalism.
445
European Union Politics
[1465-1165(200212)3:4]
Volume 3 (4): 445–458: 028518
Copyright© 2002
SAGE Publications
London, Thousand Oaks CA,
New Delhi
KEY WORDS
alternation
consociational democracy
inclusion
institutional analysis
intergovernmentalism
03 kaiser (jk/d) 25/10/02 3:05 pm Page 445

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