Ejection for Democracy Protection: On the Expulsion of EU Member States

Saving Popular Sovereignty From a Slow Death in the European Union

“…As a normative concept of authority, this right derives from a principle. Most normative studies assess the democratic legitimacy of EU interventions, such as the Article 7 procedure and expulsion (e.g., Olsen, 2022a;Patberg, 2020Patberg, , 2021Theuns, 2022) or other important procedural considerations of EU democracy protection (Bellamy and Kröger, 2021;Theuns, 2020).…”

“…As far as I am aware, only Olsen (2022b) offers a comprehensive moral framework for assessing EU interventions, although this somewhat surprisingly does not include the legitimacy of expelling an autocratic member state (although he does address this elsewhere, Olsen, 2022a). Whilst these scholars contribute important normative assessments, they often take for granted the EU's normative authority to intervene or refer to articles in the Treaties.…”

“…Most normative studies assess the democratic legitimacy of EU interventions, such as the Article 7 procedure and expulsion (e.g., Olsen, 2022a; Patberg, 2020, 2021; Theuns, 2022) or other important procedural considerations of EU democracy protection (Bellamy and Kröger, 2021; Theuns, 2020). As far as I am aware, only Olsen (2022b) offers a comprehensive moral framework for assessing EU interventions, although this somewhat surprisingly does not include the legitimacy of expelling an autocratic member state (although he does address this elsewhere, Olsen, 2022a). Whilst these scholars contribute important normative assessments, they often take for granted the EU's normative authority to intervene or refer to articles in the Treaties.…”

“…However, if a member state remains an electoral autocracy, then the rebooting of the EU becomes a democratically legitimate response. The possibility to ‘withdraw and refound’ has been touched upon in a very recent debate over whether Article 7 and expulsion from the EU can ever be justified (Olsen, 2022a; Theuns, 2022, p. 709; see also Chamon and Theuns, 2021). This is a very timely debate, because it appears increasingly likely that a new situation might emerge in which the EU effectively includes an electoral autocracy (Kelemen, 2020).…”

“…Admittedly, these mechanisms bring about roughly the same situation, but from a democratic perspective, they are not equally desirable. Olsen (2022a), when critiquing Theuns's arguments for expulsion, recognizes that rebooting is compatible with democratic ideas. His main objection is that citizens' rights should take precedence over those of their states.…”