{"title":"A climate of optimism? EU policy-making, political science and the democratization of Central and Eastern Europe (2000–2015)","authors":"Lise Esther Herman, James Dawson, Aurelia Ananda","doi":"10.1057/s41295-023-00364-2","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"Abstract Democratic erosion in the EU’s Central and Eastern European (CEE) member states has confounded EU policy-makers. In this paper, we investigate the assumptions behind the climate of optimism about CEE democratization that prevailed in EU decision-making before and after the 5th and 6th enlargements, and the extent to which political science participated in this intellectual climate. Based on a qualitative analysis of EU decision-making in the early twenty-first century and a quantitative analysis of 500 randomly sampled papers published between 2000 and 2015, we find that both policy makers and the most influential research in political science shared a bias towards optimism structured by common assumptions: A procedural understanding of democracy, a rational institutionalist belief in the EU’s capacity to bring these procedures about with the use of incentives and the related assumption that sociocultural dimensions of democracy would eventually follow institutions. We argue that these common assumptions help to explain both the EU’s failure to pre-empt and respond proportionately to democratic erosion, and the failure of our discipline to check that optimism.","PeriodicalId":51590,"journal":{"name":"Comparative European Politics","volume":"133 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6000,"publicationDate":"2023-09-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Comparative European Politics","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1057/s41295-023-00364-2","RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"POLITICAL SCIENCE","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Abstract Democratic erosion in the EU’s Central and Eastern European (CEE) member states has confounded EU policy-makers. In this paper, we investigate the assumptions behind the climate of optimism about CEE democratization that prevailed in EU decision-making before and after the 5th and 6th enlargements, and the extent to which political science participated in this intellectual climate. Based on a qualitative analysis of EU decision-making in the early twenty-first century and a quantitative analysis of 500 randomly sampled papers published between 2000 and 2015, we find that both policy makers and the most influential research in political science shared a bias towards optimism structured by common assumptions: A procedural understanding of democracy, a rational institutionalist belief in the EU’s capacity to bring these procedures about with the use of incentives and the related assumption that sociocultural dimensions of democracy would eventually follow institutions. We argue that these common assumptions help to explain both the EU’s failure to pre-empt and respond proportionately to democratic erosion, and the failure of our discipline to check that optimism.
期刊介绍：
Comparative European Politics (CEP) arises out of a unique editorial partnership linking political scientists in Europe and North America. CEP defines its scope broadly to include the comparative politics and political economy of the whole of contemporary Europe within and beyond the European Union, the processes of European integration and enlargement and the place of Europe and European states within international/global political and economic dynamics.
As the most regionally integrated political and economic space within the global system, Europe presents a particular opportunity to political scientists to explore the dynamic relationship between transnational, international and domestic processes and practices. The editors welcome original theoretical, empirical and theoretically-informed pieces which deal with these relationships.
Such issues pose awkward questions about the limitations of existing disciplinary perspectives and theoretical conventions, requiring theoretical and methodological innovation and an ability to develop genuinely interdisciplinary approaches. CEP aims to publish exceptional work prepared to rise to this challenge.
The journal is rigorously peer-reviewed. It neither reflects nor represents any particular school or approach, nor does it restrict itself to particular methodologies or theoretical perspectives. Rather, whilst promoting interdisciplinarity and a greater dialogue between the various sub-disciplines of European political analysis, Comparative European Politics publishes the best and most original work in the field. It publishes substantial articles marking either core empirical developments, theoretical innovation or, preferably, both. The journal particularly encourages pieces which seek to develop the link between substantive empirical investigations and theoretical elaboration and those which transcend the artificial separation of domestic, comparative and international analysis. The editors publish a limited number of debate pieces and review articles related to issues of contemporary theoretical and empirical controversy. Whether solicited or unsolicited these are exposed to the same exacting process of peer review.
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