Transnational intra-party dynamics on European democratic reforms

One of the core elements of the European Union's (EU) democratic deficit is the lack of a genuine supranational political competition. Some processes were intended to mitigate these effects, such as the introduction of the Spitzenkandidaten (SK) and the possibility of creating Transnational Lists (TL) for European Parliament (EP) elections. These processes would be accompanied by a strengthening of the role of the European political parties (henceforth, Europarties) as the only transnational party federations capable of mobilising their national members in decisions beyond the EP. Europarties would thus be able to promote transnational candidates to the European institutions and become true political parties at the EU-level. However, Europarties are heterogeneous organisations of national parties, where ideological dynamics of these transnational parties can be subject to party dissidence, with differentiated positions on European democracy during EU elections. By adopting a principal-agent model of party organisation, the aim of this research is to analyse what effects did Europarty internal dynamics have had on the creation of a common position on the SK and TL. Based on evidence from Europarties, we suggest that supranational intra-party dissidence is low regarding EU democratic reforms.