In this paper, Espen D. H. Olsen and Hans-Jörg Trenz confront some commonly held assumptions and objections with regard to the feasibility of deliberation in a transnational and pluri-lingual setting. To illustrate our argument, we rely on a solid set of both quantitative and qualitative data...

In this paper, Espen D. H. Olsen and Hans-Jörg Trenz confront some commonly held assumptions and objections with regard to the feasibility of deliberation in a transnational and pluri-lingual setting. To illustrate our argument, we rely on a solid set of both quantitative and qualitative data...

This conceptual paper provides a working definition of politicisation of European integration, based on a literature review. Politicisation has often been used by political scientists interested in European integration. We observe that research using the concept is rarely interested in the...

The development of post-national democracy in Europe depends on the development of an overarching communicative space that functions as a public sphere, viz., a common room created by speakers who are discussing common affairs in front of an audience. This is a place where opinions ideally are...

The attempt to pin down the constitutive elements of the European public sphere is typically marked by ambivalence between normative and descriptive elements. In normative terms, the European public sphere is identified through the standards which should be used to assess the legitimacy of...

Integration may occur through coercion and intergovernmental bargaining - through blackmail, tradition, functional adaptation, copying, diffusion or exit - but it may also occur through reflexive reason-giving and entrenched commitments. The usefulness of such an approach to transnational and...

Norway and the EU enlargement: negotiations and attitudes In May 2004 the EU will enlarge. Simultaneously, the new members will become members of the EEA. This article discusses the negotiations on the enlargement of the EEA. During the negotiations the EFTA countries were faced with tough...