Author: Antje Wiener

Title: Finality vs. Enlargement - Constitutive Practices and Opposing Rationales in the Reconstruction of Europe.

Abstract:

The paper argues that the parallel development of the debate over political finality, on the one hand, and compliance with the accession acquis, on the other, brings two opposing action rationales to the fore. Depending upon how deliberation about finality and compliance proceeds, compliance can either mean conflict or smooth adaptation and successful revision of political procedures. The benchmark for success might not be constituted by an ever growing reservoir of detailed elaborations on governance principles or yet another plan to bring Europe 'closer to the citizen' but might lie in a concept that enables the establishment of equal access to deliberation for all participating parties. The paper focuses on the necessity of interdisciplinary work that straddles the boundaries of law and the social sciences in order to bring the constitutive impact of the interrelated finality and compliance rationales to the fore. It argues that resonance with evolving constitutional substance will be enhanced by a constitutionalized space for deliberation that allows for dialogic politics. Theoretically, the paper advances a societal approach to compliance.

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