The legal notion of democracy is only its transformation into a workable institutional framework, which had to be adjusted over time according to the development of the idea itself. A major strand of research in political science currently analyses the socio-economic conditions of public participation and the various forms of informal participation. Without taking, just to give one example which is particularly relevant for the EU context, the role and influence of interest groups in the decision-making process into account, any study of democratic legitimacy seems shaky. In the same conceptual vein lays Kluth's neglect of the deliberative element of the democratic process. But public deliberation is impossible if important information is not, or only with great difficulty, accessible for the broader public.
Transparency is therefore an important precondition for democracy.
Another aspect that would have been important to consider, even on the basis of Kluth's own criteria, is the question of democratic legitimacy in the context of the implementation of Community legislation, an issue which has been discussed in the legal literature under the heading 'Comitology' for decades now. Taking all this into account, one may wonder whether there is really no democratic deficit. This site is part of the Academy of European Law online , a joint partnership of the Harvard Law School Jean Monnet Chair - EU Center at Harvard and the Academy of European Law at the European University Institute.