Strategic Responses to Domestic Contestation: The EU Between Politicisation and Depoliticisation

This paper conceptualises 'bottom-up' politicisation in Europe’s multi-level system. We argue that EU-level actors respond strategically to the functional and political pressures ‘travelling up’ from the member states. Perceiving domestic dissensus as either constraining or enabling, actors display both self-restraint and assertiveness in their responses. Motivated by the survival of the EU as a system ‘under attack’, and by the preservation of their own substantive and procedural powers, actors choose to either politicise or depoliticise decision-making, behaviour and policy outcomes at the supranational level. We discuss the choices that actors make ‘under stress’ at the EU-level – ranging from ‘restrained depoliticisation’ to ‘assertive politicisation’ – focusing in particular on the European Commission, the ECB and the Council of the EU.