LA VIE DÉMOCRATIQUE DE L’UNION EUROPÉENNE
DEMOCRATIC LIFE IN THE EUROPEAN UNION

Summary/Abstract: The article is devoted to the analysis of the origin, role and goals of civil society, which over time has become an indispensable actor in the political life of the EU. Even Jean Monnet, one of the founders of the communitarian method, understood that the condition for the success of such a unique form of association lies in the inclusion of all the available forces of the people in the process of making decisions of general interest. When he mentioned the people, Jean Monnet did not mean any abstract entity, but that trade unionists, industrialists, administration, all people should be involved in something that ultimately affects their lives. So, although it may not have existed under this name, the idea of direct involvement of the people in the political life of the EU existed from the very beginning. The first part of the article is more theoretical and is devoted to the development of the idea of civil society, especially in the light of Jürgen Habermas' philosophy. The fact that his concept of civil society is the most solid and that it is increasingly used is confirmed by the fact that only civil society recognizes itself in it and finds an attractive framework for defining its identity, as well as support to fight for its rights. In order to better illustrate the central place that civil society occupies in Jürgen Habermas' legal and political philosophy, it is necessary to briefly refer to his global vision of contemporary society. Habermas notes that within today's complex societies, there are two specialized systems, each of which lives by itself. They are the economic system and the administrative system and each has different rules according to which it functions. The economic exchange of supply and demand in the market is coordinated by money, while the work of the administrative system rests on hierarchical authority. Each of us is thus involved in both systems, either as a consumer or as an economic agent, or as a user of services or an employee of the state. However, Habermas points out that there are some forms of communication that manage to resist the rules on which these two systems are based. He calls that system the World of Life, and in it activities take place through communication. In exchanges in this World of Life, individuals participate neither as economic nor as administrative agents, but as citizens, as members of civil society. And law is an instrument that enables that world of life, i.e. civil society to impose its wishes, choices and values both on government institutions and economic factors. The second part of the article is devoted to the proposals contained in the text of the Constitution regarding the place of civil society in today's EU. A special chapter deals with the introduction of the concept of participatory democracy. In addition to representative democracy, the Constitution also treats participatory democracy, i.e. participation of civil society in the process of making joint decisions. The importance of this article is that, for the first time, the role of those intermediary structures, that is, organizations and associations of civil society, is explicitly mentioned and given importance in a European text. Such recognition of civil society should play an important role in alleviating what we call the democratic deficit of the EU where citizens feel alienated from the EU and cut off from decision-making. The Constitution also foresees the possibility of a popular initiative according to which EU citizens will be able to propose a law to the Commission, if the petition is signed by more than a million people. The Constitution also recognizes the importance of social dialogue and the role of social partners at the level of the Union, taking into account the diversity of national systems, then increases the powers of the European mediator and places special emphasis on the principle of transparency. Since, according to some theories, democracy depends on the extent to which citizens are able to participate in public discussion, the ultimate goal was to make the Union's functioning more transparent. Regarding the recognition of the status of the church and the establishment of a regular dialogue with it, despite the fact that this article was the subject of numerous discussions, it was ultimately retained in the draft Constitution. Thus, civil society has become an important actor on the political scene of the EU, and the Constitution actually only transferred to paper what already exists to a large extent in practice. The continuation of the expansion of the body of civil society rights is one of the inevitabilities on the way to the democratization of the EU, the reduction of the democratic deficit and the return of citizens' trust in European institutions, which are also prerequisites for the further progress of the EU.

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