Joseph Lacey
Biographic Data
| ID | 4165659 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Joseph Lacey |
| GIVEN NAMES | Joseph |
| FAMILY NAME | Lacey |
| SIGNATURE | LACEY J |
| AFFILIATIONS | University College Dublin |
| ORCID | 0000-0001-9290-8283 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 17 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 80 |
| WORKS AS AUTHOR | 17 |
| WORKS AS EDITOR | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2014 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 6 |
Shades of Negativity in European Parliament Debates
This article seeks to explore the nature and determinants of political conflict in European Parliament (EP) debates within the unique context of the Rule of Law Crisis (RoLC). While previous research on this topic has mainly studied the ideological dimension of this conflict, we shift focus to the affective dimension, analysing the roles of negative sentiment and motive-based criticism through a quantitative analysis of 53 hand-coded debates. We …
Does the radical left stand up for liberal democracy in the European parliament? Evidence from 53 debates on the rule of law crisis
While the radical left has strong connections to the tradition of liberal democracy, it also has associations with authoritarian forms of rule and a tolerance of illiberal transgressions when perpetrated by sister parties. Through an exploration of 53 European Parliamentary debates from 2011 to 2022, this paper illuminates a hitherto neglected part of the Rule of Law Crisis, namely the extent to which radical left parties defend liberal democracy…
On popular votes and the problems of self-government
This paper attempts to demonstrate that bottom-up popular vote processes (the optional referendum and citizens’ initiative) focused on ordinary legislation can help to improve democratic self-government by uniquely facilitating the development and expression of various forms of political agency. Most significantly, it is argued that such popular vote processes can be designed in ways that endow them with significant deliberative credentials. Meth…
Why does the European Right accommodate backsliding states? An analysis of 24 European People’s Party votes (2011–2019)
Over the last decade, the EU’s fundamental values have been under threat at the national level, in particular among several Central and Eastern European states that joined the EU since 2004. During this time, the European People’s Party (EPP) has been criticized for its unwillingness to vote for measures that would sanction the Hungarian Fidesz government, one of its members, in breach of key democratic principles since 2010. In this paper, we se…
EU aid for trade
Does the EU’s Aid for Trade (AfT) initiative contribute to global justice? Complementing work that considers distributive justice, in this paper we adopt the central tenets of the republican theory of non-domination as a regulative ideal for justice in international relations. We evaluate the extent to which the EU’s AfT initiative results from reduced political domination in international trade negotiations, and if that then mitigates economic d…
The representative deficit in different European Party Systems
This paper explores the extent to which different party systems in Europe effectively represent their citizens. We argue that many European countries suffer from a “representative deficit”, which occurs when a significant portion of citizens have to vote for a political party whose stated views are actually quite different from their own. We measure the extent of this deficit in different European countries using data from EU Profiler and euandi,…
The Democratic Production of Political Cohesion
Balancing the rights and duties of European and national citizens
Published online: 23 Aug 2018
Centripetal Democracy
Centripetal democracy is the idea that legitimate democratic institutions set in motion forms of citizen practice and representative behaviour that serve as powerful drivers of political identity formation. Partisan modes of political representation in the context of multifaceted electoral and direct democratic voting opportunities are emphasized on this model. There is, however, a strain of thought predominant in political theory that doubts the…
Conclusion to Part I
At this point in the book, I have developed the conceptual resources sufficient for providing a normative democratic assessment of modern political systems. Crucially, what must be kept in mind at all times is the extent to which the democratic purpose is satisfied by a) the voting space compound, b) the public sphere, and c) the nature of democratic representation (especially by political parties). These are the three key interrelated democratic…
European boundaries in question
This introduction provides a descriptive typology and normative analysis of the ways boundaries are being questioned in Europe. We distinguish between boundary-making (defining or redefining the territorial borders of a polity), boundary-crossing (determining the rules of access to territorial borders) and boundary-unbundling (allowing boundary-making and boundary-crossing to vary between policies and polities), noting each of these categories po…
Enlargement, association, accession – a normative account of membership in a union of states
This paper deals with the legitimacy of the EU’s external borders and the decision-making rules for changing them. First, while the EU should not indefinitely expand, we can identify no normative grounds for precluding in advance any liberal democratic nation-states from participation in the European project. Second, for those countries having more or less thick legal ties with the EU, or who are otherwise substantially affected by European decis…
European Boundaries in Question
Europe’s voting space and the problem of second-order elections
This article offers an empirically driven critical consideration of the idea of transnationalising Europe’s voting space, which would mean allowing European citizens to vote for a party from any member state at the European Parliament elections. We argue that such a move would reduce the second-order problem in European elections, as it would force political parties to move away from campaigning solely on national issues. We also claim that it wo…
Conceptually Mapping the European Union
This article identifies demoi-cracy as the most robust category for understanding the European Union, and three tasks are undertaken to contribute towards this conceptualisation. First, it is explained how demoi-cracy differs from other popular categories that have been used to describe the EU and why it stands out as the most accurate. Second, contrary to the view that places demoi-cracy in contrast to political systems existing with a singular …
Considerations on English as a Global Lingua Franca
Central to Philippe Van Parijs’ recent text, Linguistic Justice for Europe and for the World, are claims that the emergence of English as a global lingua franca is (1) inevitable, (2) necessary for transnational justice and (3) to be accelerated. After first outlining the reasoning behind these claims, this article then goes on to argue that there are good reasons to doubt that English will inevitably become a global lingua franca; the absence of…
Must Europe Be Swiss? On the Idea of a Voting Space and the Possibility of a Multilingual Demos
Contrary to the view that linguistic homogeneity is required to create a viable demos, this article argues that linguistic diversity can be a permanent feature of any democratic community, so long as there is a unified and robust voting space that provides a common intentional object, around which distinct public spheres can aesthetically organize their political discourse. An attempt to explain how such a voting space operates in Switzerland, th…
Why does the European Right accommodate backsliding states? An analysis of 24 European People’s Party votes (2011–2019)
Over the last decade, the EU’s fundamental values have been under threat at the national level, in particular among several Central and Eastern European states that joined the EU since 2004. During this time, the European People’s Party (EPP) has been criticized for its unwillingness to vote for measures that would sanction the Hungarian Fidesz government, one of its members, in breach of key democratic principles since 2010. In this paper, we se…
Must Europe Be Swiss? On the Idea of a Voting Space and the Possibility of a Multilingual Demos
Contrary to the view that linguistic homogeneity is required to create a viable demos, this article argues that linguistic diversity can be a permanent feature of any democratic community, so long as there is a unified and robust voting space that provides a common intentional object, around which distinct public spheres can aesthetically organize their political discourse. An attempt to explain how such a voting space operates in Switzerland, th…
Europe’s voting space and the problem of second-order elections
This article offers an empirically driven critical consideration of the idea of transnationalising Europe’s voting space, which would mean allowing European citizens to vote for a party from any member state at the European Parliament elections. We argue that such a move would reduce the second-order problem in European elections, as it would force political parties to move away from campaigning solely on national issues. We also claim that it wo…
Conceptually Mapping the European Union
This article identifies demoi-cracy as the most robust category for understanding the European Union, and three tasks are undertaken to contribute towards this conceptualisation. First, it is explained how demoi-cracy differs from other popular categories that have been used to describe the EU and why it stands out as the most accurate. Second, contrary to the view that places demoi-cracy in contrast to political systems existing with a singular …
Balancing the rights and duties of European and national citizens
Published online: 23 Aug 2018
Considerations on English as a Global Lingua Franca
Central to Philippe Van Parijs’ recent text, Linguistic Justice for Europe and for the World, are claims that the emergence of English as a global lingua franca is (1) inevitable, (2) necessary for transnational justice and (3) to be accelerated. After first outlining the reasoning behind these claims, this article then goes on to argue that there are good reasons to doubt that English will inevitably become a global lingua franca; the absence of…
The representative deficit in different European Party Systems
This paper explores the extent to which different party systems in Europe effectively represent their citizens. We argue that many European countries suffer from a “representative deficit”, which occurs when a significant portion of citizens have to vote for a political party whose stated views are actually quite different from their own. We measure the extent of this deficit in different European countries using data from EU Profiler and euandi,…
EU aid for trade
Does the EU’s Aid for Trade (AfT) initiative contribute to global justice? Complementing work that considers distributive justice, in this paper we adopt the central tenets of the republican theory of non-domination as a regulative ideal for justice in international relations. We evaluate the extent to which the EU’s AfT initiative results from reduced political domination in international trade negotiations, and if that then mitigates economic d…
European boundaries in question
This introduction provides a descriptive typology and normative analysis of the ways boundaries are being questioned in Europe. We distinguish between boundary-making (defining or redefining the territorial borders of a polity), boundary-crossing (determining the rules of access to territorial borders) and boundary-unbundling (allowing boundary-making and boundary-crossing to vary between policies and polities), noting each of these categories po…
The Democratic Production of Political Cohesion
Enlargement, association, accession – a normative account of membership in a union of states
This paper deals with the legitimacy of the EU’s external borders and the decision-making rules for changing them. First, while the EU should not indefinitely expand, we can identify no normative grounds for precluding in advance any liberal democratic nation-states from participation in the European project. Second, for those countries having more or less thick legal ties with the EU, or who are otherwise substantially affected by European decis…
Must Europe Be Swiss? On the Idea of a Voting Space and the Possibility of a Multilingual Demos
Contrary to the view that linguistic homogeneity is required to create a viable demos, this article argues that linguistic diversity can be a permanent feature of any democratic community, so long as there is a unified and robust voting space that provides a common intentional object, around which distinct public spheres can aesthetically organize their political discourse. An attempt to explain how such a voting space operates in Switzerland, th…
Conceptually Mapping the European Union
This article identifies demoi-cracy as the most robust category for understanding the European Union, and three tasks are undertaken to contribute towards this conceptualisation. First, it is explained how demoi-cracy differs from other popular categories that have been used to describe the EU and why it stands out as the most accurate. Second, contrary to the view that places demoi-cracy in contrast to political systems existing with a singular …
Considerations on English as a Global Lingua Franca
Central to Philippe Van Parijs’ recent text, Linguistic Justice for Europe and for the World, are claims that the emergence of English as a global lingua franca is (1) inevitable, (2) necessary for transnational justice and (3) to be accelerated. After first outlining the reasoning behind these claims, this article then goes on to argue that there are good reasons to doubt that English will inevitably become a global lingua franca; the absence of…
Europe’s voting space and the problem of second-order elections
This article offers an empirically driven critical consideration of the idea of transnationalising Europe’s voting space, which would mean allowing European citizens to vote for a party from any member state at the European Parliament elections. We argue that such a move would reduce the second-order problem in European elections, as it would force political parties to move away from campaigning solely on national issues. We also claim that it wo…
Centripetal Democracy
Centripetal democracy is the idea that legitimate democratic institutions set in motion forms of citizen practice and representative behaviour that serve as powerful drivers of political identity formation. Partisan modes of political representation in the context of multifaceted electoral and direct democratic voting opportunities are emphasized on this model. There is, however, a strain of thought predominant in political theory that doubts the…
Conclusion to Part I
At this point in the book, I have developed the conceptual resources sufficient for providing a normative democratic assessment of modern political systems. Crucially, what must be kept in mind at all times is the extent to which the democratic purpose is satisfied by a) the voting space compound, b) the public sphere, and c) the nature of democratic representation (especially by political parties). These are the three key interrelated democratic…
European boundaries in question
This introduction provides a descriptive typology and normative analysis of the ways boundaries are being questioned in Europe. We distinguish between boundary-making (defining or redefining the territorial borders of a polity), boundary-crossing (determining the rules of access to territorial borders) and boundary-unbundling (allowing boundary-making and boundary-crossing to vary between policies and polities), noting each of these categories po…
Enlargement, association, accession – a normative account of membership in a union of states
This paper deals with the legitimacy of the EU’s external borders and the decision-making rules for changing them. First, while the EU should not indefinitely expand, we can identify no normative grounds for precluding in advance any liberal democratic nation-states from participation in the European project. Second, for those countries having more or less thick legal ties with the EU, or who are otherwise substantially affected by European decis…
European Boundaries in Question
Balancing the rights and duties of European and national citizens
Published online: 23 Aug 2018
The Democratic Production of Political Cohesion
EU aid for trade
Does the EU’s Aid for Trade (AfT) initiative contribute to global justice? Complementing work that considers distributive justice, in this paper we adopt the central tenets of the republican theory of non-domination as a regulative ideal for justice in international relations. We evaluate the extent to which the EU’s AfT initiative results from reduced political domination in international trade negotiations, and if that then mitigates economic d…
The representative deficit in different European Party Systems
This paper explores the extent to which different party systems in Europe effectively represent their citizens. We argue that many European countries suffer from a “representative deficit”, which occurs when a significant portion of citizens have to vote for a political party whose stated views are actually quite different from their own. We measure the extent of this deficit in different European countries using data from EU Profiler and euandi,…
On popular votes and the problems of self-government
This paper attempts to demonstrate that bottom-up popular vote processes (the optional referendum and citizens’ initiative) focused on ordinary legislation can help to improve democratic self-government by uniquely facilitating the development and expression of various forms of political agency. Most significantly, it is argued that such popular vote processes can be designed in ways that endow them with significant deliberative credentials. Meth…
Why does the European Right accommodate backsliding states? An analysis of 24 European People’s Party votes (2011–2019)
Over the last decade, the EU’s fundamental values have been under threat at the national level, in particular among several Central and Eastern European states that joined the EU since 2004. During this time, the European People’s Party (EPP) has been criticized for its unwillingness to vote for measures that would sanction the Hungarian Fidesz government, one of its members, in breach of key democratic principles since 2010. In this paper, we se…
Shades of Negativity in European Parliament Debates
This article seeks to explore the nature and determinants of political conflict in European Parliament (EP) debates within the unique context of the Rule of Law Crisis (RoLC). While previous research on this topic has mainly studied the ideological dimension of this conflict, we shift focus to the affective dimension, analysing the roles of negative sentiment and motive-based criticism through a quantitative analysis of 53 hand-coded debates. We …
Does the radical left stand up for liberal democracy in the European parliament? Evidence from 53 debates on the rule of law crisis
While the radical left has strong connections to the tradition of liberal democracy, it also has associations with authoritarian forms of rule and a tolerance of illiberal transgressions when perpetrated by sister parties. Through an exploration of 53 European Parliamentary debates from 2011 to 2022, this paper illuminates a hitherto neglected part of the Rule of Law Crisis, namely the extent to which radical left parties defend liberal democracy…
Political science (13 works) · Politics (13 works) · Law (12 works) · Law (11 works) · Sociology (10 works) · European Union Policy and Governance (9 works) · Democracy (8 works) · Economics (8 works) · European union (7 works) · Political economy (7 works)