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Introduction: European politics nowadays
Zoltán Simon!
The European Union has been struggling with a multilevel poly-crisis for more
than a decade, leading to a legitimacy crisis that weakens popular support for
European integration. Political leaders try to compensate output legitimacy
losses on the input legitimacy side, including through the politicisation of
the Union. However, this runs counter to the trend of increasing political
mistrust, discontent, indifference, and disconnect among citizens in national
political systems across Europe. This trend is rooted in a set of intertwined
transformations in contemporary European societies and politics. Domestic
turbulences also have a negative impact on Europe influence in the global
arena of intensifying power competition. All these factors generate growing
fears in citizens: fears of disintegration at the European level, fears of disorder
and instability at the national level, fears of disorientation at the individual
level, fears of becoming irrelevant at the global level, and fears of the future,
which seems to be full of uncertainties and risks. These fears, if ignored or
left unanswered, have a dangerous potential to evolve into a new political era
of anxiety in Europe, with a presumably devastating effect in the continent.
Keywords: European politics, poly-crisis, legitimacy crisis, political malaise,
politics of anxiety
and things are made worse by waves provoked - often intentionally - by the
manoeuvres of other large vessels. As a matter of fact, the EU boat is a strange
one itself. It was initially built as a merchant ship, but has since been partially
transformed into a liner. However, this transformation has never been fully
completed, and no one really knows whether it ever will be. Many challenge
this idea, while some are even wondering whether the boat’s initial profile
The views and comments presented in this book chapter are part of the author's individual
research and publication activities, and do not represent in any way or to any extent the
positions of the institution he is an official of.