Veronica Anghel
Veronica Anghel is a political scientist and Assistant Professor at the Robert Schuman Center at the European University Institute. Previously, she was a lecturer at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) and a Max Weber Fellow in the Political Science Department at the European University Institute. Among others, she was a Fulbright Fellow at Stanford University and a Fellow at the Institute for Human Sciences in Vienna.
Veronica works at the intersection of comparative politics and international relations. She studies European integration and enlargement at the nexus between security-building and democratization. She previously worked as a foreign affairs adviser for the Romanian Presidency and the Romanian Senate. She is also an editorial fellow for Government & Opposition.
Veronica Anghel won the inaugural Rising Star Award of the European Consortium for Political Research in 2021. She tweets @anghel_v1.
Veronica works at the intersection of comparative politics and international relations. She studies European integration and enlargement at the nexus between security-building and democratization. She previously worked as a foreign affairs adviser for the Romanian Presidency and the Romanian Senate. She is also an editorial fellow for Government & Opposition.
Veronica Anghel won the inaugural Rising Star Award of the European Consortium for Political Research in 2021. She tweets @anghel_v1.
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Rather than trying to assess democratic stability by focusing on the architecture of government institutions and their record of performance, it is necessary to lay out plausible scenarios and assess what might go wrong and how poor performance can be identified early enough to allow timely correction. Ideally, such analysis would also identify who is, or should be, best able to perform the corrective intervention.
democratic institutions along the lines of Hungary or Poland. Although the
country has struggled to improve its democratic track record in the last years, it is still a laggard in securing an independent judiciary, fighting corruption, and upholding human rights compared to other EU member states. This is reflected in how elites manage governance in times of crisis. Disruptive events created the window of opportunity for incumbents to deploy discretionary leadership, including in the formation and termination of cabinets. Such interventions weakened constitutional checks and balances. As a result, Romanian democracy remains a work in progress, while politicians' preferred patterns of coalition governance are a source of stagnation.
to adapt its institutions to the long term economic and security threat created by the war. This indecision raises questions about the EU’s resilience (Anghel & Jones 2022) and its capacity-building (Genschel 2022). Second, we suggest that this absence of substantive adaptation follows a familiar failing-forward logic that is risky and may eventually prove unsustainable (Jones, Kelemen, & Meunier 2016). Finally, we suggest that a policy of realistic phasing-in for the countries of the Western Balkans would bridge the EU’s current double-minded approach. In so doing, the EU would continue its process of adaptation and resilience building and increase its chances to meet its security goals.
Rather than trying to assess democratic stability by focusing on the architecture of government institutions and their record of performance, it is necessary to lay out plausible scenarios and assess what might go wrong and how poor performance can be identified early enough to allow timely correction. Ideally, such analysis would also identify who is, or should be, best able to perform the corrective intervention.
democratic institutions along the lines of Hungary or Poland. Although the
country has struggled to improve its democratic track record in the last years, it is still a laggard in securing an independent judiciary, fighting corruption, and upholding human rights compared to other EU member states. This is reflected in how elites manage governance in times of crisis. Disruptive events created the window of opportunity for incumbents to deploy discretionary leadership, including in the formation and termination of cabinets. Such interventions weakened constitutional checks and balances. As a result, Romanian democracy remains a work in progress, while politicians' preferred patterns of coalition governance are a source of stagnation.
to adapt its institutions to the long term economic and security threat created by the war. This indecision raises questions about the EU’s resilience (Anghel & Jones 2022) and its capacity-building (Genschel 2022). Second, we suggest that this absence of substantive adaptation follows a familiar failing-forward logic that is risky and may eventually prove unsustainable (Jones, Kelemen, & Meunier 2016). Finally, we suggest that a policy of realistic phasing-in for the countries of the Western Balkans would bridge the EU’s current double-minded approach. In so doing, the EU would continue its process of adaptation and resilience building and increase its chances to meet its security goals.