Principled Politicization: When Citizens Debate the EU and its Regime Principles

In this article, building on de Wilde (2011) and Schattschneider (1960), we elaborate on the notion of principled politicization, a process of politicization by which regime principles become salient in public debate in a way that also articulates or implies structural alternatives. First, we argue that in contrast to other conceptualizations of politicization, which focus on policy issues, or “issue‐based politicization,” principled politicization concerns another type of political conflict that differs in terms of topic (regime principles) and content (alternatives). As such, this type of debate is inherently related to the concept of democracy. Second, adopting an applied political theory approach, we put the notion of principled politicization to the test by empirically studying citizen discussions about the EU. We examine whether citizens draw on EU regime principles and discuss alternatives. To do so, we conduct a qualitative secondary analysis of four datasets, consisting of interviews and focus groups with participants from different socio‐economic backgrounds and political leanings. This data was collected in Belgium, France, and the UK at four different points in time (1995–2019). We report that some citizens do engage with EU regime principles and consider alternatives to the principles they observe being implemented. This article suggests that politicization can strengthen EU democratization when debates include and, in fact, reflect the challenges to democratic principles themselves.