What are the challenges facing the EU in its attempts to establish democratic institutional structures ?

"It is time to recognise that the Union has moved from a diplomatic to a democratic process, with policies that reach deep into national societies and daily life" . This statement by the European Commission subsumes ten years of political and academic on-going debate on the "democratic deficit" of the EU. The main trigger of this issue was the launch of political integration by Treaty of Maastricht. As a result, the democratisation of the Union has been at the centre of all Treaty changes in the nineteen ninentees, which accounted for the urgent need felt by both political leaders and EU bureaucrats for enhancing the legitimacy of the EU. The failure of the Constitution's ratification process shows how crucial it remains to identify the challenges facing the EU in its attempts to establish democratic institutional structures, if the former are to be addressed. This paper will argue that these challenges are related to the undertaken shift from an elitist structure based on Nation-States to a multi-level polity including all citizens. Since these two ideas are ideal-types situated at both ends of a spectrum, the position the EU holds or should hold varies along normative lines. institutional structures will be understood here in the (broad) constructivist sense, ie as all institutionalised processes that characterise the EU as a polity, including - next to institutions themselves - constitutionalised values, mecanisms for participation, decision-making processes, etc. Democracy will be defined as a mode of governance characterised by a set of procedures but also by substantive values , both aiming at guaranteeing the election by citizens of representatives on a pluralist basis, the respect of the rule of law, as well as the protection of the rights and freedoms of individuals and minorities. Dealing with challenges requires th consider three relevant topics: the current situation, the objectives pursued by the EU and the - both conceptual and practical - obstacles on the way. Thus, I will first examine the obstacles towards a multi-level system of governance specific to the EU. Then, I will go on the impediments to the shift from an elitist and functionally fragmented decision-making structure to a more inclusive political community.