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What will matter in the medium to long term is whether the EU is considered more or less democratic. The elections to the European Parliament in May will be all-important. What will matter most is the headline figure for participation. A turnout that is as bad as, or worse than, the 2009 level (43 per cent) must be considered a failure. Anything below 50 per cent would be less than respectable.
A respectable turnout will not in itself be enough. A second question that will be asked at the end of the year is whether the people put in place after the elections – the president of the European Commission, the college of European commissioners, the president of the European Council and so on – are a plausible response to those election results. It is hard to define ahead of events precisely what will be acceptable, but if the appointments result in an EU administration that appears to have been imposed in defiance of the election results, then the EU will suffer.
The period from May to the end of the year, when the new European Commission is scheduled to begin its work, will be one long test of the EU's responsiveness. It will also be a protracted opportunity for supporters of the EU to explain its merits, to argue their case.
A third question to be asked at the end of 2014 will be whether or not citizens of Europe have any greater understanding of the EU – of what it does and why. Greater understanding is probably the most reliable path to greater approval.
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