Towards a European Transnational Party System

The issue of a better defined and more substantial institutional and functional position for political parties in the European Union system is still unresolved. This question is part of the broader, endemic problem of the Union’s democratic deficit and political development. The need for a genuinely systemic transnational European dimension of political parties is addressed by the authors in light of European party-building within the ongoing broader process of democratic institution-building of the EU.