Professor Richard Youngs’ keynote examined the European Union’s evolving response to democratic backsliding, populism, and institutional fragility. Professor Youngs argued that the EU has developed important tools—including the Democracy Shield, digital regulation, rule-of-law conditionality, civil society funding, and participatory mechanisms—but that its approach remains uneven and incomplete. He emphasized that democratic resilience must address not only external threats such as disinformation and foreign interference, but also internal dysfunctions, including weakened civic space, far-right normalization, migration politics, and democratic recovery after state capture. The ensuing discussion underscored the need for a more coherent and holistic EU strategy that effectively connects institutional reform, grassroots mobilization, and long-term democratic renewal across member states.
Reported by ECPS Staff
The keynote session on the second day of the Fifth Annual International Symposium, “Reforming and Safeguarding Liberal Democracy: Systemic Crises, Populism, and Democratic Resilience,” featured Professor Richard Youngs, Senior Fellow in the Democracy, Conflict, and Governance Program at Carnegie Europe and leader of the European Democracy Hub. In his keynote, “Democratic Resilience in Europe: Can It Be Effective?” Professor Youngs offered a focused and policy-oriented assessment of the European Union’s evolving efforts to respond to democratic malaise, backsliding, and the broader challenge of democratic renewal.
Moderated by Professor İbrahim Öztürk, the session situated Professor Youngs’ analysis within the symposium’s wider debates on democratic vulnerability, populism, and institutional resilience. Professor Öztürk guided the discussion by opening the floor to critical questions and reflections, enabling participants to connect the keynote’s policy analysis to pressing concerns over civic freedoms, migration, far-right influence, transatlantic lesson-learning, and democratic recovery after autocratization.
Professor Youngs argued that EU democratic resilience policy has advanced considerably in recent years, especially through initiatives such as the Democracy Shield, the Centre for Democratic Resilience, digital regulation, rule-of-law conditionality, civil society funding, and participatory mechanisms. Yet his assessment remained deliberately balanced: while the EU has become more active, its approach remains partial, uneven, and marked by significant blind spots. It has been strongest in addressing online disinformation, foreign interference, and formal rule-of-law concerns, but weaker in supporting bottom-up democratic mobilization, developing systematic strategies for democratic recovery, confronting internal democratic dysfunctions, and reforming the EU’s own institutional architecture.
The discussion following the keynote extended these themes into politically sensitive terrain. Participants raised questions about Europe-wide restrictions on pro-Palestinian activism, the mainstreaming of far-right influence in migration and climate policy, the erosion of the cordon sanitaire, and the relevance of Polish and Hungarian experiences for democratic recovery. Professor Youngs emphasized that Europe’s democratic resilience challenge is not only external but deeply internal, involving unresolved tensions over civic rights, identity conflicts, policy accommodation, and institutional credibility. Taken together, the keynote and discussion provided a nuanced account of both the promise and the limits of the EU’s emerging democratic resilience agenda.
Democratic Resilience in Europe
Professor Richard Youngs delivered the keynote speech with a focused and policy-oriented analysis of the European Union’s evolving approach to democratic resilience. Speaking from the perspective of his work at Carnegie Europe in Brussels, where he leads the European Democracy Hub, Professor Youngs framed his intervention as an assessment of recent practical policy initiatives developed by the EU to address democratic malaise, democratic backsliding, and the broader challenge of democratic renewal across Europe. Rather than approaching democratic resilience purely as an abstract or conceptual question, Professor Youngs sought to connect concrete EU policy developments to the more theoretical debates that had animated the symposium’s earlier panels.
At the outset, Professor Youngs emphasized that EU efforts in the field of democratic resilience have advanced significantly in recent years, but that these advances remain uneven, partial, and marked by important blind spots. European responses to democratic decline, he argued, were slow to emerge. Many of the initiatives now gaining prominence arrived relatively late, despite years of concern about democratic erosion within and around the EU. Nevertheless, over the last couple of years, democratic resilience has become a much more visible and urgent part of the EU agenda. A wide range of initiatives is now being developed to help contain, mitigate, and potentially reverse Europe’s democratic challenges.
Professor Youngs’s central assessment was therefore balanced: the EU has made important policy advances, but its approach remains patchy and incomplete. The Union has developed relatively strong instruments in some areas of democratic resilience, especially digital regulation and protection of the information space, but has been weaker in other domains, particularly bottom-up democratic mobilization, democratic recovery, and reform of the EU’s own institutional architecture. In this sense, Professor Youngs suggested that EU democratic resilience policy reflects aspects of different conceptual approaches, yet suffers from imbalances within each.
To establish the analytical framework for his discussion, Professor Youngs defined democratic resilience in two stages. The first concerns the capacity of democratic systems to resist immediate threats and crises while preserving their core democratic elements. The second is more forward-looking and concerns democratic renewal: the improvement of democratic quality in ways that reduce vulnerability to future crises. This two-level model allowed Professor Youngs to distinguish between short-term defensive measures and deeper, longer-term reforms aimed at strengthening democracy’s foundations.
Professor Youngs also emphasized that democratic resilience depends on multiple levels and actors. It may be provided through formal institutional actors, state bodies, political parties, civil society, local authorities, and, in the European context, the EU’s transnational dimension. A key question, therefore, is whether these different actors are acting in effective coordination with one another. This issue of coordination became one of the recurring themes of Professor Youngs’s keynote.
He further noted that much of the policy discussion in Europe is framed less explicitly in terms of “democratic resilience” and more in terms of how to respond to the far right. This distinction matters because it shapes the kinds of policies that are prioritized. While democratic resilience implies a broad concern with institutional quality, civic participation, political legitimacy, and democratic renewal, a narrower focus on the far right may lead to more defensive or tactical measures aimed primarily at containment.
From Stability to Strain
Professor Youngs distinguished between two ways of assessing the state of European democracy. If one looks at the immediate snapshot, the situation is not catastrophic. Democracy indices suggest that overall democratic levels in Europe have held up reasonably well, with only slight deterioration in several countries. Europe has not experienced wholesale democratic collapse. Yet the deeper concern is prospective: democratic quality may suffer significantly in the future unless more ambitious renewal efforts are undertaken. Thus, the EU’s resilience challenge is not only to resist immediate democratic breakdown but also to stave off future crises and assist democratic recovery in countries that have already undergone sustained backsliding.
The major policy development identified by Professor Youngs was the EU’s Democracy Shield, introduced as a key initiative to strengthen democratic resilience. The Democracy Shield is intended to bring together various strands of EU work aimed at defending and renewing democracy. Under this rubric, the EU has also opened a new Centre for Democratic Resilience. Professor Youngs described these initiatives as promising and tangible signs that the EU is beginning to take democratic resilience more seriously.
However, Professor Youngs also highlighted the main criticism directed at the Democracy Shield: its initial framing was overly defensive and externally focused. It tended to define the principal threat to European democracy as coming from non-democratic actors outside the EU, especially through foreign interference and online manipulation. This framing, Professor Youngs argued, risks placing too much emphasis on external threats while underplaying endogenous democratic weaknesses within European political systems. Although he acknowledged that this criticism remains partly valid, he also noted that the EU has gradually broadened its focus. The Democracy Shield now includes policies on elections, civic participation, civil society, and democratic resilience more generally.
Still, Professor Youngs argued that democratic resilience efforts across Europe remain scattered. Many initiatives exist at different levels, but they are not sufficiently joined together. Policy activity is expanding, but it has not yet been integrated into a holistic framework capable of addressing the full range of democratic challenges identified in academic debates.
Six Pillars of Resilience
Professor Youngs organized the main body of his keynote around six dimensions of EU democratic resilience policy: the online information space and foreign information manipulation and interference; rule of law conditionality; democratic hardball and alliances against far-right actors; civil society and participatory tools; democratic mobilization through protest; and reform of the EU itself.
The first and most developed area, according to Professor Youngs, is the online information space. He argued that this is where EU tools have advanced furthest and where the Union has the most concrete leverage. The EU has developed what it refers to as its “digital suite,” including the Digital Services Act and related measures, aimed at regulating large technology platforms and moderating their impact on democratic information spaces. These policies are being implemented increasingly assertively and form a central part of the EU’s democratic resilience agenda.
Professor Youngs noted that much of the work in this area is carried out through the new Centre for Democratic Resilience, which focuses on sharing lessons and best practices for countering online threats. This is the domain in which the EU possesses real institutional weight, particularly through legal and regulatory instruments. However, Professor Youngs also acknowledged criticism that the EU remains relatively cautious. More ambitious proposals—such as promoting pro-democratic algorithms, taxing anti-democratic disinformation, or moving toward public-interest digital infrastructure—remain part of policy debate but have not yet been fully adopted.
For Professor Youngs, the EU’s digital strategy is therefore significant but limited. It is strongest in containing the worst effects of online threats, but less developed in addressing the deeper structural model through which large technology platforms undermine democratic agency. The EU has done comparatively less to foster digital empowerment or use online tools to improve democratic deliberation. Thus, even in its most advanced area of policy, the EU’s democratic resilience strategy remains more regulatory than transformative.
The second major area Professor Youngs addressed was rule of law conditionality. He observed that the EU has gradually become tougher in using financial leverage against member states where rule of law concerns are acute. Since 2022, the EU has withheld large amounts of funding from Poland and Hungary on rule of law grounds. In Poland, this amounted to around €110 billion in support in the run-up to the 2023 elections. In Hungary, approximately €30 billion remains withheld, equivalent to roughly 14–15 percent of Hungarian GDP.
Professor Youngs argued that withholding funds has not been a primary driver of democratic resilience but has acted as a meaningful secondary factor. In Poland, for example, the EU’s withholding of funding may have played a relevant role in shaping the pro-democratic electoral outcome of 2023. However, he also stressed the limitations of this approach. EU conditionality remains relatively narrow and technical, focused on rule of law concerns that affect the functioning of the EU, rather than broader democracy conditionality. Moreover, the EU has not been able to use Article 7 effectively to suspend voting rights for member states that violate fundamental rule of law principles.
Professor Youngs noted that this may change under proposals for the next EU budget, which could extend rule of law conditionality to all EU funding and broaden the scope of rule of law pressure. If implemented, this would represent a significant policy development, potentially increasing the EU’s leverage over member states that backslide democratically.
The third area concerned emerging debates over democratic hardball and tactics against far-right parties. Professor Youngs observed that some member states have begun using more assertive tools against far-right leaders and parties, including legal provisions, increased surveillance, and multi-party alliances designed to prevent far-right actors from gaining power. These developments remain limited and ad hoc. There is no common EU-level strategy for dealing with the far right in this way.
Professor Youngs stressed that academic research does not prescribe a single approach to the far right. The appropriate balance between ostracism, confrontation, containment, and pragmatic engagement depends heavily on national political context. This diversity of analytical thinking is reflected in the diversity of strategies pursued across Europe. Still, Professor Youngs suggested that a hybrid EU approach may be emerging, combining tougher tactics against anti-democratic actors with pragmatic centrism as part of democratic resilience.
The fourth dimension was civil society and participation. Professor Youngs described this as an increasingly important and promising area. The EU has developed new funding streams for democratic groups working inside Europe—funding that did not previously exist at this scale. There are proposals to double these funds in the next budget, which would significantly increase the resources available for democratic resilience work.
In addition, the EU now organizes several citizen panels each year to promote citizen engagement in democratic debates. At national and subnational levels, there has also been significant growth in citizens’ assemblies, juries, and participatory panels. While these mechanisms are not entirely new, their number has increased notably. Professor Youngs also pointed to the rise of civil society-led participation initiatives, which are becoming more prevalent and influential.
Yet he also acknowledged skepticism about this area. Critics argue that these initiatives remain small-scale and that their concrete political impact is not yet visible at the overarching political level. Thus, while participatory democracy has gained attention, it has not yet become a fully transformative force in European democratic renewal.
The fifth dimension was democratic mobilization through protest. Professor Youngs noted that Europe has witnessed a wave of pro-democratic protests over the last two or three years, with most member states experiencing some form of democratic mobilization. Yet EU policy in this area has been cautious, and sometimes even negative. Governments have tended to contain or suppress protests rather than actively support them. In some countries, civic space has narrowed, making it harder for protests to be organized effectively.
This, for Professor Youngs, reveals a crucial imbalance in the EU’s democratic resilience approach. The EU remains more comfortable with top-down initiatives, regulation, and standard-setting than with genuinely bottom-up grassroots pluralism. Democratic resilience is therefore being supported from above more than cultivated from below.
The sixth dimension was reform of the European Union itself. Professor Youngs emphasized that many analysts argue democratic resilience measures will remain limited unless the EU addresses its own democratic deficit. Concerns about the EU’s democratic deficit have deepened in recent years and contribute to wider feelings of disenfranchisement among citizens. Although debates on EU reform have intensified, with many governments acknowledging the need for structural change, little has been done concretely.
Professor Youngs argued that placing democracy at the core of EU reform is a frequently expressed aspiration but remains underdeveloped in practice. This is one of the weakest links in the EU’s democratic resilience strategy: the Union seeks to strengthen democracy in member states without sufficiently democratizing its own structures and decision-making procedures.
The EU’s Unfinished Agenda
Professor Youngs then turned to democratic recovery, especially in relation to Poland and Hungary. He noted that the EU does not yet have a systematic strategy for helping countries re-democratize after sustained autocratization. This question has become more urgent because of developments in Poland after the 2023 elections and, more recently, Hungary. The EU was not especially effective in preventing democratic regression in either country, but some of the funding it kept in place for pro-democratic actors may now help democratic recovery.
Professor Youngs emphasized the central dilemma: how to recover democracy without using undemocratic means after periods of autocratization. Poland illustrates this difficulty, as the post-2023 government has faced significant challenges in restoring democratic norms. The EU, he argued, still lacks a well-developed line on democratic recovery.
He also noted that the EU’s response to Poland may have been overly generous and rapid. The Union released funds quickly to reward the new government’s pro-EU orientation, but some observers argue that this may have reduced the EU’s leverage over democratic recovery. This lesson is now shaping debates about Hungary, where the EU may be more cautious and severe in setting conditions before releasing withheld funds.
In concluding, Professor Youngs summarized five key imbalances in EU democratic resilience policy. First, the EU remains more focused on external threats than on internal democratic dysfunctions, though this imbalance is beginning to shift. Second, the EU is better at setting standards through regulation than at supporting local-level citizen participation. Third, it focuses more on rule of law than on broader indicators of democratic quality. Fourth, it is stronger in top-down regulation than in fostering bottom-up pluralism. Fifth, its approach to the far right remains pragmatic and fragmented rather than systemic.
Professor Youngs concluded that the EU’s democratic resilience agenda is becoming more prominent and has developed significantly, especially in the areas of disinformation, foreign interference, digital regulation, and formal civic participation. However, it remains mixed and uneven. It is less developed in relation to assertive responses to far-right parties, bottom-up democratic contestation, democratic recovery, and EU reform itself.
Ultimately, Professor Youngs argued that the EU still lacks a fully comprehensive understanding of democratic resilience. Its policies reflect partial elements of what democratic resilience requires, but not yet a holistic strategy. Much of the policy debate has focused on explaining the causes of democratic problems, while less attention has been given to developing operational frameworks for democratic resistance and renewal. The EU’s current approach, though promising, still needs a more coherent analytical framework against which its effectiveness can be judged.
Discussions
The discussion following Professor Youngs’ keynote speech deepened and extended the central themes of his presentation, particularly the tensions between democratic resilience, internal dysfunctions within Europe, the rise of the far right, civic freedoms, transatlantic lesson-learning, and the challenge of democratic recovery after periods of autocratization. Moderated by Professor Öztürk, the exchange moved from questions of Europe’s response to pro-Palestinian activism to the impact of far-right influence on EU policy, the comparative lessons of Hungary and Poland, the weakening of cordon sanitaire strategies, and the dilemmas faced by liberal-centrist governments attempting to reverse democratic backsliding without losing public support.
Opening the discussion, Professor Öztürk invited questions, comments, and criticism from the participants. The first intervention came from Professor Cengiz Aktar, who posed what he described as a straightforward but politically charged question concerning Europe-wide restrictions on pro-Palestinian narratives and activism. He asked Professor Youngs to assess the weight and impact of such repression on Europe’s democratic credentials and normative claims. Professor Aktar further emphasized that many European far-right parties, which democratic actors are ostensibly seeking to contain, have become increasingly pro-Israel, often as an extension of their anti-Islam orientation. In this sense, he framed the issue as a clear example of what Professor Youngs had earlier termed an “internal dysfunction” within European democracy. Rather than merely facing external democratic threats, Europe was, in Professor Aktar’s formulation, tolerating or even accommodating internal contradictions each time pro-Palestinian rallies were restricted in London, Berlin, or elsewhere.
Professor Youngs responded by acknowledging that this is indeed a growing democratic problem. He distinguished the impact of the Middle East conflict from the war in Ukraine, arguing that unlike the Ukrainian case, the Middle East conflict has had a negative effect on the quality of European democracy. In his assessment, Europe has effectively imported the tensions of the conflict into its own political systems. Restrictions on pro-Palestinian protests, he noted, have already been registered in democracy indices and help explain why civic rights indicators have deteriorated in several member states. Professor Youngs linked this directly to a point from his keynote: European governments have often failed to positively encourage democratic mobilization and have instead attempted to contain or hold protests at bay.
At the same time, Professor Youngs recognized the complexity of the issue. Were EU or national government officials present, he suggested, they would likely justify restrictions as necessary to limit antisemitism within some protests. This creates a difficult balancing act between protecting minority communities and safeguarding protest rights. Yet Professor Youngs emphasized that the issue also reinforces another theme from his keynote: the absence of a common European line. Some countries, such as Spain, have adopted more favorable positions toward the Palestinian issue, while others have imposed stricter limits. For Professor Youngs, this illustrates how external crises can expose internal democratic weaknesses and how the EU struggles to respond in an agile and democratically coherent fashion when member states diverge sharply.
Far-Right Influence and Strategic Dilemmas
Dr. Bulent Kenes then raised a question about whether the EU itself is genuinely moving in the right direction in reforming and strengthening democratic resilience. He asked whether, given recent shifts in EU migration policy, the Union can be considered immune to far-right influence or “contamination.” He further asked whether these policy adjustments reflect a deeper normative accommodation to far-right projects within the European project.
Professor Youngs responded by broadening the issue beyond migration to include climate policy as another area where far-right influence has become visible. He noted that the radical right and far right now have significant representation in the European Parliament, and this has begun to affect policy debates and outcomes. However, he cautioned that it is more complicated to determine whether such policy impacts are intrinsically anti-democratic. One may profoundly disagree with the policy positions adopted by far-right actors, but whether these positions directly undermine European democracy depends on the specific parties, countries, and policy areas involved.
Professor Youngs connected this question to ongoing debates over tactics against the far right. Academic research has long examined whether democratic actors should adopt constitutional hardball and assertive measures against anti-democratic parties, or whether they should pursue a more pragmatic and consensual approach that attempts to understand and address the root causes of far-right support. In practice, he argued, no common European line has emerged. Even some relatively liberal parties would argue that ostracizing far-right parties may increase their appeal among disaffected voters. Others contend that the greater danger lies in mainstream center-right parties becoming increasingly open to cooperation with far-right policy agendas. Professor Youngs concluded that the evidence is not yet conclusive as to which approach is more effective. However, the divergence itself reveals how difficult it is for the EU to develop a full-spectrum democratic resilience strategy while member states and political families remain divided on these tactical questions.
Transatlantic Lessons and Limits
Professor Kent Jones then introduced a comparative transatlantic perspective. Speaking as an American observer, he reflected on the different dimensions along which democratic resilience is being tested in the United States. He noted that federal courts have often provided a degree of resistance, even if the Supreme Court has sometimes been less helpful. Public backlash has also played a role in raising awareness, while the federal structure of the United States has limited some illiberal reforms during the Trump years. Against this background, Professor Jones asked whether there is a useful path for exchanging lessons between Europe and the United States. He asked what elements of the European experience might be transferable to the United States and what aspects of the American experience might be informative for Europe’s own resilience agenda.
Professor Youngs described this as a particularly important question and noted that Carnegie has been working with colleagues in the United States on precisely this issue. However, he argued that there has been a “woeful insufficiency” of lesson-learning not only across the Atlantic but also among European states themselves. This, he suggested, is an area in urgent need of development. For many years, both the EU and the United States had relatively well-developed external democracy support policies, but very little aimed inward at protecting their own democratic norms and institutions. This rested on the assumption that democracy was not seriously at risk internally. Recent trends have shattered that assumption.
Professor Youngs explained that the policy equation has now shifted. More European attention is being directed toward democratic resilience within Europe itself. Initial efforts are emerging to share lessons among member states, and he suggested that this could be extended to transatlantic cooperation. Given the political situation in the United States, this may not currently involve governmental actors, but there is considerable room for exchange among civic actors, protest movements, electoral experts, and digital democracy specialists. Professor Youngs identified the EU’s regulatory experience in the digital sphere as potentially relevant for the American context. At the same time, he emphasized that both Europe and the United States face the challenge of supporting many small grassroots efforts while ensuring that they acquire larger political significance. This, he suggested, is one of the weakest points in both contexts and perhaps the most promising area for mutual learning.
Professor Jones added that many Americans have drawn hope from the recent experiences of Hungary and Poland. In the United States, he argued, the struggle is increasingly coming down to voting, especially in the next midterm elections. The ability of Hungarian voters to remove a populist leader after 16 years has generated interest and even amazement among some American observers. Professor Jones suggested that the European experience may be most useful for the United States in showing how grassroots mobilization and effective voting can remove entrenched populist leaders. He added that while grassroots mobilization has been relatively successful in the United States, the political system has made it difficult to translate that energy into effective day-to-day opposition in Washington.
Professor Youngs responded by explaining how the Hungarian election is being interpreted in Brussels. The dominant reading, he said, is that the opposition made the right strategic choice by focusing intensely on corruption and avoiding being drawn into identity-war battles. He acknowledged that the reality is likely more complex, and that only some elements of the Hungarian experience are relevant to the United States. He also noted that Hungary’s EU membership likely acted as a secondary constraint on Orbán. Had Orbán attempted to falsify the elections in an overt way, Hungary’s EU membership would have been seriously jeopardized. In that sense, the EU functioned as a kind of external buttress, helping preserve enough political space for the opposition to retain a competitive chance.
Cordon Sanitaire and Electoral Signals
ECPS Chair Selçuk Gültaşlı then asked two related questions. First, he asked about the state of the cordon sanitaire against the far right in Europe and EU institutions, particularly given cooperation between the European People’s Party (EPP) and far-right blocs in the European Parliament. Second, he asked for Professor Youngs’ reading of Orbán’s defeat in Hungary and whether its implications for the future of far-right politics in Europe are being exaggerated or underestimated.
Professor Youngs responded by noting that the cordon sanitaire varies significantly across institutional and national contexts. In the European Parliament, there is clear concern because the traditional pro-EU coalition that had long dominated parliamentary dynamics has weakened. The center-right’s willingness to cooperate with far-right groups on some policy files has disrupted this earlier pro-EU bloc. In many national parliaments, however, the cordon sanitaire remains more firmly in place. Professor Youngs emphasized the difficulty of the challenge: if mainstream parties cooperate with the far right, far-right policies risk becoming normalized; if all other forces coalesce against the far right, the far right may use exclusion to strengthen its anti-establishment appeal.
Professor Youngs stated that the key question is whether cooperation between center-right and far-right parties on specific policy issues will become a systemic threat to democracy. He did not believe that this conclusion can yet be drawn definitively, but warned that such cooperation may open a slippery slope toward a broader democratic impact.
Returning to the question of Orbán’s defeat, Professor Youngs cautioned against interpreting it as a complete watershed moment for the European far right. The defeat is clearly good news for liberal democracy, but far-right fortunes across Europe fluctuate according to national circumstances. A far-right party may lose in one country and perform strongly in another soon afterward. The Bulgarian elections, he noted, point in a different direction from Hungary. Thus, he argued, Europe is likely to see continued fluctuation rather than either an inexorable rise or a uniform decline of far-right politics.
Poland’s Recovery Dilemma
The final question came from Matin Nikookar Ardestani, who drew on the Polish context. He observed that although the centrist, liberal-democratic, pro-EU coalition won the parliamentary election, the populist right returned through the presidential election, while the anti-populist coalition appears to have declined in support. At the same time, liberal-centrist parties seem to be adopting positions on migration, LGBTQ issues, and other cultural questions that were previously associated with right-wing populists. He asked how Professor Youngs would explain this policy shift and its correlation with declining support for liberal-centrist forces.
Professor Youngs responded by situating Poland within the broader EU dilemma of democratic recovery. He argued that fear of the far right returning to power encouraged the EU to provide generous and rapid support to Poland after the 2023 election, even before the government had fully implemented its promised democratic reforms. The new government faces the enormous challenge of dismantling or reforming a captured state apparatus built over many years by its predecessor, while doing so without violating core democratic procedures. Because of concern that the far right could return, the EU has been highly supportive of Poland, despite the fact that its democratic reform record still leaves room for improvement.
Professor Youngs suggested that this experience may shape the EU’s approach to Hungary, where it may impose tougher conditions before releasing withheld funds. He acknowledged that expectations for the Polish government after 2023 were very high, and that frustration has grown because reforms have not progressed as quickly or fully as many hoped. For Professor Youngs, the Polish case illustrates a difficult balancing act: the EU wants to support governments that move in a pro-European direction, but if it releases leverage too quickly, it may weaken its ability to encourage deeper democratic recovery.
Taken together, the discussion following Professor Youngs’ keynote underscored the complexity of democratic resilience in Europe. The exchange showed that the EU’s challenge is not only to defend democracy against external threats but also to confront internal contradictions: restrictions on protest rights, the mainstreaming of far-right policy preferences, the erosion of the cordon sanitaire, and the difficulty of restoring democracy after state capture. The discussion also highlighted the importance of comparative and transatlantic learning, especially around grassroots mobilization, electoral strategy, and institutional safeguards. Throughout the exchange, Professor Youngs maintained the balanced assessment that characterized his keynote: EU democratic resilience policy has advanced, but it remains incomplete, uneven, and often more reactive than transformative.
Conclusion
Professor Richard Youngs’ keynote and the ensuing discussion offered a nuanced assessment of the European Union’s emerging democratic resilience agenda. The central insight was that the EU has moved beyond rhetorical concern and begun to develop concrete instruments—such as the Democracy Shield, digital regulation, rule-of-law conditionality, civic participation mechanisms, and support for democratic actors. Yet these initiatives remain uneven, fragmented, and more advanced in some areas than others.
A key contribution of Professor Youngs’ analysis was his insistence that democratic resilience cannot be reduced to defensive responses against external threats. While disinformation, foreign interference, and digital manipulation remain serious concerns, Europe’s democratic vulnerabilities are also internal: weakened civic space, contested protest rights, far-right normalization, migration politics, declining trust, and the EU’s own democratic deficit. The discussion on pro-Palestinian activism, migration policy, and the cordon sanitaire underscored how difficult it is for the EU to defend democracy while managing sharp political divisions among member states.
The session also highlighted the unresolved challenge of democratic recovery. Poland and Hungary illustrate that removing or weakening autocratizing actors does not automatically restore democratic norms. Rebuilding institutions after state capture requires careful strategies that avoid reproducing undemocratic methods. Professor Youngs’ warning that the EU may have released leverage too quickly in Poland points to the need for a more systematic recovery framework.
In sum, the keynote showed that European democratic resilience is possible but not yet fully operationalized. The EU has developed promising tools, but it still lacks a holistic strategy connecting rule of law, civic mobilization, institutional reform, democratic recovery, and bottom-up pluralism. The task ahead is not merely to shield democracy from crisis, but to renew it.
