ABSTRACT
The territorial scale and resulting complexity of trans-national democracies renders these fragile with regard to democratic standards and practices. Multi-level and flexible governance mechanisms may appear as extending the opportunity structures for stakeholder and citizen participation in decision- making, but assuring this materializes implies submitting these new institutional structures to democratic scrutiny. Social institutions in advanced democracies tend to substitute real with virtual representation and participation with technical expertise. This could lead to the transformation of advanced democracies into modern forms of guardianship. One way to avoid this is through comprehensive democratic auditing that asserts, rather than negates, the significance of mainstream criteria for democratic political systems and decision processes.
