Alarums and Excursions: Improvising Politics on the European Stageby Luuk van Middelaar, translated from the Dutch by Liz Waters.Agenda, 301 pp., $35.00
How to Democratize Europeby Stéphanie Hennette, Thomas Piketty, Guillaume Sacriste, and Antoine Vauchez, translated from the French by Paul Dermine, Marc LePain, and Patrick Camiller.Harvard University Press, 209 pp., $24.95
For many who look at Europe from afar, its politics seem interesting only when conceived as a Trumpian spectacle: strongman blowhards attacking hollow liberal elites, a migration crisis at the border, a seemingly unstoppable right-wing international at the gates of power in capitals across the continent. In the months leading up to the elections for the European Parliament in late May, this was the narrative that purported to explain the stakes of the vote. “The European Union, a…