Energy security risks and democratic vulnerability in the European Union
SECURITY JOURNAL, cilt.40, sa.1, 2026 (SSCI, Scopus)
- Yayın Türü: Makale / Tam Makale
- Cilt numarası: 40 Sayı: 1
- Basım Tarihi: 2026
- Doi Numarası: 10.1057/s41284-026-00575-8
- Dergi Adı: SECURITY JOURNAL
- Derginin Tarandığı İndeksler: Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI), Scopus, Aerospace Database, Criminal Justice Abstracts, Criminal Justice Periodical Index, Social Science Premium Collection (ProQuest), Criminology Collection (ProQuest), Health Research Premium Collection (ProQuest), Technology Collection (ProQuest)
- Erciyes Üniversitesi Adresli: Evet
Özet
Over the past decade, growing vulnerabilities in the global energy system have affected both economic stability and the quality of democratic governance. The COVID-19 pandemic and the Russia-Ukraine war have intensified energy security risks, imposing new pressures on democratic processes and public accountability. Structural imbalances in energy markets, particularly within the European Union (EU), have necessitated the redefinition of energy policies and the reduction of external dependency. This study empirically investigates the impact of energy security risk on democratic governance using data from 25 EU countries for the period 2008-2023. The Voice and Accountability indicator from the World Bank's World Governance Indicators serves as the measure of democratic governance, while dynamic interrelationships are analyzed through a Panel Vector Autoregression model estimated via the generalized method of moments (Panel GMM-VAR). The findings indicate that energy security risk has predictive precedence over democratic accountability. Granger causality analysis shows a unidirectional relationship running from energy security risk to Voice and Accountability, with no significant reverse effect. The cross-sectional association between the two is negative, although the dynamic responses are modest in magnitude and conditional on the identification ordering. At the policy level, energy supply diversification and resilience-building measures should be prioritised in efforts to protect democratic stability.