One of the reasons for introducing a “Union” citizenship in the 1993 Maastricht Treaty was to provide a direct channel between the citizens of the Member States and the EU. In contrast to many other international organizations, the role of the individual has been central to the European project since its inception. In its famous 1962 judgment given in Van Gend en Loos,1 the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) underscored the importance of the “vigilance of individuals concerned” seeking to protect their European rights in the new legal order through judicial control.2 The right to directly vote on the representatives of the European Parliament had already been introduced in the 1970s. The citizens of the Member States were thus equipped with two classic forms of political participation even prior to the introduction of Union citizenship: law making and the legal adjudication of individual cases. Nonetheless, whether these channels are sufficient to guarantee the citizens effective democratic means to influence legislation and exercise control of EU institutions in the rather complex multilevel legal system of the EU has been continuously debated.