The article surveys the current state of the academic debate about actorness and legitimacy of the European Union. It investigates various kinds of EU’s actorness, as well as concepts and categories of its legitimacy, and attempts to trace their relationships, which remains an underdeveloped aspect of the discussion. We examine a wide range of scholarly articles, books and other academic sources in assessing the quality and fairness of the respective discussions and suggest that, within the current mostly normative debate, a positive evaluation of the EU’s legitimacy is unattainable and that it is necessary to acquire a fairer notion of what kind of international actor the Union is.

Technological change and innovation, together with the related development of science, have been perceived as drivers of social and economic progress and public optimism in the globalizing world. Indeed, in the past centuries and especially decades, there has been a huge advancement of humankind that can be both felt and measured. However, people have also learned that science and technology can be misused or abused, or they can have unintended consequences (cf. nuclear fission). Especially in times when the public feels that the change is fast and unprecedented, they also provoke fear and resentment. Science, technological change, and innovation can be presented and perceived as security threats, i.e. securitized. It seems that, now, we are living in one of such historical periods. The goal of the paper is to analyse if and how technological change and innovation are presented or perceived as security threats, especially in the Czech political and public discourse. To reach the goal, we can ask the following research questions: Are science, technological change, and innovation securitized? What are the concrete examples of emerging technologies and innovations that are securitized? (e.g. artificial intelligence and robotics, biotechnologies) Is the narrative present in the Czech political and public discourse? Is the securitization process successful? What are the lessons learned and recommendations for policy?

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