Michele is a doctoral fellow on the SNF-funded project “Defending Democracy in the European Union: A Socio-Legal Approach to the European Institutions” at the department of Anthropology and Sociology. The project analyses how democratic institutions have defended themselves against threats from political parties that aim to undermine their very existence. More specifically, it studies how the EU institutions have approached threats to its proper functioning coming from such political parties after the latter entered the Council of the EU or after their representatives were directly elected to the European Parliament.