It's undemocratic, of course. But the 'elites' can't easily get rid of the referendums (for starters, a lot of elites believe or profess to believe that participative democracy is a good thing). What Merkel will be looking for is no referendum in France, at least. If France can be brought on board and the other states that have ratified stay on board, the game changes entirely because then they can threaten to go ahead without the states that have not ratified.

I have tried to keep track of the persons and positions around the 'constitution' for much of the past half year on my blog, which you can read in the Dead Constitution series.