Abstract
The existing empirical findings regarding the electoral impact of the European Union in national politics have failed to come up with an unambiguous conclusion. This lack of consensus has given rise to the contested argument that the EU is a potentially relevant issue not yet ‘awaked’ – the ‘sleeping giant’ metaphor. Nevertheless, in none of these studies has there been any attempt to investigate not whether but rather how this issue manifests itself in vote choice. In trying to fulfil this gap, we examine the EU issue under a spatial perspective focusing on the distinction between proximity and directional voting. Comparing it with the classic left-right dimension, we show that the EU evokes a more directional way of thinking about parties’ stances, rewarding those parties able to overcome the lack of differentiation in the centre of the spectrum and to present clearer alternatives.
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