Clustering of Polish Citizens on the Bases of Their Support for Leaving and Remaining the European Union

Abstract

The article presents the clustering of Polish citizens based on the empirical dimension of support for European integration. The structure of the work is based on three key elements constituting the basis of the presented text. The first refers to the development of a scale to measure the extent of support for the integration of Poland with the EU. The second element covers an area of support scale modelling. After the substantial and statistical analysis of the adequacy of the probability distribution for the support scale, it was decided that a model in which the scale underwent mixing non-standard Beta distributions would be adopted. Applying the Maximal Likelihood Method (ML), the components for its fitted probability densities and estimators of prior (or mixing) probabilities were indicated. The procedure allowed us to define the clusters of which the population of voters was composed. The paper’s final section presents many practical and theoretical conclusions for political parties and scientists interested in the discussed area. The novelty of applying the ML method goes hand in hand with the findings that previously appeared in political science literature, although under different economic and geopolitical conditions.