Rise Of Euroscepticism Research Articles

Stabilocracy and the Durability of Illiberal Practices in the Western Balkans

The Western Balkans region has been hindered in its development due to a combination of factors, including a lack of democratic principles and increasing competition between Russia and the West. Despite attempts at engagement between the European Union and the Western Balkans dating back to the early 2000s, both the 2008 global economic crisis and the civil war in Syria in 2011 weakened the EU’s focus on the region. At the same time, Russian Federation’s efforts to increase its influence in the region have further encouraged anti-democratic forces and contributed to a rise in Euroscepticism. The populist policies of political leaders seeking to extend their power have further exacerbated the situation, delaying the implementation of EU conditionality principles in the region. While the EU has prioritized stability over democracy to prevent Russian expansion, this stance has been described in academic literature as “stabilocracy”. However, the current research argues that these stabilocratic practices have only further distanced the region from EU standards, thereby deepening illiberal practices and requiring critical examination of their consequences.

Eurooptimism and Euroscepticism on the Example of the British Labour Party, Liberal Democrats and Scottish National Party

In this article, the three British parties in terms of their attitudes towards the EU are analysed. British parties are not homogenous with no single position on Europe being dominant. Nevertheless, there has been a rise of Euroscepticism across all political parties regardless of their affiliation in the recent years. Brexit referendum has become a ‘point of no return’ since no political force in Britain has questioned British exit from the EU and its results. The debate has switched to the conditions on which the post-Brexit UK collaborates with the EU but there is no discussion whether Britain needs to return to the EU. It is a question of whether British interests have been taken into account and how close the relationship with the Europeans should be. The research reflects gradual evolution of the three British parties (Labour Party, the Liberal Democrats, and the Scottish National Party) and their attitudes towards European integration. It is shown that the Labour Party and the Liberal Democrats had a U-turn on key policies such as free movement of people or joining the Eurozone whereas the Scottish National Party reinvented itself and became a proponent of the European integration (with some reservations). The author tries to answer the question of whether the above parties could have prevented Brexit.

Radicalisation and discursive accommodation: responses to rising Euroscepticism in the European Parliament

The rise of Euroscepticism has shifted the structure of political conflict in the European Parliament (EP) towards an increasingly dominant pro-/anti-EU divide. Focusing on the hard case of EU enlargement, this article examines changes in MEPs’ discursive and voting patterns over the past two EP mandates. It combines two original datasets containing MEP statements during plenary debates and subsequent roll-call votes to examine the polarisation, cohesion, and consistency of legislative behaviour across different European Political Groups. The findings show that soft Eurosceptics drive a deepening of the pro-/anti-EU divide by radicalising in both discourse and vote to join hard Eurosceptics in their firm rejection of further enlargement. Pro-European MEPs, in contrast, show discursive accommodation of Eurosceptic concerns, with a growing inconsistency between sceptical discourse and continued vote-based support for enlargement-related initiatives. A case study of Turkey illustrates these two mechanisms. The findings shed light on the changing dynamics of political competition in the EP and the impact of rising Euroscepticism upon MEPs’ legislative behaviour.

„Man hat das Gefühl, dass die eigene Kultur weniger Wert ist.“ – Ein Vergleich der Einstellungen britischer und kroatischer Studierender zur Globalisierung

A recent rise in Euro-scepticism in the European Union can be linked to its unequal economic development as a consequence of globalisation. It has manifested itself in increasing support for radical right-wing parties, which is partly based on anti-globalist sentiments. One of the major expressions of this anti-globalist and Eurosceptic views has been “Brexit”, the UK’s withdrawal from the EU in 2020. Seven years before Brexit, another European country, Croatia, joined the EU. The main aim of this paper is to understand how attitudes towards globalisation differ between UK and Croatian students by analysing and comparing the students’ values, beliefs and perceptions regarding globalisation generally and EU integration more specifically. The study was conducted in 2019–2020 and consisted of a questionnaire survey on a sample of n=283 geography students (154 in Croatia and 129 in the UK). The results demonstrate that both Croatian and UK students tend to see globalisation as a positive process (57.6 %) with the largest benefits being an increase in exchange of knowledge and scientific advancements, and growth of economy. While both cohorts agree that the main negative consequences globally are increased economic inequalities and exploitation of workers, several differences in perception of negative consequences of globalisation in their respective countries are also identified.

The rise of Euroscepticism on the political scene in Poland – the case of the party Law and Justice

The aim of this article is to analyse the growing phenomenon of Euroscepticism on the political scene in Poland, taking into account the power of the ruling coalition headed by the Law and Justice party. For this purpose, after a brief discussion on the theoretical framework of Euroscepticism, in order to find the reasons for the rise of this phenomenon in Poland in recent years, the current context of the government's relationship with the European Union (EU) is analysed. Consequently, by analysing the political programmes of the Law and Justice party and statements of political actors associated with the main ruling party in Poland, the author verifies the upward trend in unfavourable attitudes towards the EU by current government, as well as consistently appearing considerations of leaving the EU (“Polexit”).

Don’t Think Twice, It’s All Right? A Historical Comparison of the 1975 and 2016 British Referendums

The article offers a detailed comparison of the 1975 and 2016 British referendums in light of the larger debates surrounding Britain’s relationship with European inte‐ gration. Rather than depicting ‘Brexit’ as the likely, or even inevitable, outcome of British European policy since 1945, it situates both referendums in their respective historical contexts, showing how each one was highly contingent and should be un‐ derstood against the particular background of its time. Yet the article also identifies some broader structural similarities and longer-term continuities, such as the paramount importance of domestic politics, and the lack of a clearly articulated ra‐ tionale for EC/EU membership in the British political discourse. In the end, both referendums were decided by dynamics that stretched far beyond the question of EC/EU membership, highlighting both the general rise of Euroscepticism since the 1990s and some distinct British particularities.

Основы байесовского подхода к количественному анализу (на примере евроскептицизма)

This article attempts to identify the main assumptions, prerequisites and techniques of the methods developed by some modern statisticians on the basis of T. Bayes' theorem for the purposes of social variables interactions assessment. The author underlined several advantages of the given approach as compared to more traditional quantitative methods and highlighted key research areas subject to evaluation by Bayesian estimates. First of all, this approach is compatible with game and decision theory, event analysis, hidden Markov chains, prediction using neural networks and other predictive algorithms of artificial intelligence. The Bayesian approach differs significantly from traditional statistical methods (first of all, it is focused on finding the most probable, rather than the only true value of the feature coupling coefficient), hence a graphical interpretation was provided for such basic concepts and techniques as probabilistic inference, maximum likelihood estimation and Bayesian confidence network. The described tools were used to test the hypothesis about the impact of life quality decrease on rise in Euroscepticism of EU citizens. ANOVA and correlation analysis of 27 thousand people’s responses to Eurobarometer questions addressed in November-December 2019 attributed strong likelihood to this assumption. Moreover, Bayesian approach allowed for a probabilistic conclusion that this hypothesis is more plausible than the link between Euroscepticism and respondents’ current financial situation (explanatory power of comparison to the past is relatively greater).

“Ecologism” as an Attempt to Overcome the Ideological Crisis of "Europeanism"

Successful European integration requires its own ideology. This is "Europeanism". In this article "Europeanism" is examined as an internally contradictory combination of irrational and rational considerations, officially presented as part of the paradigm of the European Enlightenment. After the expulsion of rival ideologies, neoliberalism builds the basis of today's Europeanism, which claims to be scientific, together with the several integration theories. Practice refutes most of these rational constructions after the 2008 crisis, both economically and politically. Integration theories cannot explain why the free market is failing. The crisis in the Eurozone 2011 revitalized economic nationalism and contributed to the erosion of the dominant paradigm. In the political field Europeanism has failed in its attempt to transform the EU's immediate environment in a positive way. The enforcement of multiculturalism, despite acknowledgments that it “has failed”, has split the Union internally. The reaction is a collapse of the belief in neoliberalism and hence the rise of Euroscepticism. In an attempt to organize some kind of "Counter-Reformation" in search of the lost loyalty, the European elite is trying to renew and supplement the ideological basis of the integration with one of the directions of (delete ‘the’) left-wing neoliberalism, namely "ecologism". It tries to impose - both domestically and internationally, the fight against "global warming" as an irrational cause that will give a new impetus to social development and integration in particular, as well as (delete ‘to’) solve specific problems of the energy poor European Union. The ecological ingredient in Europeanism is very suitable psychologically - "alarmism" is very well received by some rich and “anxious” societies. Economically it could help the energy poor Union to restrain its competitors on the world market. But the success of this attempt does not seem certain.

Spreading Euroscepticism and its macro-level determinants: empirical analysis of Eurobarometer survey in 2004–2017

ABSTRACT This article revisits the causes of Euroscepticism in the recent period and attempts to find the determinants that affect Eurosceptical public opinions. Associating the rise in Eurosceptical opinion with the economic and financial crisis, a number of studies argue that the rising Euroscepticism can be explained by several macro-level factors. Using the Eurobarometer survey results, this article has conducted empirical tests on public trust in 28 Member States of the EU for the period of 2004–2017. It shows that various economic and fiscal variables comprehensively explain the rise of Euroscepticism during the recession period in most countries. However, non-domestic variables such as fiscal conditions of other countries and exposure to the refugee crisis also appear to have a direct effect on the Eurosceptical public opinion. This finding suggests that restoring trust in the EU will require a broad economic recovery with a lower debt level in the EU and a more effective capacity of the EU to respond to the external challenges.

Republicanism, EU democracy and differentiated (dis-)integration

Few debates in political theory are challenged as much by the constant change of their empirical subject as those about democracy in the European Union (EU). With A Republican Europe of States, Richard Bellamy responds to the EU’s post-Lisbon era, which has been characterized by the euro crisis, conflicts over migration, the rise of Euroscepticism and Brexit. Keeping an eye on these contextual conditions and the related legal and political transformations, he has developed a general theory of international democracy aimed at securing non-domination between peoples and between citizens and their representatives at the international level, and elaborated its implications for the EU. The result is a distinctive version of demoi-cracy, whose firm centring on the nation-state as the natural locus of democracy is likely to be controversially discussed. In this article, I raise some critical considerations regarding the design of demoi-cratic institutions, the adequate understanding of EU citizenship and the normative credentials of differentiated (dis-)integration.

Challenges of the enlargement policy in the light of European Union transformation: Is the rise of Euroscepticism in Serbia inevitable?

The EU Summit in Thessaloniki in 2003 is often referred to as a milestone in the relations between the Western Balkans and the European Union because the region was given strong promises of a prospective European perspective through the Stabilization and Association Process. However, the initial enthusiasm that followed has melted over the coming years because the expectations of most countries in the region have not been met (with the exception of Croatia that became an EU member in 2013). Even though we get assurances from the Brussels that they will not give up on enlargement, it is obvious that this issue is not on the list of priorities of the EU at the moment. Not only that its decisiveness to encompass with enlargement the Western Balkans is on shaky grounds due to the numerous challenges that the EU is facing at the moment, but such decline in interest leads to a decline in interest in the countries of the mentioned region that are currently in the accession process. This further leads to the rise in Euroscepticism for which the Western Balkans is a breeding ground. The reasons for Euroscepticism existed even before the enlargement has been brushed aside from the Union agenda (those were mostly reasons related to pre-accession strategy for candidate countries/potential candidates and were present even in the case of countries of Eastern and Central Europe, even though there were also reasons specific for each of these countries.). However, it seems they have become stronger with the new developments in the Union. Incertitude of membership affects the rise of negative attitudes towards the Union in the public opinion of these countries which becomes manifest if we look at numerous public opinion polls. The focus of this paper will be the interpretation of the results of the research that the Institute for Political Studies conducted on an annual basis from 2015 to 2018.

Understanding Dutch Attitudes to European Integration in the Early 2000s Through the Referendum on the European Constitutional Treaty

On 1st June 2005, Dutch citizens rejected the Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe (ECT) in a referendum. Reasons for this rejection have been explored in previous studies on media framing. In these studies, scholars contend that the media influence citizens’ voting behaviour through the manner in which the news is depicted. This article aims at uncovering qualitatively what frames two Dutch newspapers, NRC Handelsblad and de Volkskrant, used to report on the referendum and why. In this manner, it adds to the existing understanding of the influence of the media coverage on the Dutch electorate. The results show that the responsibility frame is the most salient frame in the news coverage on the referendum on the ECT, indicating that newspapers discussed the referendum on the ECT in terms of the invisibility of debate on Europe in general and the incumbent government’s failure to provide sufficient and reliable information on the ECT. This is striking with regard to the fact that most authors attribute the rejection to a rise in Euroscepticism or discontent with the speed and direction of the integration process.

A Primordial Attachment to the Nation? French and Irish Workers and Trade Unions in Past EU Referendum Debates.

We aim to contribute to a better understanding of the dynamics that are driving EU politicization and the rising Euroscepticism of workers and unions in the public sphere. One explanation frames the rise in Euroscepticism in cultural terms, emphasizing workers’ alleged primordial attachment to their nation. A second uses socioeconomic frames, linking growing Euroscepticism to the increasingly neo‐liberal direction of the EU. The weight of these competing frames in the referendum campaigns on the EU Constitution in France and the Lisbon Treaty and the Fiscal Treaty in Ireland cannot be measured easily, as the categorization of a phrase as socioeconomic or cultural is in itself subject to political classification struggles. We therefore presents the findings of an inductive lexical analysis of all Irish Times, all Le Monde and all worker‐ or union‐related articles published in almost all national media outlets during the mentioned referendum debates. This was made possible by the Alceste software package that allowed us to analyse very large corpuses of articles inductively. Our analysis reveals that socioeconomic terms dominated policy debates in both countries. The findings question existing EU politicization studies that were measuring the salience of different frame types by deductive analysis.

Exploring cross-border integration in Europe: How do populations cross borders and perceive their neighbours?

Since its creation, the European Union seems to be guided by the idea that an increase in cross-border flows contributes to more European unity. Thus, emphasis has been placed for instance on lowering customs tariffs and encouraging the free movement of goods and people. However, if the opening up of borders creates new opportunities for some residents of border regions, there are others who may not benefit. For this reason, and in a context characterized by the rise of Euroscepticism, it seems crucial to take a more critical look at actual cross-border integration and to unravel its concrete consequences for the people who live in border regions. This paper aims to do so by focusing on two aspects of this process: the functional dimension, through the number of cross-border activities, and the perceptions border residents have of their neighbours, through the level of mutual social trust. The EUROBAROMETER 422 survey is used in order to produce statistical analyses and maps. This enables us to offer a new image of European cross-border integration and to draw the following conclusions. Firstly, cross-border flows are not uniform and vary greatly from one cross-border area to another. Secondly, cross-border regions in which the intensity of flows between neighbouring regions is high do not necessarily show a high level of mutual social trust between borderland populations. Thirdly, there is not always reciprocity with regard to the mutual social trust that people have towards their neighbours within cross-border areas.

(Re)considering sovereignty in the European integration process

The World War II (WWII) as a great shock significantly weakened the European nation-state paradigm and gave the European elites a chance to achieve a ‘paradigm shift’ from ‘the nation-state paradigm’ to a ‘federalist paradigm’. However, the nation-state’s strong institutionalization did not allow a paradigm shift and the WWII actually created a ‘paradigm duplication’ in the European integration process. In this two-layered atmosphere, ‘democracy’ was conceptualized under the influence of ‘federalist intellectual paradigm’ but its implementation had to be achieved in the nation-state paradigm. Therefore, this anomaly has played a significant role in the recent stalemate the European integration process has faced. For example, the literature clearly shows the relationship between the sensitivity of European nations towards their national sovereignty and the rise of Euroscepticism in the European integration process. Moreover, the institutional and legitimate strength of the nation-state gives the nation-state paradigm a gravitational power, which gradually weakens the feasibility of the ideas originating from the federalist paradigm. As a result, this article argues that a more symbiotic institutionalization of democracy and sovereignty is necessary to make the European integration more attractive again.

Waning Public Support for International Cooperation? Some Lessons from Europe

The European Union (EU) is facing one of the rockiest periods in its existence. No time in its history has it looked so economically fragile, so unsure about how to protect its borders, so divided over how to tackle the crisis of legitimacy facing its institutions, and so under assault of Eurosceptic parties. While economic recovery may be on its way, at least in some member states, the Eurozone crisis has left a mark on popular opinion. Large parts of the public have come to doubt the competence and integrity of their political and financial masters in Brussels and at home. Existing approaches to public opinion towards supranational government in Europe, or international governance more generally, stress the role of economic interest and identity considerations (for an overview see Hobolt and De Vries 2016). These explanations also fit the narrative that has emerged in the media after Brexit, namely that the outcome constituted somewhat of a revolt of the left behind, those who failed to benefit from economic and political integration in Europe or more globally, against increased migration (Clarke et al. 2017; Goodwin and Heath 2016). Yet, the recent surge in Eurosceptic sentiment, expressed in European and national elections as well as in European referendums, is in many ways puzzling from both perspectives. Euroscepticism, for example, is most pronounced in countries that have weathered the Eurozone crisis very well and economically benefitted most from the single currency (Stiglitz 2016), while the support for the EU remains high in the bail-out battered South. Moreover, aggregate analyses of the Brexit vote suggest that poorer areas on average were more likely to vote out, but many deviations exist. Very rich areas in the South voted out. When it comes to identity considerations the empirical evidence is also at best mixed. While scholars expect people with an exclusive national identity to view an international organization like the EU as a threat, something that infringes on their sense of national belonging, feelings of exclusive national identity have remained remarkably stable in Europe over recent years or even declined in countries that witnessed stark increases in Euroscepticism (De Vries 2018). Opinions towards intra-EU migration and free movement also do not seem to uniformly account for the rise in Euroscepticism (Vasilopoulou and Talving 2017). In this contribution, I aim to shed light on these empirical puzzles. I suggest that one of the key reasons why Euroscepticism is widespread within comparatively richer countries and among those who are fairly well off is because wealth allows populations or individuals to consider more risky alternatives and makes the alternative state to membership, one’s country being outside the EU, look more viable. I present empirical evidence to my claims by using recent survey data from 28 member states. These findings point towards a possibly paradoxical process underlying international cooperation more generally, namely: the increasing monetary benefits associated with more economic and political cooperation across borders might over time become the risk-hedging mechanism that allows populations or individuals to turn against international governance in the long run.

Benjamin Grob-Fitzgibbon. Continental Drift: Britain and Europe from the End of Empire to the Rise of Euroscepticism.

Benjamin Grob-Fitzgibbon. Continental Drift: Britain and Europe from the End of Empire to the Rise of Euroscepticism.

Contemporary Crisis Trends in European Union’s Development and Their Influence on Ukraine – EU Relations

The European Union is currently facing multiple crises and challenges, the future shape and character of the Union are being increasingly questioned. The processes occurring in the EU have direct impact on its external relations with other countries. The aim of the article is to analyse the contemporary peculiarities and problems of European Union's development and its impact on further relations between Ukraine and the EU. It argues that the crises management has become a new daily reality for Europe since 2009. Further, the article briefly examines the most significant crisis trends in the EU: economic problems, migration crisis, Euroscepticism, security challenges, Brexit. The latter is considered from two perspectives: as the first step to EU's disintegration and as the chance to rethink the European project. Economic problems as Euro crisis, debt crisis, unemployment are discussed and the main measures for their solving are outlined. The origins, scale and consequences of migration crisis for the EU are determined in the article. The next analyzed problem is the rise of Euroscepticism in the EU, the most influential eurosceptic parties in different EU-countries are named. Key security challenges for the EU with the emphasis on the Russian aggression in eastern Ukraine are examined at the end of the article. As the result of analysis it is concluded that the contemporary problems of the EU have mainly negative impact on the development of the Ukraine-EU relations and its future strongly depends on that, how and when the European Union will overcome all effects of recent crises.
 Keywords: European Union (EU), Ukraine, migration crisis, Euroscepticism, Brexit, Russian-Ukrainian conflict

Anger and protest: referenda and opposition to the EU in Greece and the United Kingdom

The public image of the European Union (EU) has met increasingly negative evaluations since the economic and financial crisis hit its peak. Although opposition towards the EU has been pitched as a temporary phenomenon, it has now become a distinctive characteristic of European integration, described as ‘embedded’. Recent analyses on citizens’ attitudes towards the EU underline a rational utilitarian dimension, stressing that EU attachment is affected by future life expectations. Are rationalist perspectives the only possible explanation behind the rise of Euroscepticism, though? This article offers an alternative approach, by using discourse analysis, and examines how emotions, as embedded in Eurosceptic discursive frames and practices, may affect attitudes towards the EU. We argue that an analysis of citizens’ opposition through emotions when the salience of the EU increases can show how a Eurosceptic emotion-laden public discourse may become prominent at the domestic level.

Explaining the European Union’s Changing Position towards the Gibraltar Question after the Brexit Referendum

AbstractHaving previously remained impartial on the Gibraltar question between Spain and Britain since both were member states, the European Union suddenly changed its position after the Brexit referendum in favor of the Spanish government at the expense of breaching international law. In doing so, the European Union, for the first time, created a foreign policy on the long-standing Gibraltar question. This article explores the reasons behind the creation of this foreign policy in support of Spain. The European Union feared that the idea of Euroscepticism may escalate among remaining member states after the Brexit referendum because of wide-spread claims that it would dissolve in the near future, fuelled by farright political parties. The European Union therefore created a foreign policy regarding Gibraltar in Spain’s favor in order to promote a “sense of community” for thwarting a further rise in Euroscepticism. While making its analysis, the article applies the assumption of social constructivism that ideas shape interests, which then determine the foreign policy choices of actors.