sou · GNB3151 · 2000-01-01 00:00:00 — That having been said, however, these are in many respects the best available data and, provided they are interpreted cautiously, they enable one to make some reasonably valid inferences. Before attempting a summary of the current state of support for European integration as evidenced by these indicators, one must also take account of the substantial variation in the indicators over time and across the member states. In terms of changes over time, there was first of all a significant falling off in support for integration between the late 1970s and the early 1980s (see Figure 1). This may have been related to the prevailing Eurosclerosis that many commentators on European integration have identified. This was followed, however, by a sub- stantial and sustained rise in support between 1982 and 1991. It is worth noting that this rise predated the arrival of as President of the Commission and certainly predated the major initiative of the first Delors presidency, namely the launch of the Single Market 1992 programme. On the other hand, there can be doubt but that the rise and rise in support for integration was sustained by the activism of the Delors Commission, by the pas- sage of the Single European Act and by the publicity and promo- tional efforts that surrounded Project 1992. In fact, however, the actual arrival of the calendar year 1992 confirmed a general downward trend in support for integration (see Figure 1). The period since 1989 is so packed with political and economic developments that it is impossible to attribute this decline to any one factor3. Indications that the decline was under- 3 There is a substantial and technically highly sophisticated literature on the (mainly economic) determinants of support for integration. way in a number of member states even prior to 1991 (Nieder- mayer 1995: 67) suggest that it was not simply a response to the signing of the but may also have reflected a negative reaction to the growing intrusiveness of the Single Market programme on both the politics and economics of individual states. Another factor was the waning of the euphoria that sur- rounded the fall of the Wall and the growth in the realisa- tion that event brought challenges and uncertainties regarding the future shape and role of the Community and was not simply the dawning of a new era of peace and prosperity for all. Whatever its causes, the decline in support for integration that began in the second half of 1991 has shown or no sign of being reversed While overall support for the Union over time has varied by some 20 percentage points, the range in support across countries has been as much as 50 percentage points; in 1997, for example, support, as measured by the membership indicator, went from 31 per cent in to 83 per cent in . Although any grou- ping of countries based on definite cut-off points in a distribution such as this is somewhat arbitrary, it is probably useful to think of a group of four countries with high levels of support for EU mem- bership and a group of six with quite low levels. The former com- prises , the , and . The com- position of the latter is more surprising: predictably, it includes the three most recent entrants to the Union (, and ) and the UK; the surprise is that it also includes and but does not include . On the other hand, actual opposition to integration is as high in as in all but one of the low-support countries. Eichenberg (1998) provides an excellent review and extension of this research. From the point of view of the present discussion, the most relevant findings are that the influence of objective economic circum- stances on support for integration was less in the period following than it had been before (Eichenberg, 1998:12) and that the effects vary depending on the indicator of the dependent variable that is used. When one probes beyond the very general sentiments captured by the four basic indicators, to, for example, attitudes to whether or not certain policy areas should be decided at or at the national level, one finds even greater discrepancies between member states and a somewhat different ordering. Thus in regard to the issue of the Europeanization of defence policy, some coun- tries show a very high degree of support for Europeanization and others a very low degree. Ranged on the side of the Europeaniza- tion of defence are the (76 per cent) in first place and, at a somewhat lower level, , , and Ger- many. On the other hand, and are, on this eviden- ce, overwhelmingly opposed to the Europeanization of decision- making in the defence area, being 8 per cent for and 90 per cent against. On this negative side also, though not as strongly, one finds , , , and the . However, before drawing any large inferences about the future for a common European defence policy from these data, one should note that the rate of dont know responses to this item is remarkably, one might say suspiciously, low (an average of 4 per cent). The suspicion mentioned in the previous paragraph leads to the hypothesis that some significant proportion of the responses on preferences regarding the Europeanization of defence and other policies actually reflect non-attitudes. A re- search project on turnout in Parliament elections of 1994 provided the opportunity to test this hypothesis by using an exploratory question on the overall issue of policy attribution bet- ween the national and European levels. The new question, which was inserted in Eurobarometer 41.1, included the specific response category I havent really thought about it. This response was chosen by 26 per cent of respondents, a proportion that, when combined with the 10 per cent who spontaneously offered a dont know response, yields more than one-third of the sample who acknowledge that they do not have any opinion on the basic issue of the appropriate scope of decision-making competence of and national authorities (Blondel, Sinnott and , 1998, 65–72)). Further evidence from the same study suggests that even those who were willing to express an opinion, despite, to echo Converse (1964), a generous invitation to disavow any opi- nion when none was felt, may not have had a very explicit or well thought-out basis for that opinion. Those who did take a view on the question of the overall range of issues decided on by the Euro- pean Union were asked When you say (insert response to pre- vious question), is this a general feeling that you have about Union (European Community), or have you specific issues in mind? This retrospective probe showed that only 17 per cent of the sample had specific issues in mind in responding to the original question. This reinforces the view that attitudes in this area may be less than well formed. This expectation is further confirmed by Eurobarometer data from 1995 on perceptions of the allocation of decision making power between national governments and Union level over a wide range of issues. Inter alia, the data show that 38 per cent of public believe that foreign policy is deci- ded at EU level and precisely the same proportion believe that de- fence matters are decided at EU level (Eurobarometer, 1995: B65). On any reading of the common foreign and security policy as of 1995, these perceptions were wildly inaccurate. The proportion seeing foreign policy as being at least to some extent decided at Union level should be much higher and the pro- portion seeing the same for defence should be much lower. Lest it be assumed that people are getting it wrong in relation to the com- mon foreign and security policy simply because this is an inhe- rently complex and remote area, one should also note that the proportion perceiving agricultural policy as being at least to some extent decided at Union level is only 40 per cent. The overall impression from this review of the evidence of va- rious aspects of support for European integration can be summari- sed as follows: there is fairly widespread support for the rather vague notion of efforts to unify Western Europe; as a result of a downturn since the second half of 1991, support for membership of the Union is running at only about 50 per cent and is matched by an almost equal level of indifference as to whether or not the Union continues to exist; finally, despite initial appearances to the contrary, attitudes to the policy scope of the Union are neither well-formed nor well-informed. All of this suggests that the per- missive consensus (and Scheingold, 1970), if it ever existed, was a rather fragile creature. One could go further and suggest that the term itself, so much bandied about, was actually misleading in that it glossed over significant flaws in the fabric of public opinion towards integration. it not for the prevalence of the permissive consensus assumption, there might not have been such surprise when, as the integration process began to make greater inroads on the economic and political life of the member states, support for integration began to wane, a waning that beca- me manifest not only in opinion polls but also in referendums and in parliamentary debates in several countries. These weaknesses in attitudes to integration are confirmed by the evidence relating to knowledge of the institutions of the Union. Space does not permit a detailed discussion of this aspect but the essentials can be briefly summarised. Knowledge of Euro- pean affairs is low; prevailing attitudes to the Union are characteri- sed by either indifference or lack of knowledge or a combination of both; and this lack of knowledge is particularly important because any dip below quite a high level of knowledge has a de- vastating effect on the structure and coherence of attitudes to in- tegration4. These features of the orientations of citizens to Union confirm the argument outlined earlier in this chapter that well structured, supportive attitudes commensurate with the current stage of integration have not in fact developed. The key question in the current context is: Do these attitudes have any effect on levels of participation in European Parliament elec- tions? Sources of participation and abstention The usual explanation given for low turnout in European Parlia- ment elections is that the Parliament has not got enough power. This explanation tends to be cast in terms of the second-order election model. The essence of this approach is that, in compari- 4 For a more detailed discussion see Sinnott, 1998. son to national elections, European Parliament elections do not affect the distribution of power and that there is, therefore, less at stake in such elections (and , 1981, Franklin and van der Eijk 1996). From this starting point the argument is that turn- out will be lower and that those who do turn out to vote will be motivated to do so by national considerations and not by Euro- pean ones. The problem is that this plausible model receives or no support when tested against the evidence of voter percep- tions, attitudes and behaviour. Evidence on perceptions of power and perceptions of what is at stake in elections indicates that electorates by and large do not make the sophisticated calculations about differences between the power of national parliaments and of Parliament or about differences in what is at stake between the two kinds of elections that the second-order-election model requires. Moreover, to the extent that such differential perceptions exist, they have no discernible effect on the propensity to vote Thus, for example, perceptions of the power of the Parliament have or no effect on turnout (Table 2). There is simply no difference in reported turnout among those with very low, fairly low, fairly high or very high estimates of the power of the Parliament. What does make a difference is if the citizen doesnt know anything about the power of the Parliament. Likewise, one can show that relative perceptions of the power of Parliament in comparison with the power of national parliaments do not have the anticipated effect on turnout. In fact they have a perverse effect – people who see Parliament as having more power than their national parliament are slightly less likely to vote for it (Table 3). Type of electoral participation/absention by perception of the power of Parliament, 1994 (non-compulsory countries only) (%) Type of electoral participation/absention by perception of difference the power of European and national parliaments, 1994 (non-compulsory countries only) (%) Turning to the attitudes that do matter, the affective image of the Parliament influences turnout. Moreover, it seems that not having any image of the Parliament is as damaging in terms of the likeli- hood of voting as having a negative image. The perceived reliability of the Parliament in making sure that the decisions taken by Union are in the interests of ordinary people affects turnout. European party and candidate differentials also have an impact (Table 4). Type of electoral participation/abstention by European party differential, 1994 (non-compulsory voting countries only) The concepts of party and candidate differentials refer to how much it matters to the individual citizens whether particular parties or candidates win seats in Parliament elections. The campaign also matters, at least in terms of turnout. But it matters only if the citizens exposure to the campaign is , that is if he or she reads about it or discusses it with family or friends or colleagues at work. The evidence is that purely passive exposure, that is exposure to the campaign that is limited to being on the receiving end of advertising, or television or radio coverage, or leaflets, or canvassing does nothing to increase the level of turnout. Thus the campaign is influential but by no means decisive. In the light of the above, perhaps the most surprising conten- tion of previous research is that attitudes to European integration have no significant effect on turnout in European Parliament elec- tions. This counter-intuitive finding may have arisen partly be- cause turnout in European Parliament elections has been treated as a simple dichotomy – voted versus did not vote – and partly be- cause of the limited range of attitudes to integration investigated as possible sources of participation and abstention. In fact, abstention in European Parliament elections is a fourfold phenomenon depending on whether it is voluntary or circumstantial and on whether it is accompanied by abstention in national elections or is specific to European elections (Blondel, Sinnott and , 1998: 40–43). Consequently, there is not one dependent variable but four, and the same explanation does not cover all four cases. Obviously, the key dependent variable is voluntary Euro-speci- fic abstention. The various influences on Euro-turnout cited above cast doubt on the prevailing conclusion that attitudes to European integration do not matter. However, such bivariate relationships do not prove the point. What is needed is a multivariate analysis that controls for all the relevant influences. In fact, a logistic re- gression analysis using a wide range of contextual and attitudinal variables does show that voluntary Euro-specific abstention is sig- nificantly affected by attitudes to European integration, by attitu- des to Parliament and by attitudes to the parties and candidates in the election and that it is not significantly affected by second-order considerations and calculations (Blondel, Sinnott and , 1998: 222–236). Given the conventional wisdom of the second-order-election-model, perhaps the most important mes- sage to come out of this analysis of turnout in the 1994 European Parliament elections is that attitudes to and perceptions and experiences of Europe and of Parliament make a difference to peoples participation. Contrary to what is often ar- gued, European elections are not simply proxy national elections or appendages to domestic politics. This means that appeals cast in terms of domestic political issues are not necessarily conducive either to mobilising voters or to winning votes. This brings us the wider issue of how to respond to the challenge of increasing turn- out and improving the quality of participation in European Par- liament elections. Approaches to a solution There is no instant solution to the problem of turnout in European Parliament elections but there are piecemeal, gradualist steps that can be taken (a) to facilitate participation and (b) to mobilise it. In terms of facilitating participation, three factors need to be conside- red. First, the timing of the election: Is it really sensible to pick a weekend in mid-June for an election to a Parliament that does not have a secure base in the hearts and mind of the citizens? The data from 1994 show that absence from home, either for the day, for the weekend or for holidays was a significant source of circumstantial abstention (Blondel, Sinnott and , 1998). At a minimum, the choice of mid-June does not facilitate the voters. Secondly, the evidence suggests that registration and voting card problems lead to a significant amount of circumstantial abstention. Among the non-compulsory voting countries, the problem is most prevalent in , and but it is also discernible in other countries. Improved administrative arran- gements or improved communication concerning existing arran- gements would help to solve this problem. Thirdly, there is the issue of the day of voting. If the question is whether voting should be on a weekday or on a Sunday, it is clear that Sunday voting is more conducive to turnout. The evidence suggests, however, that both weekday and Sunday voting inhibit participation, each in dif- ferent ways. The logical solution would be to allow voting on a Sunday and a Monday. Although this would considerably increase the administrative costs of holding elections, it ought to be se- riously considered and not just for European elections. Turning to the challenge of mobilising the voters, one should note that compulsory voting is a form of voter mobilisation; the problem is that it is coercive mobilisation and, as such, it is incon- ceivable for European Parliament elections. Holding concurrent elections is also a form of mobilisation; the problem is that it mo- bilises voters on a sub-European basis and, in itself, does nothing for the quality of European participation. Other institutional fac- tors directly affecting participation include the nature of the elec- toral system, though the effect of this is more complex than pre- viously thought. important, however, is the indirect effect that stems from the constitutional system of the EU and from the role of the Parliament within it. Comparing Parlia- ment to national parliaments, some have argued that the only way to secure widespread participation in European Parliament elec- tions is to have executive elected by and responsible to Parliament. European elections would then pro- duce a party or combination of parties with a mandate to govern Europe. Such a proposal must be examined in the light of the natu- re of power and of the style of decision-making in Union. can be concentrated or it can be dispersed. Examples are the traditional British model on the one hand and the American model on the other. But political systems are further differentiated according to whether the style of decision-making is adversarial or consensual. Combining these two dimensions gives four types of democratic governance (see Figure 2). Types of democratic governance Concentration/dispersal of power The point is that democratic governance in Union falls into Type IV and is virtually certain to continue do so for the foreseeable future. This must be taken into account in considering measures to mobilise voter participation. mobilisation is not going to be brought about by some grand transformation in the role of the Parliament that would enable European Parliament elections to produce a mandate to govern Europe. Given that a big-bang approach is not on, it is perhaps fortunate that the raw material for a gradualist approach to mobilisation exists. Even in the present state of the EU constitution and of the role of the Par- liament, the evidence indicates that the image of the Parliament matters, that the reliability of the Parliament matters, that Euro- pean party and candidate differentials matter and that overall atti- tudes to European integration matter. These are all things that can be worked on here and now without waiting for someone or something to transform Parliament in ways would not be consistent with the nature of either the institutions or of the political processes of the Union. Blondel, , and (1998) People and Parliament in Union; Participation, Demo- cracy and Legitimacy, , (1964) The nature of belief systems among mass publics in Ideology and Discontent, ed. Eichenberg, , C., (1998) Measurement matter: Cumula- tion in the study of public opinion and European integration, Paper presented at Annual Meeting, 3–6, 1998, Eurobarometer, (1995) Report on Standard Eurobarometer 43, European Commission Directorate General , Autumn Franklin, and (eds.) (1996) Choosing Europe? Union and National Politics in the Face of Union, : N. and Scheingold, S. (eds.) (1970) Europe's Would-Be Polity: Patterns of Change in Commu- nity, Englewood , NJ: Niedermayer, , (1995) Trends and Contrasts in and (eds. ), Public Opinion and Internationalized Governance, : , and (1980) second- order elections: a conceptual framework for the analysis of European elections results, , 8: 3–4 Sinnott, (1998) Knowledge and the position of attitudes to a European Common Foreign and Security Policy on the real-to-random continuum Paper presented at American Poli- tical Annual Meeting, 3–6, 1998, The Distribution of Powers Between the EU and the Member States There is considerable scholarly debate about the challenges facing the contemporary nation state and about the changing nature of statehood in Europe, and this debate is focused in particular by two processes – the ending of the Cold War and the evolution of European integration. The continuing centrality of nation states to political order is asserted trenchantly by many authors, who point to the depth and breadth of the institutions they have spawned. Others point to the arrival of more porous borders and to perfo- rated sovereignty, to the possibility of prismatic patters of poli- tical authority scattering allegiances and dispersing them not only at the national level but also at the subnational and supranational level, and to multiple loyalties. Controversy about the role of the nation state is bound up with debates about the relationship bet- ween European integration and statehood. (Laffan, 0Donnell, 2000, Moravcisk 1998, Sweet et al. The objective of this paper is to analyse the distribution of powers between the EU and the member states, but in a which reflects on the ties and tensions that are moulding the kind of political and economic order that is emerging in the Union. 1 The author is of European politics at at university college . INTEGRATION AND STATEHOOD IN THE EUROPEAN UNION Three tensions in integration have a considerable impact on the relationship between statehood and integration and between the member states and the collectivity. the tension between a union of states and a market the tension between the EU as a polity and a problem-solving area the tension between EU level policy-making and policy making at other levels. These tensions throw up contradictions that have a particular bea- ring on the subject matter of this conference, namely, the demo- cratic fabric of integration and the participation of citizens in EU politics. A Union of States and a Market Promoting and facilitating economic exchange was central to the integration effort from the outset.