Bulletin n. 3/2014
February 2015
CONTENTS
  • Section A) The theory and practise of the federal states and multi-level systems of government
  • Section B) Global governance and international organizations
  • Section C) Regional integration processes
  • Section D) Federalism as a political idea
    • FitzGibbon John
    Euroscepticism and the 2014 European Parliamentary Elections
    in Europe en formation (L') , n° 373, 2014/3 ,  2014 ,  29-44
    The outcome of the 2014 European Parliamentary (EP) election is widely perceived to have been a victory for Euroscepticism and those political actors who want their country to withdraw from EU membership. The media narrative has focused in particular on the success of the hard Eurosceptic (Szczerbiak & Taggart: 2004) UKIP in Britain and the Front National (FN) in France who emerged as the largest parties in their respective countries EP election vote. This article argues, however, that this specific narrative draws too nuanced a conclusion from the outcome of the elections. It emphasises that the overlooked outcome of the election was the differentiated nature of Euroscepticism that emerged across the EU. By examining several case studies—Ireland, France, Greece, Poland, Spain and the UK—it shows that the nature of opposition to European integration expressed by the parties who ‘won’ the EP elections in each state, variated to a significant degree. To view such outcomes through the prism of the ‘withdrawalist’ FN and UKIP is to exclude the emergence of opponents of European integration whose challenge is based on critiques of the policies employed at the EU level to deal with the European economic and financial crisis. The article concludes by framing the emergence of this Euroscepticism in the context of the catastrophic impact of the crisis on the European economy, and how it is not just understandable but perhaps even muted given the devastation wrought by the crisis.
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