Dimensions and alignments in european union politics: Cognitive constraints and partisan responses

Abstract

As the European Union (EU) has evolved, the study agenda has shifted from 'European integration' to 'EU politics'. Missing from this new agenda, however, is an understanding of the 'cognitive constraints' on actors and how actors respond, i.e. the shape of the EU 'political space' and the location of social groups and competition between actors within this space. The article develops a theoretical framework for understanding the shape of the EU political space (the interaction between an Integration-Independence and Left-Right dimension and the location of class and sectoral groups within this map), and tests this framework on the policy positions of the Socialist, Christian Democrat and Liberal party leaders between 1976 and 1994 (using the techniques of the ECPR Party Manifestos Group Project). The research finds that the two dimensions were salient across the whole period, explains why the party families converged on pro-European positions by the 1990s and discovers the emergence of a triangular 'core' of EU politics.

Constitutional Agenda-Setting Through Discretion in Rule Interpretation: Why the European Parliament Won at Amsterdam

“…The issue is simply not significant enough for either voters or parties: in election manifestos, parties rarely mention issues relating to the EU and almost never discuss institutional reform; 20 and even in statements by the transnational Euro-parties, the democratic deficit and the EP's powers are rarely discussed. 21 …”

Dynamic Representation: The Case of European Integration

“…For the European Union, these are the left-right dimension which structures party competition in its constituent national polities, and the integration-independence dimension which might be more salient for the EU polity (e.g. Hix, 1999;Marks and Wilson, 1999). Level refers to the two groups of actors involved-the represented (i.e.…”

“…A more mundane aspect of this is that the conventional orthogonal arrangement of the two dimensions (e.g. Hix and Lord, 1997;Hix, 1999;Marks and Wilson, 1999) would be inadequate.…”

“…Hix, 1999). While we ourselves have identified these sub-dimensions in earlier analysis (Thomassen and Schmitt, 1999), we feel justified in the present analysis in concentrating on the one overarching left-right structure.…”

“…This is evident for both voters and political elites. However, (Hix, 1999), or based their measurement on expert judgements (Marks and Wilson, 1999 National parties will be our focus in the causal analysis that follows. Figure 6 displays the positions of European Union parties and parliamentary groups and how they have changed as represented in the group structure of the European Parliament.…”