Discontent and European Identiy Three Types of Euroscepticism

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Discontent and European Identity: Three Types of EuroscepticismBernhard We elsSocial Science Research Center Berlin (WZB), Reichpietschufer 50, Berlin D-10785, Germany.E-mail: [email protected]

In the last decade, support for European integration has declined and euroscepti-cism has risen. Using Eastons concept of political support, this paper studies the

interrelationship between euroscepticism and European identity. Starting from thehypothesis that identity as a central element of political community serves as abuffer against system-threatening euroscepticism, I develop a hierarchical model of euroscepticism. My results demonstrate that there are three types of eurosceptics,two of which hold opposite implications for European integration demand forimprovement vs a halt to or even an abolishment of European integration. Thedifference between both types is that the first group has a European identity, whilethe other does not. I conclude that the large size of the eurosceptic camp challengesEuropean integration.Acta Politica (2007) 42, 287306. doi:10.1057/palgrave.ap.5500188

Keywords: European integration; European identity; political support

Introduction

For decades, opinion research on European integration focused on theevolution of and support for the developing polity. 1 However, the last decademarked a change in the dynamics of public support and put euroscepticism on

the agenda. Since the early 1990s, it seemed that the European Union wasinstitutionally on course for further integration deepening and widening atthe same time. This trend accelerated in two ways during recent years: first, theEU enlarged by adding 10 new members states, crossing the so-called ironcurtain and taking on board eight new democracies in Central and EastEurope; second, the EU began work on an EU constitution. However, theEuropean Elections of 2004 the founding elections of a European Unioncrossing the borders between West and East sounded alarm bells in threeaspects regarding public support that were ignored. First, although the

elections after the democratic transformation in Central and East Europemarked a second critical juncture in postwar European history, turnout waslower than ever before and the proportion of votes gained by eurosceptical

Acta Politica, 2007 , 42, (287306)r 2007 Palgrave Macmillan Ltd 0001-6810/07 $30.00

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support, with the majority of the people in France and the Netherlandsrejecting it. In the worst-case scenario, this would mean that the constitution isdead. In a more optimistic view, the process of ratifying the EU constitution isput on hold on pause for reflection as Tony Blair has said. Third, in mid-June 2005, the EU-budget talks broke down and the president of the EU, JeanClaude Juncker, concluded that the EU is in deep crisis. Meanwhile, theEuropean Parliament has blocked the budget. Public support for Europeanintegration has been on the decline since the signing of the Maastricht treaty in1992 a phenomenon called post-Maastricht blues (Eichenberg and Dalton,2003; Netjes and Edwards, 2005). Today, European integration seems to be incrisis at the levels of both the people and the politicians. Declining publicsupport and the disaster with the ratification of the EU constitution certainlyhave been catalysts for elite dissent. European integration would be even morein crisis if this elite dissent would lead to an increase in euroscepticism.

In this paper, I address the question of whether there are buffers preventing atotal questioning of European integration. Using Eastons concept of politicalsupport, I argue that European identity as a core element of politicalcommunity could serve as such a buffer against scepticism. This theoreticalperspective suggests that euroscepticism is hierarchical and cumulative. I thentest these hypotheses using data from the EOS Gallup Europe Post Europeanelections 2004 survey, Flash Eurobarometer 162.

2

In the next section, I analyzethe characteristics of people with European identity and eurosceptics, and, incombining the measures for European identity and euroscepticism, differenti-ate three types of scepticism: the adamant eurosceptics, the eurosceptics, andthe critical Europeans. Finally, I investigate their distribution among countriesand their social characteristics.

Concept and Main Hypotheses

Only recently, research on support for European integration returned to theold question of the role of identity in European integration (Inglehart, 1970).Former research on support for European integration was oriented towards autilitarian framework, analyzing the costs and benefits for individuals or thesociety as a whole. Research results suggest that both positive macro-levelperformance and positive microeconomic perspectives generate support forEuropean integration (Eichenberg and Dalton, 1993; Gabel and Palmer, 1995;Anderson and Reichert, 1996; Gabel, 1998). However, as Marks and Hooghehave argued lately, emotional or gut commitments can be extremelypowerful in shaping views towards political objects (2003, 6). While reflectingon allegiance at both the national and the European levels research on identity

Bernhard We elsDiscontent and European Identity

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(Marks and Hooghe, 2003; Netjes and Kersbergen, 2005). I propose instead toinvestigate European identity.

Considering identity is in line with the conception of political supportproposed by Easton (1965). According to Easton, orientations towardspolitical objects must be conceptualized hierarchically. He differentiatesbetween three object levels and two modes of orientation. Object levels arethe authorities, the regime, and the community. Modes of orientations areeither specific or diffuse (see Figure 1).

Political authorities are defined as the occupants of authority roles,individual or collective: Authorities include, of course, all public officialsfrom chief executives, legislators, judges and administrators down to local cityclerks and policemen, as well as the institutions, such as legislatures or courts,of which they are part (Easton, 1975, 438). The regime is characterized by itspolitical values, norms, and structure. The political community is the collectionof persons bound together by a political division of labor (Easton, 1965, 177).Specific orientations concern output-directed evaluations. The uniqueness of specific support lies in its relationship to the satisfaction that members of asystem feel they obtain from the perceived output and performance of thepolitical authorities (Easton, 1975, 437). Diffuse orientations refer to what anobject is or represents, not what it does.

The theory of political support suggests that positive experience withconcrete political objects may spill over to positive orientations toward

political objects at a more abstract level. Thus, positive experience withpolitical authorities results in their specific support. If this positive experience isnot challenged, specific support of authorities transforms to diffuse support,first, of the authorities, then, of the regime. Such attachment may be a productof spill-over effects from evaluations of a series of outputs and performancesover a long period of time (Easton, 1975, 446). This is a typical process of generalization which indicates that the term diffuse may be misleading, since itdenotes generalized evaluations. This is why Fuchs (1993) has proposed todifferentiate between specific and generalized orientations. Easton himself

speaks of a generalized attachment to political objects (Easton, 1975, 444).Political community plays a special role in the orientations towards politicalobjects Support for a political community is support of the first order It

Political objectsRegimeModes of orientation Authorities Community

XSpecificXXXDiffuse

Figure 1 Orientations towards political objects. Constructed from Easton (1965).


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community among its members (Easton, 1965, 176). One may argue that thepolitical system is embedded within the political community (Juviler andStroschein, 1999, 438). In contrast to authorities and regimes, communitycontains an element of self-ascription, membership, and identification.

These considerations on support could be applied to political scepticism. Theother side of support is discontent, although neither discontent nor scepticismis an exact opposite of support because non-support may also includeindifference. 3 However, the theoretical reasoning with regard to politicalscepticism is similar to the one for support. Turning the hypothesis on supportaround, one may suggest that the more general or abstract levels of orientations could provide a buffer against the erosion of support at lowerlevels. General evaluations are more stable over time than specific evaluations.The buffer should be especially strong with regard to the most fundamentalfirst-order level of support, the political community. Easton argues thatdisillusionment with the political community would lead to withdrawal of support from the authorities and the regime. Conversely, one might argue thatfull identification with the political community could prevent or bufferdiscontent. This can be stated and qualified as follows:

Buffer hypothesisIdentification with the political community creates a buffer against politicalscepticism or discontent. The buffering effect is strongest at the most generalizedlevel of discontent, and weakens the more specific the object of discontent.

The framework of political support assumes generalization and suggests theaccumulation of support from the specific to the general, as long as positiveexperience and evaluations persist. Similarly, one may hypothesize that alsodiscontent or scepticism may accumulate. This second hypothesis can be statedas follows:

Cumulation hypothesis

Political scepticism is likely to cumulate, in that, specific discontent over alonger period should translate into generalized discontent, and should spillover from authorities to regime.

A Model of euroscepticismAccording to the buffer hypothesis formulated above those with a strong


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no European identity. Furthermore, the difference in discontent between thosewith and without European identity should be greatest at the most abstract levelof orientations (generalized support for the regime) and lowest at the mostconcrete level (the specific evaluation of the authorities). The cumulationhypothesis, on the other hand, suggests that one should observe spillover effectsfrom specific discontent with authorities to generalized discontent, and fromthere spillover to discontent with the regime culminating in a decline inEuropean identity. The best test for this hypothesis is the examination of longitudinal trends; however, this is beyond the scope of the data available, andso we restrict our analysis to a static perspective. Thus, evidence can only beachieved indirectly and causality or process characteristics can only betheoretically assumed, as long as empirical evidence does not suggest otherwise.The data set we have provides recent evidence for all current 25 member states.

Let us first establish that orientations toward Europe are structuredaccording to the framework used here. That is, are distinct orientations heldtowards authorities, regime, and community? The EOS Gallup Europe PostEuropean elections 2004 survey contains questions that, from a conceptualstandpoint, fit the proposed differentiation nicely:

For each of the following propositions, please tell me if it rathercorresponds or rather does not correspond to your attitude or your opinion:

(a) It is very important for you which particular political party gained the mostseats in the European Parliament elections

(b) It is very important for you which particular candidates win seats andbecome MEPs in the European Parliament elections

(c) The European Parliament takes into consideration the concerns of European citizens

(d) You trust the institutions of the European Union(e) The membership of [COUNTRY] in the European Union is a good thing(f) You feel you are a citizen of the European Union(g) You feel attached to Europe.

Possible answers: Yes, rather; No, rather not; [DK/NA].Conceptually, items (a)(d) contain stimuli suggesting orientations toward

political authorities, that is, candidates, parties, the European Parliament, and possibly at the borderline of regime European institutions. However,Easton suggests that both individual and collective actors and institutions canbe regarded as authorities. A positive evaluation on items (a) and (b) impliesthat candidates or parties are effective that it matters that they are in

parliament. This seems at least implicitly related to expected outcomes, that is,the effectiveness of authorities. Thus, the expectation is that these orientationscapture specific orientations toward authorities Items (c) and (d) also relate to


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(item (e)) is often used as an indicator of support for the regime (Niedermayerand Westle, 1995). Items (f) and (g) very clearly capture orientations towardthe political community of Europe, namely European identity. So these sevenindicators appear to tap four dimensions of orientations: specific support forthe authorities (effectiveness), generalized support for the authorities(responsiveness), political regime support (membership support), andorientation toward the EU political community (European identity).

An exploratory factor analysis helps to clarify whether this kind of differentiation of political objects and modes of orientation is present inpublic opinion. For the analysis, all 25 country surveys have been pooled.Positive answers (Yes, rather) have been coded 1; negative (No, rathernot) 1; and no answer and dont know 0. The results support the proposeddifferentiation (Table 1). The dimensional differentiation is very distinct for allitems except for trust in European institutions. As expected, this is aborderline issue to orientations to the political regime and, consequently, itshows quite a high loading on the regime dimension. However, the loading onthe factor responsiveness (generalized support for the authorities) is almost0.2 higher, justifying classifying the item as primarily orientated toward theauthorities.

A second question is whether the relationship between the dimensions isstructured as suggested by the buffer hypothesis. To keep the direction of thesign in line with the causality for euroscepticism assumed by the hypothesis,item coding for the orientations toward authorities and regime has beenreversed.

The model to be tested is a latent variable path model, which suits thepurpose here very well. In a cross-section analysis, this allows a modeling of process causality that otherwise can only be tested empirically in a time-seriesdesign. The buffer hypothesis claims that orientations toward the politicalcommunity European identity, in this case prevent discontent. It is

assumed that this is most strongly the case for the most general level of euroscepticism, that is orientations toward the regime a negative evaluationof EU membership in this case. This implies that the association betweenEuropean identity and membership scepticism (membership support) should bethe strongest, between European identity and generalized orientations towardauthorities (irresponsiveness) the second strongest, and the effect on specificorientations toward authorities (ineffectiveness) the weakest. The model alsoenables us to check whether the hypothesized political objects are truly distinct:a large residual covariance would indicate that the three objects are not truly

distinct.Figure 2 presents the model. The low outer residual covariance indicates thatthe separation of orientations towards different objects holds up The inner


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Table 1 Dimensions of attitudes toward Europe: effectiveness, responsiveness, diffuse support, and identity

Object Political community Politic

Mode of orientation Generalized GenIndicator European identity Members

You feel attached to Europe 0.8812 You feel you are a citizen of the European Union 0.7785 The membership of [COUNTRY] in theEuropean Union is a good thing

0.2496

The European Parliament takes into consideration

the concerns of European citizens

0.1581

You trust the institutions of the European Union 0.1856 0.453It is very important for you which particular candidates winseats and become MEPs in the European Parliament elections

0.0759

It is very important for you which particular political party gainedthe most seats in the European Parliament elections

0.0806

Explained variance (in %) 18.4 8.

Pooled data, 25 countries; 24,063 respondents; samples of almost equal size. Bold figures indicate attributionloading).Source : Eurobarometer Flash 162, EOS Gallup, Post European Election Survey 2004.A

c t aP ol i t i c a2 0 0 7 4 2


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relevant paths missing in the inner model. This finding leaves room for testingthe cumulation hypothesis. With regard to the buffer hypothesis, the modelis quite in line with the expectations. European identity has a negative impacton the three levels of discontent or euroscepticism. Furthermore, the negativeimpact is strongest with regard to membership, and lowest with regard toineffectiveness. However, the difference between membership scepticism and

irresponsiveness is marginal at best.The buffer hypothesis can also be addressed in a more direct way. The

hypothesis is that the difference in euroscepticism or support between thosewho identify with Europe and those who do not should be largest at the mostgeneral level of orientations and lowest at the most specific level. In otherwords, one would not expect those that identify themselves as Europeans to beuncritical at a concrete level, but one would expect them to refrain fromdeveloping scepticism at the more fundamental levels of orientations. Whenone compares the differences in means for the three scales of scepticism, that is,

ineffectiveness, irresponsiveness, and membership scepticism, this is indeed thecase. The mean difference between those who have a European identity andthose who havent is almost half the size for ineffectiveness compared with

R2R2R2

membership: .20irresponsiveness: .19

Europeanidentity

EU membership

not good

Irresponsiveness

EPirresponsive

No trust inEU-

institutions

EU "attachment"

Citizen of Europe

.45

.69

Candidateelection

irrelevant

Partyelection

irrelevant

.43

.74

.53

.62

-.45

-.44

-.21Ineffectiveness

ineffectiveness: .05

Figure 2 European identity and three levels of euroscepticism the buffer hypothesis. Latentvariable path model (LVPLS), LVPLSC (Lohmo ller, 1984). Inner residual co-variance: 0.12; outerresidual co-variance: 0.09; BentlerBonett Reliability 0.41; Communality 0.77. Eurobarometer

Flash 162, EOS Gallup, Post European Election Survey 2004; pooled analysis, 25 countries, 24,063respondents.


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(as expressed by coefficient Eta) for membership orientations as they are forineffectiveness. Irresponsiveness ranges in-between the two, but is closer tomembership scepticism. This should not surprise us, since both orientations aregeneralized (Table 2).

The results leave room for testing the cumulation hypothesis. Are therespillover effects from concrete experience, that is, from specific evaluations tomore generalized attitudes? More precisely, the hypothesis implies thatnegative experience with the effectiveness of the authorities eventuallytranslates into increasingly negative generalized orientations toward autho-rities and, when such experiences persist, into increasing scepticism about theregime. Technically, this assumes that one should note a directed relationshipbetween the latent variables of levels of euroscepticism.

Results show that this is indeed the case (Figure 3). The perception of ineffectiveness translates into higher levels of perception of irresponsiveness,which in turn translate into higher levels of EU membership scepticism. Thetransition from specific to generalized orientations toward authorities is lesspronounced than the transition between the generalized orientations towardauthorities to generalized orientations toward the regime. This is in line withEastons concept of political support that assumes that generalized orientationsare relatively persistent and not easily affected by concrete experience.

European Identity and euroscepticism: Who, Where, and Which Types

Finding support for both the buffer and the cumulation hypothesis hasimplications for further analysis First support for the buffer hypothesis

Table 2 Difference in euroscepticism between respondents with and without a European identity

Level of orientation No Europeanidentity (Mean)

Europeanidentity (Mean)

DifferenceEU identityno

EU identity

Eta

Ineffectiveness 0.54 0.33 0.87 0.21Irresponsiveness 0.78 0.79 1.59 0.42EU membership scepticism 0.15 1.58 1.73 0.44

Ineffectiveness and irresponsiveness are additive scales, built from the respective items (see Table 1),coding reversed. Scale range: 2 (positive evaluation of both items) to +2 (negative evaluation of both items).EU membership scepticism: contains only the membership item, reversed coding. To facilitatecomparison, the original scale ( 1 to +1) has been weighted by 2 resulting in a scale from 2 to+2. Pooled data, 25 countries; 24,063 respondents; samples of almost equal size.Source : Eurobarometer Flash 162, EOS Gallup, Post European Election Survey 2004.


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one or more of the three elements of euroscepticism, but are attached toEurope at the same time and those who feel discontent and are not attached toEurope. euroscepticism of the first kind may have totally different implicationsfor European integration and its support than the latter. Second, thecumulation hypothesis suggests that the perception of political objects isdifferentiated, but related. Forty-one percent of those being skeptical at the

lowest level (effectiveness of the authorities) also show discontent at the nexthighest level (responsiveness), and 88% of those feeling discontent at these twolevels also feel discontent at the highest level (i.e., are EU membership sceptics).The proportion of non-cumulative discontent at only the second level is 17%.It is only 6% at the third level. All this suggests that it should be possible tosum up the three degrees or levels of euroscepticism into an overall score of euroscepticism.

I construct two scales as follows:

European identity scale

The scores of the two items for European identity have been added resulting in

Europeanidentity

EU membership

not good

Irresponsiveness

EPirresponsive

No trust in EU-

Institutions

EU "attachment"

Citizen of Europe

.45

.70

Candidateelection

irrelevant

Partyelection

irrelevant

.43

.74

.49

.66

-.31

-.40

-.21

.32

.15

Ineffectiveness

R2R2R2

membership: .28irresponsiveness: .21ineffectiveness: .05

Figure 3 European identity and three levels of euroscepticism the cumulation hypothesis.Latent variable path model (LVPLS), LVPLSC (Lohmo ller, 1984). Inner residual co-variance: 0.02;outer residual co-variance: 0.09; BentlerBonett Reliability 0.42; Communality 0.77. Eurobarom-

eter Flash 162, EOS Gallup, Post European Election Survey 2004; pooled analysis, 25 countries,24,063 respondents.


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identification). The scale has a mean of 0.76, which indicates that thedistribution is skewed in the direction of European identity. The standarddeviation is 1.56.

Euroscepticism scale

The coding of the items relating to effectiveness, responsiveness, andmembership support has been reversed and the items summed up. Since EUmembership scepticism consists of one item only, it was double-weighted. Thescale has a minimum of 6 (full content), a maximum of 6 (full discontent),and a mean of 1.37. This indicates that the distribution is skewed in thedirection of a positive evaluation of EU political objects. The standarddeviation is 3.49.

A crucial question is which other sources of European identity andeuroscepticism exist beside experiences with and evaluations of the perfor-mance of authorities and the regime. Research on attitudes toward Europeanintegration has offered one major explanation: the role of political elites andpolitical parties in mobilizing orientations and providing cues to deal with thesomewhat distant political objects at the European level (We els, 1995;Carrubba, 2001; Marks et al ., 2002; Steenbergen and Scott, 2004; Netjes andEdwards, 2005). This approach has high explanatory power, but cannot bedirectly pursued here. The indirect approach is cognitive mobilization,introduced by Inglehart in the late 1960s. According to Inglehart (1970, 47),cognitive mobilization increases the individuals capacity to receive andinterpret messages relating to a remote political community. As such, cognitivemobilization is a necessary but not sufficient condition y . It depends onmessages in the mass media, school, and of opinion leaders ( Ibid ., 48). Thispoints back to the cues explanation, as long as one can assume that messagesare on average positive. This is still the case in Europe, although eurosceptical

voices and parties are on the rise. However, the implication is that education,political information, and political interest can be regarded as possible sourcesfor developing positive orientations toward the EU. For European identity,however, one may assume that exposure to the political community also playsa major role. Indeed, a simple regression shows that the more informed, themore politically interested, and the better educated have a stronger Europeanidentity. Besides that, the strongest effect is due to the length of EUmembership of the respondents country (Table 3a).

It does not come as a surprise that cognitive mobilization is negatively

related to euroscepticism. The length of membership has a much smaller effect(Table 3b). Introducing European identity (Table 3c) demonstrates the strongbuffering power of positive orientations toward the community It is by far the


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Table 3a European identity regressed on political information, political interest, education, andlength of EU membership

B SE B Beta T Sig. T

EU informed 0.22 0.01 0.13 20.72 0.00Political interest 0.16 0.01 0.10 16.28 0.00Education 0.08 0.01 0.04 6.11 0.00Length of EU membership (log) 0.13 0.00 0.17 26.85 0.00

(Constant) 0.32 0.03 11.20 0.00Adjusted R2 0.07

Table 3b Euroscepticism regressed on political information, political interest, education, andlength of EU membership


EU informed 0.76 0.02 0.20 33.07 0.00Political interest 0.78 0.02 0.22 35.68 0.00Education 0.16 0.02 0.04 5.91 0.00Length of EU membership (log) 0.07 0.01 0.04 7.01 0.00


Table 3c Euroscepticism regressed on political information, political interest, education, andEuropean identity


EU informed 0.53 0.02 0.14 26.08 0.00Political interest 0.61 0.02 0.17 31.49 0.00Education 0.08 0.02 0.02 3.16 0.00European identity 1.01 0.01 0.45 81.83 0.00


Eurobarometer Flash 162, EOS Gallup, Post European Election Survey 2004; pooled analysis, 25countries, 24,063 respondents.EU informed, political interest 1 (No) to +1 (Yes).Education: 0 through 5 low to high.


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against euroscepticism. If, however, the content of the messages becomesnegative, even the most receptive, politically active, and politically capablecitizens may turn their backs to European integration. Only their Europeanidentity may prevent this for a while. At the moment, there is no reason toassume that the public discourse about European integration will change intodominantly negative evaluations. Nevertheless, the tendency of some politicalelites and parties to increasingly articulate scepticism and sometimes actuallyopposition to European integration cannot be overlooked.

How strongly European identity may buffer against discontent andeuroscepticism is also indicated by the distribution of identification with andscepticism toward the EU within a country. Plotting the proportions of thosehaving a positive value on the two scales in a country against each other showsthat in those countries where the share of European identity is high, the shareof euroscepticism is low and vice versa. Since it seems that the development of aEuropean identity is contingent on the length of time citizens have beenconfronted with the symbols of the community, the obvious expectation is thatidentity should be lower in the new member states and higher in the old ones.This is on average supported by Figure 4. However, some new members,

GB

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Figure 4 European identity and euroscepticism in 25 EU member states. K Old EU members.J New EU members (joiner in 2004). % European identity: % positive values on the Europeanidentity scale (range 2 to 2). % eurosceptics: % positive values on the eurosceptic scale (range

) l d d ld b


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Slovenia, Malta, and Hungary in particular, show more identification and lessscepticism than some older ones. Indeed, euroscepticism is widespread in GreatBritain, Sweden, and Austria.

This raises the question of whether there are different types of euroscepti-cism. There must be people with a positive European identity who arenevertheless sceptical. This type of euroscepticism is certainly different fromthat showing no attachment to Europe. This combination is reminiscent of concepts like the dissatisfied democrats (Hofferbert and Klingemann, 2001)or the critical citizens (Norris, 1999). Similar to the notion of critical citizens convinced democrats showing discontent with how their democracy works one may talk of critical Europeans to characterize those who are stronglyattached to the European community but feel discontent at the same time. Onemay assume that they associate a different goal with their scepticism than thosewho do not have a sense of European identity. Critical Europeans arediscontented, but not against the European community. They may have avariety of reasons for criticism, but this criticism is oriented towardimprovement not abolishment. In contrast, critics without a Europeanidentity are better labeled adamant eurosceptics since they may even consider astop or abolishment of European integration.

In order to differentiate types of euroscepticism, I have constructed atypology on the basis of European identity and euroscepticism. I have recodedthe scales into three categories: positive/indifferent/negative. The result is athree-by-three typology producing nine types. Those on the negative side of euroscepticism (i.e., those positive about the performance of the authoritiesand the regime) are not of interest here, though it is worth noting that allegiantEuropeans (those showing a European identity and being content with theperformance) fall short of being the absolute majority of citizens in theEuropean Union. In all, 54% of the EU citizens appear to be satisfied withthe regime and authorities, though not all of these have a European identity.

On the other side are the eurosceptics. Altogether 32.2% of the citizens feeldiscontented with the performance of the EU. The two groups of most interesthere are the adamant eurosceptics and the critical Europeans, comprising 14.2and 9.3% of the citizenry, respectively (Table 4).

In 16 of the 25 member states, there are more adamant eurosceptics thancritical Europeans. In those countries one may expect to find criticism againstEuropean integration to be dominated by strong opposition to Europeanintegration. In contrast, where critical Europeans outweigh adamant sceptics,one would expect the critical discourse about Europe to be directed toward

improvements of the EU system barring intense and vocal minorities of adamant eurosceptics.There are six countries in which the proportion of adamant eurosceptics is


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Czech Republic, and Slovakia. Since all those countries except Great Britainare new members, it is possible that further exposure to the Europeancommunity could socialize these relatively new EU citizens into criticalEuropeans. However, the same cannot be said for the countries that followafter the top bracket with about 15% of adamant sceptics: Sweden, theNetherlands, and France. These countries show that severe euroscepticism canbe found even in core countries of the old European Union after all, thereferenda for the EU constitution failed in France and the Netherlands.

With regard to critical Europeans, Austria is a true outlier. Here, theproportion of critical Europeans is extremely high (22%). Normally, theproportion of critical Europeans is highest (about 10%) in countries wherethe proportion of adamant eurosceptics is about average (Figure 5).

Are demographics distinctive for the different types of eurosceptics? Thegeneral expectation is that euroscepticism goes along with less politicalinformation, less interest in politics, and lower education. However, it is alsopossible that some types of euroscepticism diverge in these categories. Criticismof European integration and the European Union seems to be often inspired by

dissatisfaction with EU democracy (Rohrschneider, 2002; Fuchs, 2003), andactually demonstrates a relatively high level of information as well as a highlevel of European commitment. Thus, it could well be that critical Europeansare well informed, politically interested, and better educated.

Data supports the general expectation but not the specific one on criticalEuropeans. Eurosceptics of all types tend to be considerably less informed, lessinterested in politics, and somewhat lower educated than average. CriticalEuropeans are somewhat better off in all three regards compared to theadamant eurosceptics. This appears to indicate that critical Europeans are not

the ones to be able to forcefully fight for improvement at least not on a basisof characteristics, such as knowledge, interest, or education, traditionallyregarded as resources for political action The same for even stronger reasons

Table 4 A typology of EU orientations three types of euroscepticism

Euroscepticism scale EU identity scale

Negative Neutral/indifferent Positive

Negative (EU performancepositive)

Non-allegiantinstrumentalists (3.7%)

Instrumentalists(8.0%)

AllegiantEuropeans (42.3 %)

Neutral/indifferent (2.7%) Indifferents (3.5%) (7.6%)positive (EU performancenegative)

Adamanteurosceptics (14.2%)

Eurosceptics (8.7%) Critical Europeans(9.3%)

Countries weighted by population size.


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them a strong force in political action Yet it would be wrong to conclude

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GB: 46

Adamant eurosceptics

Critical Europeans

Country:% Eurosceptics total

Figure 5 Euroscepticism in 25 EU member states, rank-ordered by the proportion of adamanteurosceptics. Critical Europeans: positive values on identity scale and euroscepticism scale.Adamant eurosceptics: negative values on identity scale and positive values on eurosceptic scale.Difference in euroscepticism total and the sum of critical Europeans and adamant eurosceptics:neutral/indifferent on identity scale, positive values on eurosceptic scale.


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citizens: over 40% of eurosceptics in six member countries. Moreover, inparticular the adamant eurosceptics constitute a potential recruiting ground foreurocritical parties, populist demagogues, or nationalists (Table 5).

Conclusion

In recent years, support for European integration has declined and the signs of rising euroscepticism have become numerous. I have utilized Eastons well-known concept of political support to conceptualize euroscepticism and itsbarriers. I argued that euroscepticism is a multi-level attitudinal phenomenon like political support. It addresses different levels of political objects:

authorities, the regime, and the community. Orientations toward the politicalcommunity have a special position in the hierarchy of political objects. Theyare the first-order level of support; the necessary basis for any political system.They encompass the political system in two ways: because the political systemis embedded in the political community, and because they contain an elementof self-ascription, membership, and identification going beyond the formalcitizen role.

Because orientations toward the political community have this particularstatus, I argue that self-identification as a European can serve as a bufferagainst discontent. Conversely, discontent may cumulate from one level toanother. I tested these hypotheses with an attitudinal latent variable pathmodel and found empirical confirmation The results show that European

Table 5 Characteristics of types of eurosceptics: political information, interest in politics, andeducation

Critical europeans

Eurosceptics%

Adamanteurosceptics

Differencecritical adamant

% % %

EU informed (avg. 63.7%) 51.8 50.1 47.1 4.7Very interested in politics (avg. 49.9%) 37.3 35.8 32.9 4.4

Years finished full time education:1519 (avg. 19.7%) 22.1 21.7 21.5 0.620 (avg. 49.3%) 51.5 53.0 56.3 4.8

21 and more (avg. 28.1%) 22.9 21.9 18.7 4.2N 100% 1,805 1,775 2,994

Critical Europeans: positive values on identity scale and eurosceptic scale. Eurosceptics: neutral/indifferent on identity scale, positive values on eurosceptic scale. Adamant eurosceptics: negativevalues on identity scale and positive values on eurosceptic scale.


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higher generalization of attitudes (generalized support for the regime and theauthorities) but not as effective against specific scepticism about theauthorities.

Research on the sources of identification is still scarce. However, cognitivemobilization and, in particular, the length of time citizens were confronted withthe symbols, institutions, and actions of the EU political system (i.e., theduration of EU membership) play an important role as a basis for identity.Consequently, these factors are negatively related to euroscepticism. Mostimportant is the observation that European identity is the strongest factorpreventing scepticism. This holds true at the individual level as well as at thecountry level provided the proportion of citizens with a European identity ishigh. However, this does not imply that those that identify themselves with theEU cannot be eurosceptics. There are different types of eurosceptics: criticalEuropeans can combine EU identity with scepticism, while adamanteurosceptics combine scepticism with no attachment to the European politicalcommunity. Critical Europeans demand for improvements of the EU, whileadamant eurosceptics demand for a stop of or end to European integration.Eurosceptics are no negligible group: they amount to about 32% of Europeancitizens (14% adamant eurosceptics, 9% critical Europeans and another 9% of eurosceptics with indifferent feelings about the community). However, there isgreat variation across countries, ranging from as much as 46% of euroscepticsin Britain (among them 29% adamant) to 10% in Luxembourg. Overall,eurosceptics of any type are less politically informed, less interested in politics,and less educated than the average citizen. Neither the critical Europeans northe adamant eurosceptics have the resources required for accomplishing thegoals of their scepticism. However, given the sizeable group of eurosceptics,they may be a potential target for eurosceptical collective actors or leaders. Theresults show that the European Union has a long way to go to convince theEuropean people.

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Notes

1 This is a revised version of a paper presented at the conference on Euroscepticism Causes andConsequences, organized by Liesbet Hooghe and Gary Marks, 12 July 2005, Vrije Universiteit,


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Amsterdam. The author wants to thank the participants for constructive comments and, inparticular, Liesbet Hooghe for extensive comments.

2 The early data use has been made possible by the director of EOS Gallup, M. Pascal Chelala.3 This is not a trivial difference. Empirical results on support cannot be transformed into results on

political scepticism by merely reversing the interpretations. Both support and scepticism implyexplicit attitudes while indifference implies none. One may find little support, but also littlescepticism so long as indifference is very high.


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Discontent and European Identiy Three Types of Euroscepticism