Suchergebnisse

The article applies Social Choice theory to analyse new and so far undiscovered aspects of the Danish referendums on the Maastricht Treaty in 1992 and 1993. The article queries whether the amended Maastricht Treaty adopted in 1993 was, in fact, the most preferred alternative for a majority of Danish voters. A reconstruction of voter preferences regarding the political alternatives in the European Union — the Maastricht Treaty, the amended Maastricht Treaty and the Status Quo — reveals that the amended Maastricht Treaty, despite the fact that it was the Condorcet winner and won the 1993 referendum, may not have been preferred by a majority but was probably the most preferred alternative only for a minority of the electorate.

Numerous scholarly articles have investigated member states' a priori voting power in past, present and possible future Councils of the European Union (EU). This article introduces three empirically oriented variants of the standardized Banzhaf index and compares them with the standardized Banzhaf index itself. The comparison suggests that the averages of the empirically oriented indices converge towards the Banzhaf index, and hence that there is no dominant ordering of the member states or the issues and, consequently, no stable minimal winning coalitions over time. However, statistical analysis reveals that the country-bycountry average difference from the Banzhaf index, considering all issues, remains significant in all three variants of empirical power.

Comparative tests of predictive accuracy across models are exceptionally rare in political science. The collection of articles in this issue provides a rigorous, systematic evaluation of alternative models for explaining and predicting decision-making within the European Union. I examine how alternative models were evaluated and raise questions about the differences in the extent to which the operational definitions of variables match contending theoretical approaches. I also raise questions regarding the difference between models with regard to whether the issues are part of a repeated game or a single-shot game. Finally, I propose future tests to hone in on some of the puzzles raised by the findings reported here.

Our model suggests that national political, economic and cultural dimensions have to be taken into account when explaining support for European Union (EU) membership among the Swiss electorate. Using data from the first Eurobarometer survey in Switzerland (1999), we empirically test our model using structural equation modelling. We find that institutional attachment and `image' of neighbouring countries are strongly linked to the perception of threat to national interests, which in turn is a strong predictor of support for joining the EU. We also show that national identity, attachment to neutrality, as well as perceived economic gain or loss from EU membership are directly linked to attitudes towards EU membership.

The European Union is one of the world?s most complex political systems: this makes it a challenge to study. To the uninitiated its institutions seem remote, its remit unclear, its operations difficult to understand and its outputs sometimes perplexing. It combines some attributes of a state with those of an international organisation, yet it closely resembles neither. Its development is shaped by an increasing number of players, including 25 member governments, multiple common EU institutions, clusters of experts, private interests and citizen groups. All converge to influence what the EU is.

What factors explain public support for international redistribution? While the European Union has sent billions of taxpayers' money to over indebted euro countries in an attempt to avoid an economic collapse, these transfers have encountered fierce resistance among both donor and recipient constituents. However, we know surprisingly little about why citizens support or oppose redistribution within the EU. This paper suggests that domestic levels of corruption and institutional quality may be one of the most important explanations for the great variation in public support for financial assistance, bailouts and aid. Using recent European Elections Survey data merged with data on regional level quality of government, we show that the effects of institutional quality are consistently stronger than macro-economic factors, including economic development, inequality or levels of public debt. We find strong evidence that citizens in low corrupt contexts are more likely to support financial assistance to fellow member states. The results have implications for future challenges in securing public support for EU economic integration as well as for our understanding of how and why corruption undermines society's collective action capacity.

Examines issues related to the Russian-European Union strategic partnership, highlighting provisions and objectives of the Partnership and Cooperation Agreement signed in 1994, and the "four roadmaps" targeting the realms of economics; freedom, security, and justice; external security; science and education; and culture. The pragmatism inherent to such a partnership is stressed.

This article analyses the extent to which European Union (EU) directives allow for variation in domestic implementation. Such flexibility in implementation may be used to deal with heterogeneity among member states. Based on an original dataset of 164 directives adopted between 2006 and 2015, we find that the use of flexibility is associated more with efforts to accommodate differences between national policies (substantive use of discretion) than with attempts to facilitate the decision-making process in and between EU legislative institutions (strategic use of discretion). Although flexibility may be used to address some of the same concerns that drive differentiated integration (DI), the situations in which each is most likely to be used are distinct because they approach the divergences between member states differently.

The rise of "new regionalism" is one of the most salient features of the post-Cold War international order. Despite the resurgence of regionalism in Europe, little consensus exists on how regional identity impacts public opinion toward the European Union. To remedy this problem, this study examines the impact of three types of individual-level regional identity on support for integration: parochialism (exclusive regionalism), inclusive regionalism, and pseudo-exclusive regionalism. Contrary to scholarly expectations, the multilevel analysis reveals that inclusive regionalists are as equally Eurosceptic as parochial regionalists. In general, regional identity depresses support for integration unless it is expressly combined with a supranational identity. This finding holds true even in minority nations, where respondents are, on the whole, less Euro-friendly.

Cross-border welfare rights for citizens of European Union member states are intensely contested, yet there is limited research into voter opposition to such rights, sometimes denoted 'welfare chauvinism'. We highlight an overlooked aspect in scholarly work: the role of stereotypes about beneficiaries of cross-border welfare. We present results from an original large-scale survey experiment (N=2525) among Swedish voters, randomizing exposure to cues about recipients' country of origin and family size. Consistent with a model emphasizing the role of stereotypes, respondents react to cues about recipient identity. These effects are strongest among respondents high in ethnic prejudice and economic conservatism. The findings imply that stereotypes about who benefits from cross-border welfare rights condition public support for those rights.

What triggers the information exchange among the regional offices in Brussels? To answer this question, we develop a framework based on network theory and present the first large-N quantitative study on European Union-level inter-regional networks. Our results show that information exchanges take place predominantly among regions from the same member state. Furthermore, the likelihood of regular information exchanges between two regional offices depends on the resources invested in regional representation, the joint involvement in inter-regional associations, and geographical proximity. In contrast to our expectations, our findings refute the hypotheses that more regional autonomy and more experience in Brussels increase the propensity toward cross-border inter-regional networking, a practice that might potentially contribute to the fragmentation of member state representation.

Comparative tests of predictive accuracy across models are exceptionally rare in political science. The collection of articles in this issue provides a rigorous, systematic evaluation of alternative models for explaining & predicting decision-making within the European Union. I examine how alternative models were evaluated & raise questions about the differences in the extent to which the operational definitions of variables match contending theoretical approaches. I also raise questions regarding the difference between models with regard to whether the issues are part of a repeated game or a single-shot game. Finally, I propose future tests to hone in on some of the puzzles raised by the findings reported here. 1 Table, 19 References. [Copyright 2004 Sage Publications Ltd.]