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The literature on party group switching in the European Parliament contends that members re-affiliate primarily for strategic reasons. This article advances the discussion by also considering the occurrence of non-strategic switches which follow the collapse of weakly institutionalized groups. Using an original dataset which includes DW-Nominate scores (1979–2009), I operationalize policy-seeking behavior among strategic switchers by deriving member- and delegation-to-group policy distance variables. The pooled logistic regression models using a penalized maximum likelihood estimator make it possible to address quasicomplete separation, and the results show that members from large groups and delegations have significantly lower odds of switching. Further, as members or delegations become incongruent with their group, the odds of switching increase. The study has important implications for research investigating the relationship between weak party institutionalization and parliamentary behavior.

Volt is a pan-European, Eurofederalist party that seeks to deepen and democratize European Union integration. It participated in elections in nine European countries and won representation in the Dutch Parliament and German constituency for the European Parliament. We examine Volt Netherlands, which studies the possibilities of a pan-European party. We look at the importance of its pro-European positions for voting for this party; this is an issue that all national branches of Volt share. We also examine the specific political opportunity structure of the Netherlands, where pro-nuclear environmentalism was an open niche. In this way, we weigh the importance of the party's pan-European appeal and the country-specific political opportunity structure. We show the importance of the country-specific factors for new party support and thus cast doubt on the ability of pan-European parties to mobilize voters all over Europe with the same message.

This research analyses whether Official Development Assistance (ODA) of Germany, France, the United Kingdom and the European Community/European Union (EC/EU) between 1980 and 1995 rewarded good governance in developing countries, using OLS regressions for three cross-sections over that time period. The results show that good governance, in the form of respect for basic human rights, democratic structures and low military spending, did not play a consistent or prominent role in European aid. The coordination between the European donors however seems to have increased during the first half of the 1990s. France and the UK give more aid to their former colonies, the EC/EU favours ACP countries. The results also indicate that both strategic and economic factors influence ODA distribution, whereas recipient needs receive only limited attention.

This research analyses whether Official Development Assistance (ODA) of Germany, France, the UK & the European Community/European Union (EC/EU) between 1980 & 1995 rewarded good governance in developing countries, using OLS regressions for three cross-sections over that time period. The results show that good governance, in the form of respect for basic human rights, democratic structures & low military spending, did not play a consistent or prominent role in European aid. The coordination between the European donors however seems to have increased during the first half of the 1990s. France & the UK give more aid to their former colonies, the EC/EU favors ACP countries. The results also indicate that both strategic & economic factors influence ODA distribution, whereas recipient needs receive only limited attention. 5 Tables, 3 Figures, 1 Appendix, 37 References. [Reprinted by permission of Sage Publications Ltd.]

"North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the European Union" published on by Oxford University Press.

"Comitology: Controlling Everyday Rule-Making in the European Union" published on by Oxford University Press.

The electorate's ability to influence the European agenda through European elections and national referenda has led to a close inspection of public attitudes by both academics and politicians. Taking a micro-level approach, this article contributes to the larger literature on the formation of public attitudes and aims at identifying the factors that influence public attitudes towards European integration in Bulgaria, one of the new member states. We use a national survey and rely upon utilitarian, value-based and heuristic factors to test several hypotheses. Although our data confirm the argument that support is higher in countries with lower opportunity costs of transferring sovereignty to the European Union, we also find that EU membership is assessed by projecting potential benefits for future generations rather than self-centered expectations of immediate returns.

Degressive proportionality constitutes the main conceptual criterion to determine the composition of the European Parliament (EP). In reality, however, this concept entails serious practical problems as exemplified by the current distribution of seats in the EP. This article takes up the call and presents a new method for a better balanced seat allocation in the EP after the 2014 elections. Comparing with recent methods in the field, our results reveal that the method proposed yields a more balanced and juster parliamentary seat distribution among all European member states by joining the strengths of the existing methods and avoiding their weaknesses. In light of upcoming rounds of enlargement and possible amendments to the EP's internal rules of procedure and existing EU Treaties, we contend that our results are not only of interest to the academic world.

This study is motivated by the puzzle of diminishing gains in the European Union budget bargaining for governments with a Eurosceptic domestic audience, even as Euroscepticism is increasingly represented in national legislatures. Engaging literature on fiscal federalism in the European Union and the institutionalist politics of its budgetary process, we argue that European integration diminishes the ability of member states' governments to leverage Euroscepticism to extract concessions from the European Union budget. This is because Euroscepticism is becoming less exceptional, and greater differentiation in integration reduces the will to reward those seen as systematically less committed to integration. Running panel-corrected standard errors regressions on Operating Budgetary Balances since 1977, we find that in intergovernmental bargaining, domestic popular Euroscepticism is an advantage, but parliamentary Euroscepticism is not.

Recent research argues that European integration has led to an ideological convergence of member state party systems, which is purported to have significant consequences for democratic representation. We argue that convergence of party positions is less problematic if congruence between governed and governing is maintained. We therefore turn to test whether integration has had an effect on congruence between the public and their governing elites. Using five measures of integration, two sources of public opinion data, and expert surveys on political parties, we find little evidence that integration into the European Union reduces congruence between the public and the national party system, government or legislature either ideologically or across five issue areas. These results should assuage concerns about integration's effect on domestic political representation.

Mass opposition to Europe may stem from mainstream as well as formally Euroskeptic parties. Large parties in the member states of the European Union (EU) tend to combine support for Europe with a high level of intra-party dissent over the issue. Thus, these parties provide heterogeneous yet potentially influential signals about European integration to their supporters. In this paper, we examine the effect of intra-party dissent on the opinion of party supporters. Our estimation of this relationship explicitly addresses the issues of endogeneity, omitted variables, and measurement problems endemic to the empirical study of elite effects on mass opinion. Specifically, we use variation in the centralization of candidate selection rules as an instrumental variable for intra-party dissent. We find substantial evidence that intra-party dissent does indeed increase variation in support for integration among party supporters. With common levels of intra-party dissent, even pro-EU parties can cause a substantial portion of their supporters to adopt anti-EU opinions.

The role of national parliaments in scrutinising their governments in European Union affairs has been at the forefront of debates on democratic accountability in the European Union for the past two decades. Resolutions are the legislative instruments most clearly associated with government control. This article finds that party political strategies, and especially the different constraints and incentives for mainstream/government parties and issue entrepreneurs on Europe, are the most important factors determining the activity of national parliaments in the form of resolutions on European Union affairs. Issue entrepreneurs are parties which are Eurosceptic and for which Europe is salient. Motions initiated by issue entrepreneurs are numerous but limited to criticising the government and contain little technical detail, while the resolutions of mainstream government parties mostly support the government's position. Resolutions and motions in European Union affairs are thus used rather as instruments of 'position taking' than as a form of government control, but could still help to foster accountability by bringing European Union issues and government policy to the citizens' attention.