Auditing Electoral Democracy in Europe: Achievements of the PIREDEU project

Transcription

1 Auditing Electoral Democracy in Europe: Achievements of the PIREDEU project Mark N. Franklin Stein Rokkan Professor of Comparative Politics European University Institute, Fiesole, near Florence, Italy Chair of the Steering Committee: Providing an Infrastructure for Research on Electoral Democracy in the European Union PIREDEU final conference opening panel, Brussels, November 18 th 2010

2 European Parliament Elections of 2009 PIREDEU (Providing an Infrastructure for Research on Electoral Democracy in the EU) was funded by the EU's DG Research under their FP7 programme and by the British ESRC. It has involved 14 institutions in 9 countries and collaborators in all 27 EU countries. Actually five linked projects coordinated from the EUI s Robert Schumann Centre under the auspices of EUDO (the European Union Democracy Observatory), also housed there

3 European Parliament Elections of 2009 PIREDEU (Providing an Infrastructure for Research on Electoral Democracy in the EU) was funded by the EU's DG Research under their FP7 programme and by the British ESRC. It has involved 14 institutions in 9 countries and collaborators in all 27 EU countries. Actually five linked projects coordinated from the EUI s Robert Schumann Centre under the auspices of EUDO (the European Union Democracy Observatory), also housed there - A voters study (interviews with 1,000 randomly chosen citizens in each of 27 countries) cooredinated at the University of Amsterdam

4 European Parliament Elections of 2009 PIREDEU (Providing an Infrastructure for Research on Electoral Democracy in the EU) was funded by the EU's DG Research under their FP7 programme and by the British ESRC. It has involved 14 institutions in 9 countries and collaborators in all 27 EU countries. Actually five linked projects coordinated from the EUI s Robert Schumann Centre under the auspices of EUDO (the European Union Democracy Observatory), also housed there - A voters study (interviews with 1,000 randomly chosen citizens in each of 27 countries) cooredinated at the University of Amsterdam - A candidates study (interviews with 20 percent of all candidates in all 27 countries) coordinated at the WZB-Berlin

5 European Parliament Elections of 2009 PIREDEU (Providing an Infrastructure for Research on Electoral Democracy in the EU) was funded by the EU's DG Research under their FP7 programme and by the British ESRC. It has involved 14 institutions in 9 countries and collaborators in all 27 EU countries. Actually five linked projects coordinated from the EUI s Robert Schumann Centre under the auspices of EUDO (the European Union Democracy Observatory), also housed there - A voters study (interviews with 1,000 randomly chosen citizens in each of 27 countries) cooredinated at the University of Amsterdam - A candidates study (interviews with 20 percent of all candidates in all 27 countries) coordinated at the WZB-Berlin - A party manifestos study (compendium of manifesto promises by all parties EU-wide) coordinated at the University of Mannheim

6 European Parliament Elections of 2009 PIREDEU (Providing an Infrastructure for Research on Electoral Democracy in the EU) was funded by the EU's DG Research under their FP7 programme and by the British ESRC. It has involved 14 institutions in 9 countries and collaborators in all 27 EU countries. Actually five linked projects coordinated from the EUI s Robert Schumann Centre under the auspices of EUDO (the European Union Democracy Observatory), also housed there - A voters study (interviews with 1,000 randomly chosen citizens in each of 27 countries) cooredinated at the University of Amsterdam - A candidates study (interviews with 20 percent of all candidates in all 27 countries) coordinated at the WZB-Berlin - A party manifestos study (compendium of manifesto promises by all parties EU-wide) coordinated at the University of Mannheim - A media study (content analysis of news outlets in 27 countries) coordinated at the Universities of Exeter and Amsterdam

7 European Parliament Elections of 2009 PIREDEU (Providing an Infrastructure for Research on Electoral Democracy in the EU) was funded by the EU's DG Research under their FP7 programme and by the British ESRC. It has involved 14 institutions in 9 countries and collaborators in all 27 EU countries. Actually five linked projects coordinated from the EUI s Robert Schumann Centre under the auspices of EUDO (the European Union Democracy Observatory), also housed there - A voters study (interviews with 1,000 randomly chosen citizens in each of 27 countries) cooredinated at the University of Amsterdam - A candidates study (interviews with 20 percent of all candidates in all 27 countries) coordinated at the WZB-Berlin - A party manifestos study (compendium of manifesto promises by all parties EU-wide) coordinated at the University of Mannheim - A media study (content analysis of news outlets in 27 countries) coordinated at the Universities of Exeter and Amsterdam - A contextual data study (collecting all relevant electoral and institutional data EU-wide) coordinated at the Warsaw School of Social Psychology

8 European Parliament Elections of 2009 PIREDEU (Providing an Infrastructure for Research on Electoral Democracy in the EU) was funded by the EU's DG Research under their FP7 programme and by the British ESRC. It has involved 14 institutions in 9 countries and collaborators in all 27 EU countries. Actually five linked projects coordinated from the EUI s Robert Schumann Centre under the auspices of EUDO (the European Union Democracy Observatory), also housed there - A voters study (interviews with 1,000 randomly chosen citizens in each of 27 countries) cooredinated at the University of Amsterdam - A candidates study (interviews with 20 percent of all candidates in all 27 countries) coordinated at the WZB-Berlin - A party manifestos study (compendium of manifesto promises by all parties EU-wide) coordinated at the University of Mannheim - A media study (content analysis of news outlets in 27 countries) coordinated at the Universities of Exeter and Amsterdam - A contextual data study (collecting all relevant electoral and institutional data EU-wide) coordinated at the Warsaw School of Social Psychology All of the above are also linkable to data generated by the EU-Profiler project (a Voting Advice Application fielded in 27 countries and winner of the World e-democracy Forum Award 09) which provided a public service and at the same time collected data on party positions and the evolution of party support over the 2009 campaign.

9 The 2009 European Election Study and Past EESs Date N of countries Voters study Media study Candidate study Manifestoes study Contextual data study

10 The 2009 voting decision in context Government performance Political system Parties Manifestos (Cross-section view) Candidates Events Media Voters Election outcome

11 The 2009 elections in over-time perspective Pre-election Eurobarometer (April 2009) (Time-series view) EU Profiler monitoring of opinion evolution (Starts May 2009) Monitoring of newspapers and Television stories (Starts May 2009) 2009 European Parliament Election (June 2009) PIREDEU post-election surveys (Start June 2009) Time

12 Conceptual map The following concepts were identified as potentially relevant across all components of the PIREDEU study 1. Voting: Party choice and turnout 2. Attachment to parties 3. Engagement and mobilization 4. Media availability, content and usage 8. Representation 5. Value orientations 6. Domestic and European issues 7. Institutional setting

13 Conceptual map The following concepts were identified as potentially relevant across all components of the PIREDEU study 1. Voting: Party choice and turnout 2. Attachment to parties 3. Engagement and mobilization 4. Media availability, content and usage 8. Representation 5. Value orientations 6. Domestic and European issues 7. Institutional setting for example, item 3

14 Conceptual map The following concepts were identified as potentially relevant across all components of the PIREDEU study 1. Voting: Party choice and turnout 2. Attachment to parties 3. Engagement and mobilization 4. Media availability, content and usage 8. Representation 5. Value orientations 6. Domestic and European issues 7. Institutional setting for example, item 3 # Core concept Voters Candidates Manifestos Media Context 3 Engagement and mobilization Q21-Q23 campaign contact, website usage, campaign interest Q8-Q11, Q13 campaign tools, campaign intensity; Q15- Q17 campaign funds and aims Existence of a manifesto, date published, availability, publicity. six items relating to engagement and mobilisation, including various themes in the news and articles about the election itself, and the extent of campaign interest. Party finances in EP 2009 vs. party finances at the previous national election

15 Pre-linked data Voters study, country A Candidates study, country A Party manifestos study, country A Media study, country A Contextual data study, country A Country A data Country B data Country C data Custom dataset for analysis by researcher Simplified view of data organization in the PIREDEU research infrastructure. Though not organizationally part of PIREDEU, the EU Profiler used the same codes and questions as far as possible.

16 First findings The first published findings of the PIREDEU project appear in a Special Issue of Electoral Studies edited by myself and Sara Hobolt. It will appear in January 2010, but the articles are already on the web Simon Hix & Michael Marsh: Second-Order Effects Plus Pan-European Political Swings: An Analysis of European Parliament Elections Across Time Catherine de Vries, Wouter van der Brug, Marcel van Egmond & Cees van der Eijk: Individual and Contextual Variation in EU Issue Voting: The Role of Political Information Sara Hobolt & Jill Wittrock: The Second Order Election Model Revisited: An Experimental Test of Vote Choices in European Parliament Elections Andreas R.T. Schuck, Georgios Xezonakis, Matthijs Elenbaas, Susan Banducci & Claes de Vreese: Party Contestation and Europe on the News Agenda: The 2009 European Parliamentary Elections Heiko Giebler & Andreas Wüst: Campaigning on an Upper Level? Individual Campaigning in the 2009 EP Elections Mark Franklin & Sara Hobolt: The Legacy of Lethargy: How Elections to the European Parliament Depress Turnout

17 Implications for democratic governance in the EU On the whole, the findings of the Special Issue of Electoral Studies are good news for EU democracy EP elections appear less random in these findings 1. The Complexion of the EP may be starting to reflect overall swings in political fortunes 2. Where more information is provided about the EU, the EU figures more in voters decisions 3. The media provide more information about the EU when the EU is more salient to voters 4. Candidates work harder to get out the vote where they have a better chance to win

18 Implications for democratic governance in the EU On the whole, the findings of the Special Issue of Electoral Studies are good news for EU democracy EP elections appear less random in these findings 1. The Complexion of the EP may be starting to reflect overall swings in political fortunes 2. Where more information is provided about the EU, the EU figures more in voters decisions 3. The media provide more information about the EU when the EU is more salient to voters 4. Candidates work harder to get out the vote where they have a better chance to win These appear to be favourable developments. BUT European Parliament elections themselves still constitute a bad experience for voters. In a sense we always knew this. Most EU citizens do not vote in these elections.

19 Implications for democratic governance in the EU On the whole, the findings of the Special Issue of Electoral Studies are good news for EU democracy EP elections appear less random in these findings 1. The Complexion of the EP may be starting to reflect overall swings in political fortunes 2. Where more information is provided about the EU, the EU figures more in voters decisions 3. The media provide more information about the EU when the EU is more salient to voters 4. Candidates work harder to get out the vote where they have a better chance to win These appear to be favourable developments. BUT European Parliament elections themselves still constitute a bad experience for voters. In a sense we always knew this. Most EU citizens do not vote in these elections. The new finding is that the youngest EU citizens experience a negative socializing effect, making them less likely to vote not only in their first EP election but also in subsequent elections, EP and national.

20 Implications for democratic governance in the EU On the whole, the findings of the Special Issue of Electoral Studies are good news for EU democracy EP elections appear less random in these findings 1. The Complexion of the EP may be starting to reflect overall swings in political fortunes 2. Where more information is provided about the EU, the EU figures more in voters decisions 3. The media provide more information about the EU when the EU is more salient to voters 4. Candidates work harder to get out the vote where they have a better chance to win These appear to be favourable developments. BUT European Parliament elections themselves still constitute a bad experience for voters. In a sense we always knew this. Most EU citizens do not vote in these elections. The new finding is that the youngest EU citizens experience a negative socializing effect, making them less likely to vote not only in their first EP election but also in subsequent elections, EP and national. Additional findings of many different kinds will be presented at the conference you are now attending.

21 Prospects for an election studies infrastructure PIREDEU is an infrastructure design study. What are its findings with relevance to this? 1. A multi-component election study is possible across countries 2. Researchers from different national and intellectual traditions can design a common study that is highly integrated 3. This can be done at reasonable cost

22 Prospects for an election studies infrastructure PIREDEU is an infrastructure design study. What are its findings with relevance to this? 1. A multi-component election study is possible across countries 2. Researchers from different national and intellectual traditions can design a common study that is highly integrated 3. This can be done at reasonable cost BUT 4. An infrastructure is not viable that focuses on European Parliament elections alone 5. This is true primarily from an intellectual point of view - European Parliament elections occur within a wider context that includes national elections - National elections are also strongly impacted by European Parliament elections and by the wider EU context.

23 The next step: CERES (Consortium for European Research with Election Studies) This has been carefully planned in coordination with the Comparative Study of Electoral Systems (CSES - an umbrella association of national election studies) The idea deriving from the PIREDEU findings is to regard electoral democracy in Europe from a holistic perspective where (1) the major decision-makers at the EU as well as the national level are national governments, and (2) national elections are no-longer exogenous events from a European perspective. Please do attend the CERES launch meeting, Thursday evening at 6pm before the joint EUDO-PIREDEU reception.