The Impact of European Integration and Elections on National Parties Revisited in Times of Crisis

Transcription

1 The Impact of European Integration and Elections on National Parties Revisited in Times of Crisis Thomas Poguntke

2 Overview I Title hints at the catchword Europeanization Avoids the pitfalls of this concept Simply talk about the impact of European integration on national parties This is exactly the overall perspective that I pursued in two major projects with a number of collaborators

3 Overview II Impact of European integration on West European national parties ESRC project with Nick Aylott, Robert Ladrech, Kurt Richard Luther, Luis Ramiro, Laura Morales Impact of Europarties on CEE national parties German Research Foundation project with Benjamin von dem Berge, Jan van Deth, Peter Obert

4 Overview III Two parts of my talk: First, presentation of some major results from these projects Empirical evidence of substantial effects of European integration on national parties Second, based on this evidence reflections on contemporary developments in times of crisis

5 Research Perspectives Slightly different angles of projects Commonality of the data presented here: European integration is the ultimate cause of changes in national political parties?

6 The Europeanization of National Political Parties Thomas Poguntke Nicholas Aylott Robert Ladrech Kurt Richard Luther Elisabeth Carter Laura Morales Luis Ramiro

7 Main research question What is the impact of European integration on the organization of national political parties, and on the balance of power within national political parties

8 Data Expert Survey on Members of government, MPs, MEPs EU /05 completed questionnaires from 334 party actors 86 parties

9 Change of Party Political Accountability of National Government Members in European Decision-Making Arenas (%) Prior instruction European Council Council of Ministers less no change more Ex post explanation less no change more Discretion less no change more Time period: 1994/ /05; N = ; Missing 24-47; Source: Europeanization Project, British Economic and Social Research Council (grant No. R ); 9

10 Change of Party Political Accountability of MPs and MEPs (%) Prior instruction MEP less 9,8 11,3 no change 61,0 59,1 more 29,2 29,6 Ex post explanation less 6,3 5,2 no change 51,5 55,8 more 42,2 39,0 Discretion less 6,9 15,2 no change 41,6 48,9 more 51,5 35,9 Time period: 1994/ /05; N = 334; Missing 24-39; Quelle: Europeanization Project, British Economic and Social Research Council (grant No. R ) MP 10

11 Major Finding European integration undermines party political accountability Attempts to improve accountability seem to have little effect

12 Europarties Heading East. The Influence of Europarties on Central and Eastern European Project Members Partner Parties o Directors: Thomas Poguntke, Jan W. van Deth o Researcher: Benjamin von dem Berge, Peter Obert o Country Experts: Mihail Chiru (RO), Sergiu Gherghina (RO), Martin Kovanic (SK), Dávid László (HU), Kristína Marusová (SK), Gergo Papp (HU) Funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG) Located at the Mannheim Centre for European Social Research (MZES) at the University of Mannheim

13 Research Questions (1) How do Europarties exert influence on CEE partners? (2) What are the results of Europarty influence?

14 Cases: 17 CEE parties Hungary Romania Slovakia KDNP EPP FIDESZ, from 1995 FIDESZ- MPP, since 2003 FIDESZ- MPSZ MDF FKGP PNT-CD UDMR PD-FSN, from 1993 PD, since 2007 PD-L KDH MKDH, since 1998 SMK SDKU, since 2006 SDKU-DS MSZP MSZDP PES PDSR, since 2001 PSD [PD (changed from PES to EPP in 2005)] SMER, since 2005 SMER-SD SDL (joined SMER in 2005) SDSS (joined SMER in 2005) Total 16 Parties

15 Policy-Dimension: Programmes

16 Major Finding Westeuropeanization Culmination around date of accession

17 Romanian Parties Intra-Party-Dimension: IPD

18 Summary Clear effect of European integration on policy and intra-party democrcay of national parties However, results have shown two countervailing trends: A reduction of formal power of leadership in CEE parties as a results of demands to realize IPD A de facto strengthening of leadership power in Western European national parties Erosion of party MEP-linkage

19 Eurocrisis and National Parties Presidentialization of European governance Effect on national party leaderships over and above the effects that we can show in our data Substantial narrowing of political space (Mair) the re-incarnation of Tina is called Angela Erosion of party democracy on national level

20 Eurocrisis and European Politics Eurocrisis: push for European party politics Europarty candidates for EP elections (?) Changes of dynamic of party competition Europeanization of EP elections At same time: Eurocrisis meant push towards the Europeanization of national politics: French elections, Greek elections, Spanish elections, German coalition negotiations

21 Eurocrisis and European Politics All national elections have sudenly acquired a distinctly European dimension There is finally something that resembles a European public space Parties have begin to play the multi-level game both ways. Uncertain whether the outcome of the game will pro-european!