This chapter comprises a very brief introduction to European Union (EU) politics. It aims to help those students who are completely new to the EU by drawing attention to some general background information and context, which should help to make sense of the chapters that follow. To that end this introductory chapter begins by explaining what the EU is, why it was originally set up, and what the EU does. The chapter ends by explaining how the book is organized.
Chapter
1. Introduction
Michelle Cini and Nieves Pérez-Solórzano Borragán
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9. Trade and Development
Dirk De Bièvre
This chapter examines trade and development in line with European trade politics. It explains that the European Union holds full sway over external trade policy, a truly supranational competency equivalent to the powers of a federal state. Most European political economy scholars have engaged with the substantive area with an Open European Economy Politics approach, privileging society-centred instead of a state-centred analysis. The chapter covers the advantages of a more generic, socio-economic actor preference approach distinguishing different types of trade. It looks into how new global challenges have occasioned the EU to engage in a declared policy of strategic autonomy.
Book
Edited by Rory Costello and Neil Robinson
This book provides a broad and accessible introduction to contemporary European politics, covering the fundamental elements of European democracies, institutions, and practices of government. It provides comprehensive coverage of the twenty-seven member states of the European Union, additionally drawing on examples from the UK, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland, Serbia, and Bosnia-Herzegovina. The book is divided into three parts. Part 1 focuses on democratic representation, examining the core features of electoral democracy in Europe. Part 2 turns to the institutions and practices of government, focusing in particular on how institutional design shapes political outcomes. Part 3 examines a number of contemporary issues and challenges, including migration, economic crises, the threat of international terrorism, and the rise of anti-establishment parties, and examines the effects they have had on politics in European countries. Throughout, up-to-date examples on issues such as Brexit, the coronavirus pandemic, and growing instability in Europe are used to help students understand the real-world context of European politics.
Book
Rory Costello and Neil Robinson
This book provides a broad and accessible introduction to contemporary European politics, covering the fundamental elements of European democracies, institutions, and practices of government. The book is organized thematically and is divided into three parts. Part 1 focuses on democratic representation, examining the core features of electoral politics in European democracies. Part 2 turns to the institutions and practices of government, focusing in particular on how institutional design shapes political outcomes. Part 3 examines a number of contemporary issues and challenges, including migration, economic crises, climate change, populism, European integration, and defence and security, and examines the effects that these issues have had on politics in European countries. Each chapter is written by subject specialists and draws on examples from the full range of established European democracies (the twenty-seven member states of the European Union, the UK, Switzerland, Norway, and Iceland) plus selected consolidating democracies (Serbia, Bosnia-Herzegovina). Throughout, up-to-date examples on issues such as Brexit, the Covid-19 pandemic, the war in Ukraine, and growing instability in Europe are used to help students understand the real-world context of European politics.
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1. Introduction
The Introduction argues that to understand European politics there are two premises that need to be accepted. Firstly, the interplay between European and national-level politics must be taken seriously. The two cannot be studied independently. Secondly, a theoretical model of politics is necessary to help us to make assumptions about politics explicit and to ensure that the arguments used are logically consistent. Models help us to zoom in on a particular aspect of politics and apply our analysis to real-life examples. It also helps us to spot the similarities and differences across political systems and governments so we can make comparisons. The Introduction answers the question: why focus on Europe? One of the most obvious reasons is that Europe is the home to the largest number and variety of democratic governments anywhere in the world.
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6. Financial Integration and Regulation
Lucia Quaglia
This chapter provides an overview of financial integration and regulation. It discusses the main issues at stake in the political economy of financial integration and regulation in Europe. Due to the recurrence of financial crises, the globalization of finance, the multi-level governance of financial services, and the large size and far-reaching influence of the financial sector, financial integration and regulation hold particular significance in the European political economy. Over time, financial integration increased in the European Union, which has harmonized regulations on a variety of financial services across Member States. The financial integration and regulation in Europe face several ongoing and future challenges, such as the incompleteness of the Banking Union and its asymmetric functioning.
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Introduction
Rory Costello
This chapter begins by describing the scope and main themes of the book, and explaining the rationale for the countries selected for inclusion. It discusses the prevalence of democracy in Europe, and provides an overview of some of the main similarities and differences between European democracies. A number of recent developments that have challenged the political status quo across the continent are highlighted. The chapter also outlines the general approach taken throughout the book, and discusses the importance of comparison in political research. It concludes with an outline of the book and a brief summary of its three main sections.
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19. Conclusion: Politics in the Age of Globalization
This concluding chapter summarizes some of the major themes and the threads of various arguments discussed throughout the book. It first emphasizes the complexity of the field and the ways in which political philosophy and the empirical study of politics are intertwined, arguing that the study of politics cannot be neatly separated from the study of other disciplines such as philosophy, law, economics, history, sociology, and psychology — and the fact that policy-making typically involves the natural sciences. The chapter proceeds by analysing how globalization influences political studies and highlights the limits of ‘methodological nationalism’ in political analysis. Finally, it considers Eurocentrism in the study of politics and contends that we cannot automatically assume the pre-eminence of Europe and the United States, or the West more generally, noting the apparent inevitability of the rise of other centres of power.
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15. The European Parliament
This chapter focuses on the European Parliament (EP), the one directly elected institution of the European Union. It first provides an overview of the EP’s composition and functions, before discussing the struggle for increased powers within the EP. It then considers debates and research on the EP. The focus of contemporary research on the EP includes political behaviour and EP elections, the internal politics and organization of the EP, and inter-institutional bargaining between the EP, the European Council, and the European Commission. One theme of the academic debate is the extent to which the EP has become an effective independent actor in the affairs of the EU.
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11. Migration
Andrew Geddes and Leila Hadj Abdou
This chapter explores the impact of international migration on the political economy of contemporary Europe. It details the definitional issues, scale, and types of migration flows to Europe. The EU and its Member States shape the political economy of migration both externally and internally as well as the causes and effects of a key dynamic in the European political economy (EPE) of migration. The chapter examines the notions of the selectivity of migration policies and the militarization of borders. Additionally, politics and policymaking are driven by two powerful trends: the heightened politicization of migration in the EU and the trend towards greater selectivity in migration policies.
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23. The EU as a New Political System
Simon Hix
This chapter examines the development and operation of the European Union from a comparative politics perspective. It first considers the evolution of the EU, from the signing of the Treaty of Paris in 1951 that established the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC) to the admission of Lithuania in 2015 as the nineteenth member of the Eurozone, and the UK’s decision to leave the EU in 2016. The chapter then explores the process of European integration and goes on to explain what it means to think of the EU as a political system. It also describes the two basic dimensions of the EU system: the vertical dimension (the EU as a ‘regulatory state’) and the horizontal dimension (the design and operation of EU decision-making). The chapter concludes by analysing the ‘missing link’ in the EU system— the lack of genuine democratic politics.
Book
Catherine E. De Vries, Sara B. Hobolt, Sven-Oliver Proksch, and Jonathan B. Slapin
Foundations of European Politics introduces important tools of social science and comparative analysis. The first part of the book acts as an introduction to the topic, looking at democratic politics and multilevel politics in Europe. The second part moves on to citizens and voters, considering issues related to ideology and voting decisions. Part III looks at elections and introduces electoral systems and direct democracy, representation, political parties, and party competition. The next part is about government and policy. The last part looks at the rule of law, democracy, and backsliding.
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8. Economic Liberalism, Inequality, and Populist Backlash
Jonathan Hopkin
This chapter covers the interplay between economic liberalism, inequality, and populist backlash. It introduces the concept of anti-system politics, which overwhelmed the political systems of the European countries. The contours of backlash politics in Europe since the Global Financial Crisis of the late 2000s showcase how party systems have changed under pressure from hard-pressed voters facing stagnating living standards. Additionally, the causes and consequences of this backlash include how the crisis of the European economy has sparked political contestation and how political institutions responded to the aforementioned backlash. The chapter then considers analytical tools of European political economy to discuss the European countries' political upheaval and economic pressures that drive political instability.
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Introductory Chapter
European Political Economy: Mapping the Research Field
Manuela Moschella, Lucia Quaglia, and Aneta Spendzharova
The chapter conceptualizes European Political Economy as a distinct research field. It provides a genealogy of the field, detailing how EPE draws from several disciplines, including Comparative and International Political Economy, as well as European Studies. As part of this, the chapter identifies 4 key turning points in European integration that have helped defined the field and developed the scholarship. This chapter also summarises for theoretical approaches that offer important conceptual tools that students will use throughout the textbook to examine the dynamic interactions between politics and economics within the EU.
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14. European Politics into the Future
This chapter explores recent changes in European politics and looks to the future for European democracy as it stands now. The chapter explores the ongoing political change that can be seen within European countries and also at the European Union (EU) level. It aims to highlight four important debates about the state of democracy in Europe. These are: the debates about the rise of political fragmentation and its consequences for democracy; democratic backsliding in central and eastern Europe; the impact of the United Kingdom leaving the EU on democracy; and the democratic deficit in EU politics.
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11. The United Kingdom: Towards a Parting of the Ways
Anand Menon and Luigi Scazzieri
This chapter examines the history of the United Kingdom’s relationship with the European integration process. The chapter dissects the long-term trends in public opinion and the more contingent, short-term factors that led to the referendum vote to leave the European Union. The UK was a late joiner and therefore unable to shape the early institutional development of the EEC. British political parties and public opinion were always ambiguous about membership and increasingly Eurosceptic from the early 1990s. Yet the UK had a significant impact on the EU’s development, in the development of the single market programme and eastward enlargement. If Brexit goes through, Britain will nevertheless maintain relations with the EU in all policy areas from agriculture to energy and foreign policy. Europeanization will remain a useful theoretical tool to analyse EU–UK relations even if the UK leaves the Union.
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3. Europeanization: Concept, Theory, and Methods
Theofanis Exadaktylos, Paolo R. Graziano, and Maarten P. Vink
This chapter explores a number of fundamental issues that arise when studying Europeanization. It first explains what Europeanization is and what it is not, why some parts of political life seem more affected by the process of European integration than others, and how to interpret variation between member states of the European Union. It then considers the theoretical debates about the relevance of Europeanization, focusing on new institutionalism, goodness of fit, mediating factors, and domestic compliance. It also provides examples of Europeanization studies. It reviews main trends in Europeanization research on policy domains, politics, and polity. Finally, the chapter considers research design issues in Europeanization studies.
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3. The EU Policy Process in Comparative Perspective
Alasdair R. Young and Christilla Roederer-Rynning
This chapter examines the European Union’s policy-making process with a comparative perspective. It outlines the stages of the policy-making process (agenda-setting, policy formation, decision-making, implementation, and policy feedback) and considers the prevailing approaches to analysing each of these stages. It also shows how these approaches apply to studying policy-making in the EU. Themes addressed in this chapter include policy-making and the policy cycle, the players in the policy process, executive politics, legislative politics, and judicial politics. The chapter argues that theories rooted in comparative politics and international relations can help elucidate the different phases of the EU’s policy process. It concludes by explaining why policy-making varies across issue areas within the EU.
Book
Edited by Michelle Cini and Nieves Pérez-Solórzano Borragán
European Union Politics is the most complete and issues-led introductory textbook on the European Union. Alongside rigorous coverage of the theory, institutions, and policies of the EU, the book engages with contemporary debates, and current crises. The seventh edition has been substantially updated, with significantly revised chapters on Brexit and the CJEU, as well as two new chapters covering the EU response to the COVID-19 pandemic, and the European migration and refugee crisis. The text’s accessible writing style makes it the ideal starting point for anyone wishing to fully understand the workings of this complex and ever-evolving system. Throughout the book, students are supported by helpful learning features, including key points, questions, and examples.
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4. ‘France is back’ … in a French Europe
Olivier Rozenberg
This chapter examines France’s relationship with the European Union by focusing on the heterogeneity of adaptation to the EU. While public policy and legislation became increasingly Europeanized, the EU had a limited impact on political life and the domestic institutional system. This situation changed during the 2010s, as revealed by the 2017 presidential elections and the arrival of President Macron. The chapter considers patterns in France–EU relations before discussing the impact of EU membership on public opinion and political parties. It then looks at the Europeanization of French politics and the impact of EU membership on French institutions as well as public policy. The chapter argues that while domestic politicization is recent, there remains considerable continuity in other aspects of France’s adaptation to the EU.
