National Public Opinion and the EU in the Post-Maastricht Era: Is the Socialisation Theory Actually Dead?

Previous research has found that the socialisation process accounts for cross-national and cross-temporal variation in the level of public support for European integration—an effect explained as the socialisation theory. However, the theory has been tested only for the period up to the early 1990s, which coincided with the alleged permissive consensus. With the constraining dissensus, the related theory has been de facto assumed to be missing in action. In this paper, using Eurobarometer data from 1992 to 2001, we argue that the socialisation process as an explanation of public levels of support for the EU has indeed lost substance following the deep changes undergone by the EU during that period but still retains a role. The socialisation theory becomes less persuasive than explanations in terms of people's economic and social assessments of how the EU is affecting nation states and individuals, and national publics' different preferences for particular models of the EU. The article concludes with the implications of these findings. Keywords: European integrationsocialisation theoryutilitarianismpublic opinion about the EU Notes 1 Referred to as the Lisbon Treaty. 2 This period has been referred to as the constraining dissensus (see for example, Hooghe & Marks, Citation2008). 3 For a discussion of the permissive consensus, see for example, Inglehart (Citation1971) and Stavridis (Citation1992). 4 One study that tested the socialisation theory after the early 1990s was carried out by Kaltenthaler & Anderson (Citation2001), but this study has significant weaknesses which somewhat limit the validity of the work and necessitate further research. Kaltenthaler & Anderson used a relatively short reference time period, namely from 1994 to 1997, and only investigated within the context of support for EMU and a single currency. The dependent variable used was binary, not continuous itself. The authors used only the positive answer to the question of whether respondents supported EMU and a single currency and transformed this as a percentage (percentage of people who replied 'yes' to the question). 5 The country's EU membership evaluation question was used here as the dependent variable. 6 The unification question and desired speed of unification question were used here as dependent variables. 7 Examples are factions within the RPR/UMP or even PS and political parties in the political periphery such as the MPF, FN, RPF, MDC, PC in France, and factions within the Labour Party and the Conservative Party (from 1997, the leadership of the Conservative Party adopted though a more eurosceptic stance) and political parties in the political periphery such as the United Kingdom's Independence Party. 8 One of the main weaknesses of Hooghe & Marks' (2004) research is that they only used data for the year 2000. 9 These twelve countries were EU members throughout the study period. 10 Despite EB data not being free from flaws (see Balestrini, 2007 and Bruter, Citation2003 for a critique of Eurobarometer surveys), it offers a number of advantages which clearly outweigh its weaknesses and is especially suited to the present cross-national and cross-temporal study. 11 The 'don't know' response was re-coded as a middle category in the benefit question. 12 In other words, utilitarian reasoning is more important in explaining EU support than affective attachment. 13 However, due to the size of the sample, small effects may not be detected (Miles & Shevlin, Citation2001). 14 Ireland's unemployment rate dropped rapidly during the study period. 15 However, Eichenberg & Dalton (Citation2007) did not use the same dependent variable. Their dependent variable measured the difference between the percentage of survey respondents who felt that their country's EU membership was a 'good thing' and the percentage who felt it was a 'bad thing'. 16 Although national economic and social policies were often subject to international and European constraints before Maastricht, the latter especially within the exchange rate mechanism. However, European monetary union and the subsequent stability pact made the European constraint more visible to citizens and accentuated the impact of the European constraint on citizens' standards of living but also on their economic, social and political values. 17 The subsidiarity principle indicates that action should only be taken by the Community or Union if and in so far as the objectives of the proposed action cannot be sufficiently achieved by the Member States and can therefore be better achieved at European level. 18 Due to the size of the sample, small effects may not be detected (Miles & Shevlin, Citation2001). 19 To this extent, in her conceptualisation of euroscepticism, Sorensen's (Citation2007) findings that it will be difficult for the EU to adopt policies to please all publics due to the causes and targets of euroscepticism varying from country to country, converge with our findings. Sorensen however arrived at that conclusion through a different route, via a non-causal, constitutive analysis.