Contestation in the Streets

Evidence of political contestation in the EU, largely drawn from public opinion data and party manifestos, is inconclusive concerning the degree to which attitudes toward the EU are inde-pendent from other political cleavages as well as on the salience of the European political dimen-sion to most citizens. In this article, the author examines longitudinal and cross-national data on European political protests to discuss the dimensionality of contention when protests involve the EU. An analysis of this data indicates that Europe is the focus of a small but growing number of protests and also suggests that the EU matters intensely to groups who fear their livelihood is threatened by integration. Moreover, the evidence suggests there is a strong correspondence between anti-integration and Left political sentiment within popular protests.