To Speak or Not to Speak of Europe — Issue-Emphasis Strategies

The previous chapter on elite positions showed that European integration has become integrated into the existing conflict structures, although in a complex way. Radical left parties, for example, face the difficult question of whether they should oppose Europe for economic motives or support it for cultural reasons. Similarly, mainstream parties from the Christian-democratic and Conservative party family hold Eurosceptic potential for cultural reasons, but this conflicts with their economically motivated pro-common market view. Moreover, it is a delicate task for established political actors to adapt or reverse traditional, long-held European integration positions. In these circumstances, when European integration orientations do not fit neatly into a political actor’s ideological profile, if they threaten internal cohesion or may scare potential voters away, a useful strategy is to try to shift public attention away from this political issue. This is what we would expect from most ideologically moderate parties, as their attitudes to Europe are quite ambivalent. By contrast, if politicians think they will benefit from increased politicization because they hold a European position that is attractive to their voters and is at the same time consistent with their general programmatic profile, they will try to move Europe further up on the political agenda. In any case, politicians deliberately either emphasize or downplay European integration relative to other political issues in order to win public support and achieve electoral gains.