In 2014, Europe will mark the 100th anniversary of the start of the “Great War”, remembering the tens of millions of lives lost during that conflict. Also, this year more than 300 million Europeans will go to the polls to elect representatives to the European Parliament (EP)—the European Union’s (EU) only directly elected institution. Is there a link between one event and the other, you may ask? As John Feffer, co-director of ‘Foreign Policy In Focus’ recently wrote, “In place of jostling empires, there is [today] the European Union, a modern family beset by the usual bickering but nothing that a smothering bureaucracy can't handle.” The elections this May could actually be a watershed event, with potentially immense consequences for the continent and beyond. Institutional changes introduced since the last EP elections, as well as strong external factors—Europe’s current economic situation, disaffection for the ideal of European integration, or international tensions—will most likely result in a very different composition to the EP than in the past.
Past EP elections failed to provide the European Parliament with the popular backing and legitimacy it sought and needed for a strong legislative body. Despite the many reforms implemented since 1979 to enhance its powers and role within the EU’s institutional framework, this has not excited voters, with turn-out falling from 62 percent in 1979 to 43 percent in 2009. Contextually, more than five years of continuing crises—debt and financial crises, austerity measures, slow economic recovery, and high unemployment rates in many EU countries—as well as international turmoil in countries including Libya, Mali, Iran, Syria, and Ukraine, which have divided or side-lined Europe, have unleashed an unprecedented level of distrust and skepticism about “anything EU.” This context may well translate into either a massive rate of abstention or a tsunami of “protest votes,” returning to Strasbourg a strong bloc of nationalistic and populist Euroskeptic lawmakers, with severe ripple effects in Brussels and within individual Member States—or both.
The 2014 election is the first since the institutional changes brought about by the Lisbon Treaty. The treaty significantly enhanced the powers and attributions of the EP, making it the deciding force on the vast majority of EU legislation. More than 40 new sectors now come under the co-decision procedure between Parliament and the Council of Ministers, including agriculture, energy policy, and immigration. The EP now has the final say on the EU budget, and today, roughly 80 percent of national legislation at the Member State level derives from EU legislation. Over the next five years, some of the EP’s committees will decide Europe’s destiny, especially on sizable issues such as the International Trade Committee on the EU-U.S. free trade talks, the Economic and Monetary Affairs Committee on the governance of the Euro, and the Civil Liberties Committee on immigration and freedom of movement issues. The Lisbon Treaty brought about another sea change, giving the EP the responsibility to (PDF) “elect the president of the Commission, on the basis of the candidate proposed by the European Council after taking into account the results of the EP elections”. For the first time, albeit indirectly, Europe’s citizens will be able to weigh in on the next Commission’s president.
This is all the more likely as Europe’s main political parties seem intent on heeding the EP’s 22nd November 2012 resolution, calling on them to “nominate candidates for the presidency of the Commission and [stressing] the importance of reinforcing the political legitimacy of both Parliament and the Commission by connecting their respective elections more directly to the choice of the voters.” Europe’s Socialists have shown the way, nominating Germany’s Martin Schulz, the current president of the EP, to lead the pan-European socialist campaign. Schultz is also running as the socialist candidate for the seat of European Commission President. The Liberals and the Greens have already followed suit while the European centre-right EPP is expected to announce its candidate at its European Elections Congress in Dublin on 6-7 March.
These changes could very well personalize, polarize, and Europeanize the elections. The ongoing economic crisis, the painfully slow recovery, and the austerity policies followed by governments across the EU on “Brussels’ injunction”, have not only cast Europe and the EU at the very heart of national debates, but they have also dramatically changed the very foundations of these debates (PDF) with a “popular perception that the EU is part of the problem and not part of the solution.” Putting forward known or at least recognisable and credible candidates, with clear and concrete proposals laying out different alternatives for Europe, can only be viewed as progress, helping both raise the salience as well as the stakes of the upcoming election. But will Europe’s political parties truly rise to the challenge?
For the first time, we have an EP election where each political family will campaign behind a common, pan-European figurehead. Yet, it is far from certain that the candidates chosen by those very same parties will be up to the task of rebuilding trust in Europe. In a biting but terribly accurate piece in the French daily Le Figaro, French Member of the European Parliament (MEP) Sylvie Goulard enumerated the skills and qualities that made for a good MEP: competency, focus and dedication to the electoral mandate, and capacity to influence policy and debates back in one’s own member state. She also included fluency in English, the lingua franca of the EU. Ultimately, she concluded that unfortunately these attributes were not necessarily the ones presiding over the choice of MEP candidates in France. Instead, viewing the number of national politicians “recycled” to the EP as either a holding position until better political times at home, an end-of-career reward, or political punishment via eviction from the national political stage. One can fear that Mrs. Goulard’s assessment also holds true beyond the borders of France.
Popular wisdom (and many polls) has it that the 2014 EP elections will see populist parties flourish against the mainstream pro-European political establishment, often perceived and hence blamed for being the root cause of the continent’s dire socio-economic situation—a “spring of discontent,” finding its translation in a large Eurosceptic minority returning to Strasbourg. If so, that would indeed be a watershed event for the EU, sending shivers through both Brussels and throughout its 28 Member States. This, in addition to the state of the economy and the institutional changes introduced by the Lisbon Treaty, could incentivize both EU critics and supporters to shake off their usual “voter fatigue” and spur them to take to the ballot. Whether Europe’s political parties are able to rise to the challenge, field the right candidates and lead a campaign focused on clear and meaningful policy proposals, concretely addressing the concerns of Europe’s citizens, still remains to be seen.
A century after the start in Sarajevo of one of the world’s bloodiest conflicts, a peaceful and fairly integrated EU will vote in May to return to Strasbourg representatives from its 28 Member States. Whatever the results, this eighth EP election will be very different from all others before it, and one can only hope that Europe’s political parties will finally take it seriously, and that Europe’s citizens will take it to heart.
In a series of articles, Diplomatic Courier and APCO Worldwide are partnering to cover the 2014 European Union elections. Find more information about this series here, and read all the articles in this series here. Follow @EPElections for daily news and updates from APCO’s team in Brussels.
Philippe Maze-Sencier is executive director in APCO Worldwide’s Washington, DC office, and leads APCO’s government relations practice.
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Can the EU’s Political Parties Get Out the Vote?
February 28, 2014
In 2014, Europe will mark the 100th anniversary of the start of the “Great War”, remembering the tens of millions of lives lost during that conflict. Also, this year more than 300 million Europeans will go to the polls to elect representatives to the European Parliament (EP)—the European Union’s (EU) only directly elected institution. Is there a link between one event and the other, you may ask? As John Feffer, co-director of ‘Foreign Policy In Focus’ recently wrote, “In place of jostling empires, there is [today] the European Union, a modern family beset by the usual bickering but nothing that a smothering bureaucracy can't handle.” The elections this May could actually be a watershed event, with potentially immense consequences for the continent and beyond. Institutional changes introduced since the last EP elections, as well as strong external factors—Europe’s current economic situation, disaffection for the ideal of European integration, or international tensions—will most likely result in a very different composition to the EP than in the past.
Past EP elections failed to provide the European Parliament with the popular backing and legitimacy it sought and needed for a strong legislative body. Despite the many reforms implemented since 1979 to enhance its powers and role within the EU’s institutional framework, this has not excited voters, with turn-out falling from 62 percent in 1979 to 43 percent in 2009. Contextually, more than five years of continuing crises—debt and financial crises, austerity measures, slow economic recovery, and high unemployment rates in many EU countries—as well as international turmoil in countries including Libya, Mali, Iran, Syria, and Ukraine, which have divided or side-lined Europe, have unleashed an unprecedented level of distrust and skepticism about “anything EU.” This context may well translate into either a massive rate of abstention or a tsunami of “protest votes,” returning to Strasbourg a strong bloc of nationalistic and populist Euroskeptic lawmakers, with severe ripple effects in Brussels and within individual Member States—or both.
The 2014 election is the first since the institutional changes brought about by the Lisbon Treaty. The treaty significantly enhanced the powers and attributions of the EP, making it the deciding force on the vast majority of EU legislation. More than 40 new sectors now come under the co-decision procedure between Parliament and the Council of Ministers, including agriculture, energy policy, and immigration. The EP now has the final say on the EU budget, and today, roughly 80 percent of national legislation at the Member State level derives from EU legislation. Over the next five years, some of the EP’s committees will decide Europe’s destiny, especially on sizable issues such as the International Trade Committee on the EU-U.S. free trade talks, the Economic and Monetary Affairs Committee on the governance of the Euro, and the Civil Liberties Committee on immigration and freedom of movement issues. The Lisbon Treaty brought about another sea change, giving the EP the responsibility to (PDF) “elect the president of the Commission, on the basis of the candidate proposed by the European Council after taking into account the results of the EP elections”. For the first time, albeit indirectly, Europe’s citizens will be able to weigh in on the next Commission’s president.
This is all the more likely as Europe’s main political parties seem intent on heeding the EP’s 22nd November 2012 resolution, calling on them to “nominate candidates for the presidency of the Commission and [stressing] the importance of reinforcing the political legitimacy of both Parliament and the Commission by connecting their respective elections more directly to the choice of the voters.” Europe’s Socialists have shown the way, nominating Germany’s Martin Schulz, the current president of the EP, to lead the pan-European socialist campaign. Schultz is also running as the socialist candidate for the seat of European Commission President. The Liberals and the Greens have already followed suit while the European centre-right EPP is expected to announce its candidate at its European Elections Congress in Dublin on 6-7 March.
These changes could very well personalize, polarize, and Europeanize the elections. The ongoing economic crisis, the painfully slow recovery, and the austerity policies followed by governments across the EU on “Brussels’ injunction”, have not only cast Europe and the EU at the very heart of national debates, but they have also dramatically changed the very foundations of these debates (PDF) with a “popular perception that the EU is part of the problem and not part of the solution.” Putting forward known or at least recognisable and credible candidates, with clear and concrete proposals laying out different alternatives for Europe, can only be viewed as progress, helping both raise the salience as well as the stakes of the upcoming election. But will Europe’s political parties truly rise to the challenge?
For the first time, we have an EP election where each political family will campaign behind a common, pan-European figurehead. Yet, it is far from certain that the candidates chosen by those very same parties will be up to the task of rebuilding trust in Europe. In a biting but terribly accurate piece in the French daily Le Figaro, French Member of the European Parliament (MEP) Sylvie Goulard enumerated the skills and qualities that made for a good MEP: competency, focus and dedication to the electoral mandate, and capacity to influence policy and debates back in one’s own member state. She also included fluency in English, the lingua franca of the EU. Ultimately, she concluded that unfortunately these attributes were not necessarily the ones presiding over the choice of MEP candidates in France. Instead, viewing the number of national politicians “recycled” to the EP as either a holding position until better political times at home, an end-of-career reward, or political punishment via eviction from the national political stage. One can fear that Mrs. Goulard’s assessment also holds true beyond the borders of France.
Popular wisdom (and many polls) has it that the 2014 EP elections will see populist parties flourish against the mainstream pro-European political establishment, often perceived and hence blamed for being the root cause of the continent’s dire socio-economic situation—a “spring of discontent,” finding its translation in a large Eurosceptic minority returning to Strasbourg. If so, that would indeed be a watershed event for the EU, sending shivers through both Brussels and throughout its 28 Member States. This, in addition to the state of the economy and the institutional changes introduced by the Lisbon Treaty, could incentivize both EU critics and supporters to shake off their usual “voter fatigue” and spur them to take to the ballot. Whether Europe’s political parties are able to rise to the challenge, field the right candidates and lead a campaign focused on clear and meaningful policy proposals, concretely addressing the concerns of Europe’s citizens, still remains to be seen.
A century after the start in Sarajevo of one of the world’s bloodiest conflicts, a peaceful and fairly integrated EU will vote in May to return to Strasbourg representatives from its 28 Member States. Whatever the results, this eighth EP election will be very different from all others before it, and one can only hope that Europe’s political parties will finally take it seriously, and that Europe’s citizens will take it to heart.
In a series of articles, Diplomatic Courier and APCO Worldwide are partnering to cover the 2014 European Union elections. Find more information about this series here, and read all the articles in this series here. Follow @EPElections for daily news and updates from APCO’s team in Brussels.
Philippe Maze-Sencier is executive director in APCO Worldwide’s Washington, DC office, and leads APCO’s government relations practice.
