People and Parliament A framework for analysis and

People and Parliament: A framework for analysis and key data from the special Eurobarometer on the European Parliament Autumn 2007 Richard Sinnott University College Dublin Palle Svensson University of Aarhus FP 6 Civic. Active

Civic. Active an FP 6 Research project FP 6 Civic. Active

The European Parliament Paradox FP 6 Civic. Active

Average Turnout in European Parliament elections 19792004 & guesstimated power of the European Parliament FP 6 Civic. Active

Reasons for abstention Type A • • “working double shift, no time. ” “new baby arrived. ” “had no one to baby-sit my six children. ” “couldn’t get to voting station due to caring for my aunt. ” “incapacitated due to old age. ” “lashing rain. ” “because it was wet and I had no way of getting to the polling station. ” “couldn’t get there, no one came to collect me” (from a respondent confined to a wheelchair). FP 6 Civic. Active

Reasons for abstention Type B • “I couldn’t be bothered. ” • “I have no interest – I don’t follow politics. ” • “It’s a lot of bullshit. I don’t believe in any of them. They all talk shite. ” • “What difference would it make? Have a look around here it’s awful” • “They promise you the moon and the stars and when the time comes they do nothing for you. ” • “didn’t understand anything about the system. ” • “No differences between parties, no real choice. ” • “Nobody approached me for a vote, so when nobody did I figured it wasn’t worth giving. ” FP 6 Civic. Active

Type A: Circumstantial vs. Type B: Voluntary FP 6 Civic. Active

A related distinction Facilitation vs. Mobilisation FP 6 Civic. Active

Facilitation Circumstantial Mobilisation Voluntary FP 6 Civic. Active

And another distinction: Institutional level vs. Individual level FP 6 Civic. Active

A typology of variables affecting voter participation/abstention FP 6 Civic. Active

Simplified model of the determinants of electoral participation Institutional facilitation Individual facilitation Balance Institutional mobilisation FP 6 Civic. Active Individual Mobilisation vote/ abstain

Application of the model to the special Eurobarometer on the European Parliament FP 6 Civic. Active

Measuring the image of the EP in Eurobarometer 68 • Prompted positive/negative image of the EP (see first half of presentation) • Spontaneous image of the EP (see second half of presentation) FP 6 Civic. Active

Key variables from EB 68 • Exposure to the European Parliament in the media • Knowledge of the European Parliament • Prompted positive/negative image of the EP • Spontaneous image of the EP • Importance of the European Parliament FP 6 Civic. Active

EU citizens’ exposure to the European Parliament through the media 1977 -2007 FP 6 Civic. Active

• Does it matter? FP 6 Civic. Active

Trust and Positive Image of European Parliament by objective knowledge FP 6 Civic. Active

Trust and Positive Image of European Parliament by subjective knowledge FP 6 Civic. Active

The effect of knowledge on positive image of the European Parliament: a multivariate problem and a multivariate solution FP 6 Civic. Active

Multivariate analysis of positive/negative image of the European Parliament Source: EB 68. 1 Unstandardized Coefficients B Demographic effects Age Std. Error Sig. -. 024 . 003 *** Female . 025 . 010 ** Year finished education . 019 . 005 *** Cognitive effects Exposure to European Parliament in the media . 060 . 011 *** High objective knowledge . 072 . 004 *** Feel informed about activities of EP . 247 . 007 *** 2. 103 . 031 *** Constant FP 6 Civic. Active Adjusted R 2 =. 178 Note: country effects included but not shown in table.

Summary of the multivariate regression results FP 6 Civic. Active

Socio-demographic effects on positive image of the European Parliament: • Age has a negative effect • Gender (female) has a positive effect • Education has a positive effect FP 6 Civic. Active

Cognitive effects on positive image of the European Parliament: Controlling for these demographic effects: • Exposure to the EP has a positive effect • Objective knowledge has a positive effect • Subjective knowledge has a positive effect FP 6 Civic. Active

Interim conclusion Increasing knowledge of the EP enhances the image of the EP FP 6 Civic. Active

Further exploration of the image of the European Parliament focusing on spontaneous images FP 6 Civic. Active

Spontaneous images of the European Parliament • ‘When you think about the European Parliament is there anything in particular you appreciate about it? ’ Source: EB 68. 1, QB 10 • ‘When you think about the European Parliament is there anything in particular you do not appreciate about it? ’ Source: EB 68. 1, QB 11 FP 6 Civic. Active

Spontaneous Images of the European Parliament • Positive – – – Unification role (5%). Common decisions/policies (4%). Democratic role (4%). Economic stability/Financial support within the EU (4%). Voice of each nation counts (3%). Other (9%). • Negative – Too bureaucratic/inefficient (5%). – Too expensive (4%). – The voice of small countries does not count/big countries have too much power (4%). – Lack of information/transparency (3%). – Too much interference in national affairs (3%). – Other (12%). FP 6 Civic. Active Source: EB 68. 1

Spontaneous Image of the European Parliament 1994 & 2007 FP 6 Civic. Active Source: EB 68. 1

Spontaneous Image of the European Parliament 1994 -2007 FP 6 Civic. Active Source: EB 68. 1

Perceived current importance of the European Parliament FP 6 Civic. Active

Perceived Current importance by spontaneous image of the European Parliament 2007 FP 6 Civic. Active

First conclusion Increasing knowledge of the EP enhances the image of the EP FP 6 Civic. Active

Second conclusion The role of the EP (as measured by its perceived importance) is curtailed by the lack of any image of the EP among some 60 per cent of the citizens of Europe FP 6 Civic. Active

References Blondel, Jean; Richard Sinnott and Palle Svensson, People and Parliament in the European Union: Democracy, Participation and Legitimacy. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998. Sinnott, Richard, ‘Tackling the problem of voter abstention – the facilitation/mobilisation framework and some empirical evidence’ in Report of Second European Conference of Electoral Management Bodies, Strasbourg: European Commission for Democracy through Law (Venice Commission), December 2005, pp. 49 -69.