Euro-scepticism revisited: Poland after EU accession

Abstract

The results of the elections to the European Parliament in June 2004 in Poland have given rise to speculation as to whether the Polish constituency is, to a large extent, turning Euro-sceptic. This is because of two reasons. First was the very low turnout rate of less than 21%. Second was the fact that three out of four successful parties were considered more or less Euro-sceptic. This contribution examines to what extent party-based Euro-scepticism in Poland is based on ideology or is more a function of party competition and, therefore, tactical. The findings suggest that most of the Euro-sceptical positions are tactical and can thus be expected to at least partially be replaced by a pragmatic approach to European politics. It will be interesting to see if this also holds true for the single Euro-rejectionist party League of Polish Families, LPR, whose Europhobic attitude is part of its party ideology.

Key words:

• Hard Euro-Scepticism
• soft Euro-Scepticism
• party-based Euro-Scepticism
• Poland
• European Constitutional Treaty
• EP Elections 2004
• Second Order Elections
• Euro-sceptic Ideology
• EU Enlargement
• EU accession

Acknowledgements

A former version of this paper has been presented at the Third International Conference on Elites and EU-Enlargement. Popular Opposition to, and Support for Different Types of Integration into the European Union among the New Member States of Central and Eastern Europe, Praha, 17 – 18 February 2006, British Academy, Academy of Science of the Czech Republic and Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung Prague. Thanks for comments to Włodzimierz Wesołowski, Heinrich Best, Simona Guerra and Martin Myant. Many thanks also to helpful comments on a later version by Petra Grabner and Carsten Schymik.

Notes

¹ Not dated but ranged before statements from January 2002.

² Translated from Polish by the author.

³ Translated from Polish by the author.