Agenda control in EU referendum campaigns: The power of the anti‐EU side

European Union (EU) referendums provide unique opportunities to study voters’ attitudes toward a distant level of governance. Scholars have long tried to understand whether EU referendum results reflect domestic (dis‐)satisfaction with the incumbent governments or actual attitudes toward the Union. Finding evidence supporting both domestic and European factors, the recent focus has thus turned to referendum campaigns. Recent studies emphasise the importance of the information provided to voters during these campaigns in order to analyse how domestic or European issues become salient in the minds of voters. These studies nonetheless overlook the asymmetrical political advantage in such campaigns. The broader literature on referendums and public opinion suggest that in a referendum, the ‘No’ side typically has the advantage since it can boost the public's fears by linking the proposal to unpopular issues. This article explores whether this dynamic applies to EU treaty ratification referendums. Does the anti‐EU treaty campaign have more advantage than the pro‐EU treaty campaign in these referendums? Campaign strategies in 11 EU treaty ratification referendums are analysed, providing a clear juxtaposition between pro‐treaty (‘Yes’) and anti‐treaty (‘No’) campaigns. Based on 140 interviews with campaigners in 11 referendums, a series of indicators on political setting and campaign characteristics, as well as an in‐depth case study of the 2012 Irish Fiscal Compact referendum, it is found that the anti‐treaty side indeed holds the advantage if it engages the debate. Nonetheless, the findings also show that this advantage is not unconditional. The underlying mechanism rests on the multidimensionality of the issue. The extent to which the referendum debate includes a large variety of ‘No’ campaign arguments correlates strongly with the campaigners’ perceived advantage/disadvantage, and the referendum results. When the ‘No’ side's arguments are limited (either through a single‐issue treaty or guarantees from the EU), this provides the ‘Yes’ side with a ‘cleaner’ agenda with which to work. Importantly, the detailed data demonstrate that the availability of arguments is important for the ‘Yes’ side as well. They tend to have the most advantage when they can tap into the economic costs of an anti‐EU vote. This analysis has implications for other kinds of EU referendums such as Brexit, non‐EU referendums such as independence referendums, and the future of European integration.     

Opinion change and voting behaviour in referendums

Abstract. Voters in a referendum obtain information and derive voting cues from a variety of sources. Some of these, such as political parties or ideological orientations, are similar to those also found to be influential in elections. Others can be quite different. In some referendums, the issue may be entirely new and unfamiliar to many voters, initiating a 'learning' or 'cue–taking' process specific to the campaign itself. In referendum campaigns, parties may be internally divided and sometimes send conflicting signals to their electorates. As a result, voting behaviour in referendums often exhibits greater volatility than is found in elections. In the ten papers included in this Special Issue of EJPR , we focus on the process of opinion formation and change which occurred in a number of European, North American and Australia/New Zealand referendums held under a variety of different institutional and political conditions. In this essay, I argue that there are three distinctive patterns of opinion formation and reversal that tend to occur in referendum campaigns, each of which has significant consequences both for voting choice and for referendum outcomes.     

The Danish Euro-Party System*

In direct elections to the European Parliament, the behaviour of the Danish electorate, unlike that of other member countries of the EC, deviates strongly from the usual party pattern of national, general elections, thus producing a very differently structured Euro-party system. The existence of this distinct Euro-party system has been confirmed in the two consecutive Euro-elections of 1979 and 1984. This article analyses the special electoral behaviour of the Danish voters in Euro-elections. The deviation is explained primarily by the presence of a European cleavage in the Danish electorate which partly counteracts normal party identification. While supporters of Danish membership of EC vote just as they do in national, general elections, opponents of EC behave in a very different way. The voting in Euro-elections has become a mixture of election and referendum behaviour.     

Legitimacy through referendum? The nearly successful domino‐strategy of the Eu‐referendums in Austria,Finland, Sweden and Norway

The end of the Cold War made it possible for some neutral countries to join the European Union. However although the European integration promotes economic co‐operation it also reveals problems concerning national and regional identity. In order to legitimise EU‐membership, the new potential member states Austria, Finland, Sweden and Norway conducted referendums on whether or not they should join EU. These referendums, although different in some national aspects, are an example of an international synchronisation of the political establishments. This synchronisation is discussed in light of a ‘Domino‐Strategy’ of the referendums. Furthermore, the article describes some aspects of the referendum campaigns by stressing the importance of geographical differences, organisational standpoints, public opinion and discourse which shows astonishing similarities but also decisive differences.     

Direct democracy and regional integration: Citizens' perceptions of treaty implications and the Irish reversal on Lisbon

Analyses of voting in European Union referendums typically distinguish between ‘second‐order’ effects and the impact of substantive ‘issues’. In order to explain change in referendum outcome, two types of substantive issues are distinguished in this article. Focusing on Irish voting in the Lisbon Treaty referendums and using data from post‐referendum surveys, it is found that perceptions of treaty implications outperform underlying attitudes to EU integration in predicting vote choice at both referendums, and perceptions of treaty implications are strong predictors of vote change between the referendums. The findings have broadly positive implications for normative assessments of the usefulness of direct democracy as a tool for legitimising regional integration advance.     

Five Danish referendums on the European Community and European Union: A critical assessment of the Franklin thesis

Abstract. Denmark had five referendums in the period from 1972 to 1998 dealing with Danish membership in the European Community, the Single European Act, the Maastricht Treaty, the Edinburgh Agreement and the Amsterdam Treaty. Did the Danes really address these issues and involve themselves actively in the policy–making process on a vital issue or did they merely vote for or against the current government? The latter option represents the 'second order' elections argument advanced by Mark Franklin and others (see Franklin's article in this issue). If correct in this instance, it may have important and negative consequences for the potential of referendums to involve citizens more directly in the way they are governed. In this article, the Franklin thesis is assessed on the basis of data on voting behaviour in five Danish referendums on Europe and the democratic implications of these findings are discussed.     

The 1994 EU Referendum in Norway: Continuity and Change

In the 1994 EU referendum a majority of Norwegian voters rejected membership in the European Union. The outcome contrasts with victories for membership in the corresponding referendums in Austria, Finland and Sweden. The article reports a preliminary investigation of factors relating to the support for "no". Analysis of aggregate data (representing 435 municipalities) and survey data demonstrates the importance of traditional cleavages as well as new cleavages for the vote. The no-vote was strongest in northern Norway, among supporters of the traditional "counter-cultures" and among those employed in the primary sector. Women were more likely to vote no as were public sector employees. The major parties took relatively clear stands on the issue, and we find that party identification shows a strong correlation with the vote in the referendum. With a turnout of 89 percent, the 1994 referendum represents an all-time high for elections in Norway. Compared with the previous referendum on the EC in 1972, we find that the increase in mobilization was particularly strong in the no-dominated periphery, but the shift in mobilization patterns was not decisive for the outcome of the referendum.     

It takes two: how Eurosceptic public opinion and party divisions influence party positions

Do parties respond to voters’ preferences on European integration in elections to the European Parliament (EP)? Following recent research that shows political party responsiveness to Eurosceptic attitudes during EP elections is conditioned by party characteristics, this article seeks to understand how party unity on European integration affects party responsiveness to Euroscepticism. It argues that when Eurosceptic attitudes among voters are high and the parties are divided in their position on European integration, parties will be more responsive to voters and take a more Eurosceptic position. To test the theoretical expectations, the study uses data from the Chapel Hill Expert Survey, the Euromanifestos Project, and European Election Study for 1989–2009 for over 120 parties across 20 European Union member states. The findings have important implications for understanding the nature of democratic representation in the European Union.     

Learning from the Danish case: A comment on Palle Svensson's critique of the Franklin thesis

Abstract. Palle Svensson in this issue of EJPR has objected to the characterisation of Danish voters made by Franklin and others who, in various publications, expounded the thesis that on issues of low salience, referendum votes tend to follow party lines. Svensson finds evidence that the Maastricht Treaty was not an issue of low salience to Danish voters in the ratification referendums conducted there, and gives other details of the evolution of public opinion regarding Europe that clarify the circumstances in which our thesis should apply. In the light of his arguments, this Comment presents a more nuanced version of the thesis that learns from the Danish case, and should be of greater utility than our earlier version in helping to interpret the role of government standing in referendum outcomes.     

News matters: Influences on the vote in the Danish 2000 euro referendum campaign

Abstract.  This study investigates how the information environment in the Danish 2000 euro referendum campaign served to crystallize opinion on the issue within the context of a number of other hypothesized influences on the vote, based on previous studies of referendum voting. Our data include a nationally representative two-wave panel survey and a content analysis of news coverage during the referendum campaign. We develop a weighted measure of exposure to news on public and private television channels, that takes into account the volume and tone of the coverage towards the YES and NO campaigns, and using this we find that exposure to public television news significantly influences vote choice when controlling for other predictors. We also find varied levels of support for hypotheses concerning the influence of other key variables such as ideology, economic evaluations, government approval and issue-specific contextual variables. The findings emphasize the importance of considering the information environment during referendum campaigns.     

Do populist parties support referendums? A comparative analysis of election manifestos in Europe

Earlier research refers to populist parties as being advocates of a greater use of referendum. Yet, there has been no large-scale systematic test of this claim. This article addresses this gap in the literature and tests the relationship between populism and greater use for referendums in party manifestos. It analyzes 824 manifestos of 187 populist and non-populist parties in 27 Member States of the European Union between 1994 and 2018. We test if populist parties are virtually all in favor of a greater use of referendums and whether they would talk about referendums much more than non-populist parties.     

The Political Limitations of Evidence: A Critique of the Electoral Reform Society's It's Good To Talk

The Electoral Reform Society has called for more and better quality information to improve democratic debate in relation to referendums. This article argues that, particularly in relation to the European Union referendum, this would have had a marginal impact, because much of the debate was not reducible to facts and emotional and dispositional factors were of particular significance in the campaign.     

Red Europe versus no Europe? The impact of attitudes towards the EU and the economic crisis on radical-left voting

The 2014 European Parliament election saw a relatively large increase in the size of radical-left parties (RLPs), particularly in Western Europe. This article aims to provide new ways of thinking about the dynamics of radical-left voting by analysing the changing role of attitudes towards the European Union in explaining support for RLPs at European Parliament elections during the Great Recession. It is argued that the Europeanisation of economic issues during the financial crisis, together with the particular kind of Euroscepticism advocated by these parties, have enabled them to successfully attract a heterogeneous pool of voters. Using the 2009 and 2014 European Election Studies, it is shown that the effect of negative opinions about the EU on support for RLPs increased significantly during the crisis. In addition, support for RLPs also increased among voters with positive views of the EU who were nevertheless highly dissatisfied with the economic situation.     

How representative are referendums? Evidence from 20 years of Swiss referendums

Direct democracy allows citizens to reverse decisions made by legislatures and even initiate new laws which parliaments are unwilling to pass, thereby, as its proponents argue, leading to more representative policies than would have obtained under a purely representative democracy. Yet, turnout in referendums is usually lower than in parliamentary elections and tends to be skewed towards citizens of high socio-economic status. Consequently, critics of direct democracy argue that referendum outcomes may not be representative of the preferences of the population at large. We test this assertion using a compilation of post-referendum surveys encompassing 148 national referendums held in Switzerland between 1981 and 1999. Uniquely, these surveys also asked non-voters about their opinion on the referendum's subject. Comparing opinion majorities in the surveys against actual referendum outcomes we show that representativeness increases slightly in turnout as well as over time. However, we find only few cases where the outcome would have been more representative even under full turnout vis-a vis a counterfactual representative outcome. Thus, our results are in line with research on the turnout effect in elections: Higher turnout would not radically change the outcome of votes. On balance we find more cases where referendums provided more representative outcomes than cases where the outcome was unrepresentative vis-a-vis representative democracy. Hence, we conclude that, overall, direct democracy seems to improve representation in Switzerland.     

Primed by the Euro: The Impact of a Referendum Campaign on Public Opinion and Evaluations of Government and Political Leaders

The premise of political priming is that public evaluations of political leaders are made on the basis of issues that are on the top of citizens' minds. This study investigated the impact of a national referendum campaign about a European integration issue on the evaluation of the incumbent government, the prime minister, and the opposition leaders. Drawing on a content analysis of news media and a two-wave panel survey, the results showed that as the topic of the referendum (the introduction of the euro) became more visible in the media during the campaign the importance of the euro issue for formulating general evaluations of political leaders increased. The incumbent government that was seen to handle the referendum poorly was penalized by the referendum. Exposure to news media outlets that covered the referendum extensively and offered negative evaluations of political leaders boosted the decline in the overall performance rating of political leaders by politically less involved respondents. These results stress the necessity of considering the campaign and the specific content of the media to understand fluctuations in public opinion during a referendum campaign. The study concludes with a discussion of the implications of a referendum campaign for political leaders.     

Institutional reform and public attitudes toward EU decision making

In the face of the discourse about the democratic deficit and declining public support for the European Union (EU), institutionalist scholars have examined the roles of institutions in EU decision making and in particular the implications of the empowered European Parliament. Almost in isolation from this literature, prior research on public attitudes toward the EU has largely adopted utilitarian, identity and informational accounts that focus on individual-level attributes. By combining the insights from the institutional and behavioural literature, this article reports on a novel cross-national conjoint experiment designed to investigate multidimensionality of public attitudes by taking into account the specific roles of institutions and distinct stages in EU decision making. Analysing data from a large-scale experimental survey in 13 EU member states, the findings demonstrate how and to what extent the institutional design of EU decision making shapes public support. In particular, the study finds a general pattern of public consensus about preferred institutional reform regarding powers of proposal, adoption and voting among European citizens in different countries, but notable dissent about sanctioning powers. The results show that utilitarian and partisan considerations matter primarily for the sanctioning dimension in which many respondents in Austria, the Czech Republic, Denmark and Sweden prefer national courts to the Court of Justice of the EU.     

President Obama on the ballot: Referendum voting and racial spillover in the 2014 midterm elections

The 2014 elections were widely viewed as a referendum on the presidency of Barack Obama. Republicans ran against the incumbent president, and many view the Republican Party's victories in 2014 as a mass rejection of President Obama's policies. We argue that this account of the 2014 elections is incomplete. We advance the theory of racial spillover—that associating an attitude object with President Obama causes public opinion to polarize on the basis of racial attitudes—to explain both vote choice and referendum voting in the 2014 elections. In an analysis of the CCES and an original survey, we show that congressional vote choice was strongly racialized in 2014. We go on to show that perceptions of the election as a referendum on President Obama were also racialized, and that these perceptions mediated the link between racial animus and 2014 congressional vote choice. This represents the first study to show that racialized congressional evaluations continued into 2014 and we provide direct evidence that attitudes about President Obama mediated the effect of racial animus on congressional vote choice. We conclude by discussing the implications for referendum voting, racial spillover, and the 2014 midterm elections.     

Rejecting representation? Party systems and popular support for referendums in Europe

Under what conditions do citizens favor deciding political issues by popular vote? Models of support for popular vote processes usually consider the influence of individual attitudes such as political trust and interest in politics. But much less is known about the effect of institutional variables on support for popular vote processes. This article builds on research showing that disaffection with elected officials shapes support for referendums by considering the influence of the party system. First, an analysis of multilevel data from twenty-four European democracies indicates that individuals are more supportive of referendums in countries with fewer effective political parties. Second, a mediation analysis provides evidence that the number of parties influences referendum support through individual-level political trust and external efficacy. Where there are fewer viable parties, feelings that elected officials are unresponsive tend to increase popular support for referendums. These findings suggest a trade-off between available representation by political parties and support for direct influence over public policy.     

Voting on Europe: The Potential Pitfalls of a British Referendum

As Britain prepares for a possible referendum on continued membership of the European Union, it is essential that more careful thought is paid to the dynamics of referendums. Polling data reveal the existence of a substantial knowledge deficit in the UK and other parts of the EU: large numbers of voters simply do not understand the EU. There is also reason to question the conventional view that voters can correct for such a deficit by using cues from opinion leaders and the media. The experience of recent referendums in other EU member states suggests that many voters will take part in the proposed British referendum without independent and informed knowledge of the issues at stake, that many will have been swayed by partisan elite opinion, and that many will decide on the basis of their views about domestic politics rather than their views about Europe.     

Why Bother Lying When You Know So Few Care? Party Contact,Education and Over‐reporting Voter Turnout in Different Types of Elections

Studies on individual‐level voter turnout in the European Parliament elections rely solely on self‐reported turnout data. At the same time, a long tradition in public opinion research examines the impact of individual and contextual variables on over‐reporting of voter turnout. The ultimate goal of these efforts is an assessment of the bias introduced when turnout models are estimated from self‐reported turnout data. In this article, it is proposed that certain characteristics related to turnout (and turnout over‐reporting), like university education or party contact, should also be positively associated with political awareness and knowledge. If so, they might contribute to respondents' greater ability to distinguish between different salience levels, significantly increasing non‐voters' propensity to over‐report turnout in high‐salience elections, but not in low‐salience ones. This hypothesis is tested using data on electoral participation in Sweden, comparing patterns of turnout over‐reporting in the (high‐salience) national parliament elections and the (low‐salience) European Parliament elections. The results of this test, the first one to give an account of patterns of over‐reporting of turnout in the European Parliament elections, largely support the above hypothesis. Finally, the consequences of this phenomenon for the validity of inferences made from self‐reported turnout data are analyzed.