European Integration, Intergovernmental Bargaining, and Convergence of Party Programmes
| DOI | 10.1177/1465116506063709 |
| Published date | 01 June 2006 |
| Author | Han Dorussen,Kyriaki Nanou |
| Date | 01 June 2006 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
European Union Politics
European Integration,
DOI: 10.1177/1465116506063709
Volume 7 (2): 235–256
Intergovernmental
Copyright© 2006
SAGE Publications
Bargaining, and Convergence
London, Thousand Oaks CA,
New Delhi
of Party Programmes
Han Dorussen
University of Essex, UK
Kyriaki Nanou
University of Essex, UK
A B S T R A C T
Over the past 50 years, the European Union (EU) has dramat-
ically increased its policy-making power. However, there
remains considerable variation over time as well as across
policy areas in the relative power of the EU and the member
states. The variation is likely to influence EU-wide bargain-
ing. Following the logic of bargaining games with domesti-
cally constrained actors, or two-level games, the changes
in the bargaining environment may also influence party
competition within the member states of the European
Union. Using manifesto data for 1951–2001, this article
examines convergence of party programmes across Western
Europe. It is shown that European integration has increas-
ingly constrained the range of policy platforms. Moreover,
we generally find a stronger effect if and when countries are
actually members of the EU. European integration bolsters
K E Y W O R D S
programmatic convergence of Euro-friendly as well as
Eurosceptic parties. However, European integration particu-
intergovernmental
larly influences the convergence of Eurosceptic parties in EU
bargaining
member states.
party competition
policy convergence
two-level game
2 3 5
2 3 6
European Union Politics 7(2)
Although the process has not always been a smooth one, it is undeniable that
the institutions of the European Union (EU) have increased dramatically in
importance over the past 50 years. Throughout this period, a defining feature
of the European Union has remained its system of multilevel governance in
which the competencies of the various levels of authority are not clearly sepa-
rated. The EU is still a prime example of power-sharing between national and
supranational authorities. Decision-making power for nearly all policy issues
falls between the national and the EU level. Consequently, it is appropriate
to view European integration as a process by which bargaining power is
shifting from national political institutions to the European supranational
institutions. So far, this has particularly affected the legislative and executive
branches of government, where national governments and parliaments find
themselves weakened relative to the European Commission and, less obvi-
ously, the European Parliament. However, the increasing importance of the
European Court of Justice indicates that a similar shift of power now also
affects the judiciary.
The leading research question of this article is how, if at all, national
polities react to the structural loss of bargaining power relative to EU insti-
tutions. Based on the logic of two-level games, we examine empirically
whether European integration has led to programmatic convergence. The
logic of two-level games suggests that changes in the bargaining environment
may lead to a ‘rallying-around-the-flag’ effect in the member states, in particu-
lar when policies coming from Europe are perceived as a threat to the
domestic status quo. Schelling (1960) argued that, in international negotia-
tions, governments can benefit from the perception of being politically vulner-
able at home, the so-called ‘paradox of weakness’. This conjecture has been
applied to analyse the importance of domestic veto players, as well as the
size of the domestic ‘win-set’, defined as the area of possible outcomes that
can win majority support to change the status quo (Shepsle and Weingast,
1987). Closely related, Putnam’s (1988) thesis states that a smaller domestic
‘win-set’ increases the bargaining power of negotiators in intergovernmental
bargaining (see also, Iida, 1993; Milner and Rosendorff, 1997). Tsebelis (1995,
2002) reasons accordingly that a unified parliament acting as a unified collec-
tive veto-player strengthens the bargaining position of its national govern-
ment, because it is a more effective constraint.
Research into the Schelling or Putnam conjecture has generally evaluated
the outcomes of international negotiations, and analysed whether more
constrained negotiators indeed got a better deal (e.g. König and Hug, 2000;
Hug and König, 2002; Bailer and Schneider, 2006).1 Only a few studies
consider what would seem to be a logical consequence of the Schelling conjec-
ture: if governments benefit from ‘tying their hands’, then they should have
Dorussen and Nanou
European Integration and Party Programmes
2 3 7
a strategic incentive to do so. Fearon (1994, 1997), Tarar (2001) and Leventog˘lu
and Tarar (2005) argue that negotiators may create so-called audience costs
by escalating a conflict. Most relevant, however, are the studies by Mo (1994)
and Pahre (1997), which allow for endogenous domestic institutions.
If a unified parliament increases its government’s bargaining power, then
parties may have an interest in presenting a common stance. In other words,
is it indeed the case that European integration has led political parties to
converge to a common unified stance in order to boost national influence at
the European level? Do such strategic considerations affect the policy plat-
forms of all parties similarly? It may be necessary to distinguish between
government and opposition parties, as well as parties that are generally pro-
EU or anti-EU. Finally, the notion of ‘win-set’ suggests that it is only the policy
positions of parties that are needed for a majority in parliament that matter.
Consequently, we test the Putnam thesis specifically for the relevant
minimum winning coalition (MWC) that can be identified in parliament for
a particular policy issue (Riker, 1962; Axelrod, 1970).
There are some recent examples that parties may indeed exhibit such
strategic behaviour. During the 2005 negotiations on the EU budget, the
Labour and Conservative parties in Britain largely agreed on the need to
protect the British rebate and the need for changes in the Common Agricul-
tural Policy. Similarly, in 2004, Greek parties across the political spectrum
converged on the need to protect subsidies to olive growers as well as cotton
and tobacco producers during the negotiations on the reform of subsidy status
for Mediterranean products. Falkner et al. (2005: 333), moreover, note that the
‘world of domestic politics’ does not stop once a common policy has been
agreed. With regard to Great Britain they observe:
For ideological reasons, the Conservative government fought hard against the
Directives at the EU level. The transposition process was then frequently used as
a ‘continuation of decision-making by other means,’ i.e. as an opportunity to
continue combating Directives that were already adopted against the will of the
UK government. (Falkner et al., 2005: 333)
For example, in 1986 the British Conservative government decided to opt out
of the Social Protocol, whereas during the 1980s Labour had supported
harmonization of social policy standards throughout the EU. However,
Labour’s position on this matter changed markedly in the run-up to the
general election of May 1997. Although in 1997 the New Labour government
agreed to sign up to the Social Protocol during the negotiations of the Amster-
dam Treaty, its approach towards implementation was in line with its general
stance to minimize the effects of the directives. Especially with relation to the
Parental Leave Directive, the Employment Relations Act of 1999 incorrectly
2 3 8
European Union Politics 7(2)
transposed this directive by setting lower rules than were required by the
directive (Falkner et al., 2005: 147–8; Sifft, 2004: 19).
The next section reviews the emerging literature on the impact of
European integration on the convergence of party programmes. The third
section presents a two-level bargaining model to analyse strategic program-
matic convergence. Next, we test whether there has indeed been such conver-
gence in the various member states of the European Union: the fourth section
details the research design, and section five presents the main results. We find
significant effects of European integration on the issue-specific content of
party programmes. European integration bolsters programmatic convergence
of Euro-friendly as well as of Eurosceptic parties, although these parties still
respond differently to this and other external influences. Policy positions of
governing or minimum winning coalitions are less obviously affected by
European integration. The conclusions briefly discuss the implications of our
findings for the study and practice of European integration.
European integration and convergence of party
programmes
There is a growing literature studying the EU impact on the organizational
structure of political parties, in particular on the relationship between national
parties and European parliamentarians and the functioning of European
party families (Hix and Lord, 1997). A further area of consideration has
become the importance of the EU and European issues in domestic electoral
competition. The central research questions here are when political parties
will emphasize their pro- or anti-EU stance, and what are the electoral gains
and losses of such an electoral strategy (Marks et al., 2002).
Yet only very recently scholars have begun to examine the possible
broader impact of European integration on party programmes. A small
number of studies look for evidence in the manifesto data (Budge et al., 2001)
to see whether...
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