From staunch supporters to critical observers: Explaining the turn towards Euroscepticism among regionalist parties
| Author | Arjan H Schakel,Emanuele Massetti |
| DOI | 10.1177/14651165211001508 |
| Published date | 01 September 2021 |
| Date | 01 September 2021 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
Article
From staunch supporters
to critical observers:
Explaining the turn
towards Euroscepticism
among regionalist parties
Emanuele Massetti
School of International Studies and Department of Sociology
and Social Research, University of Trento, Trento, Italy
Arjan H Schakel
Department of Comparative Politics, University of Bergen,
Bergen, Norway
Abstract
Based on a new dataset, this article explains a turn towards Euroscepticism by region-
alist parties from the early 2000s. Our findings point to the effects of cross-dimensional
ideological linkages – positions adopted on the centre-periphery and left–right dimen-
sions – and of an increasing formal regional involvement in European Union affairs
without actual influence, which leaves regionalist (and especially secessionist) parties
frustrated with the European Union multi-level system. Our findings substantiate the
argument that regionalist parties are strongly supportive of economic integration but
less supportive of political integration. They are also in line with the fall of the ‘Europe
of the Regions’ thesis.
Keywords
European integration, Europe of the Regions, Euroscepticism, regionalist party,
secessionism
Corresponding author:
Emanuele Massetti, School of International Studies and Department of Sociology and Social Research,
University of Trento, Via Tommaso Gar 14, Trento 38122, Italy.
Email: emanuele.massetti@unitn.it
European Union Politics
!The Author(s) 2021
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DOI: 10.1177/14651165211001508
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2021, Vol. 22(3) 424–445
Introduction
As the European Union (EU) is moving from crisis to crisis, struggling to turn
them into opportunities for relaunching the ‘European project’, it becomes crucial
to understand which political forces are oriented towards sustaining or opposing
such a project. While the positions of major party families have been extensively
studied, other party families have attracted less attention and, when they have, the
findings have not always been convergent and conclusive. In this article, we ana-
lyze the regionalist party family’s stances on European integration. In particular,
we concentrate on analyzing and explaining a marked change in the level of sup-
port for European integration amongst regionalist parties in the last two decades.
Our study is relevant for two main reasons. First, regionalist parties have estab-
lished themselves as important actors in several European democracies (Elias and
Tronconi, 2011; Mazzoleni and Mu
¨ller, 2017), at a time in which support for
European integration has started to shrink. In some EU member-states, their rel-
evance in national politics
1
and their prolonged dominance in some regions makes
these parties increasingly relevant actors, including for the prospects of further
European integration. Indeed, the main steps towards an ever more integrated
Europe are made through the negotiation and then ratification of treaties, which
in turn allow EU institutions to produce further integration through ordinary
European legislation. Given the important role of political parties in these pro-
cesses and given the increasing difficulties for the pro-integration forces to prevail,
even the positions adopted by regionalist parties can be relevant for the final
outcome, especially at the stage of domestic approval. In addition, regionalist
parties’ attitudes towards European integration and the EU are also relevant for
EU policy making. Indeed, these parties are increasingly active in the EU multi-
level system of governance (Massetti and Schakel, 2020), having some control on
policy implementation through their role in regional governments, as well as trying
to affect policy decisions in Brussels, either directly (Callanan and Tatham, 2014)
or via their member-state (Bolleyer et al., 2014).
Secondly, the extant literature on regionalist parties’ positioning on European
integration presents us with an unclear answer. On the one hand, quantitative
studies have concluded that regionalist parties have always been consistent and
convinced supporters of European integration (Jolly, 2007). On the other hand,
qualitative studies have highlighted both an instrumental approach to European
integration, which leads regionalist parties to remarkable longitudinal changes in
their stances (Elias, 2009; Hepburn, 2010; Lynch, 1996), and the presence of con-
siderable variation within the regionalist party family (De Winter and Gomez-
Reino, 2002). In addition, some scholars have advanced the thesis that support
for European integration has considerably decreased amongst regionalist parties in
the 2000s (Elias, 2008). However, more recent quantitative studies have found mild
or inconclusive evidence on this putative turn towards Euroscepticism (Bakker
et al., 2015: 145; Jolly, 2015: 97–99; Sz€
ocsik, 2013). As a result, ‘over the past
few years, perspectives are divided amongst those who maintain the party family
425
Massetti and Schakel
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