Euroscepticism and European election turnout in central and eastern Europe

Abstract

This thesis will be based on two research questions. The first question asks: Does the Central and Eastern Europe Communist history affect in any way the level of Euroscepticism? Does this then affect European Parliament turnout? On the other hand the second question asks: Has the type of Euroscepticism amongst Central and Eastern European countries change in any way during the 2004-14 election periods, and has this change if any been growing?. The main objectives arising from this thesis was to investigate to what extent the Communist past of Central and Eastern European Countries affected the type of Euroscepticism present in these countries, and to see whether the different forms of Euroscepticism are reflected in European Parliament elections. Through the various pieces of literature studied it was identified that there are numerous variances of Euroscepticism especially between the old Member States and the new Member States deriving from Central and Eastern European Countries. This has triggered the creation of the above mentioned research questions. The first research question revolved on whether the Central and Eastern European Countries' Communist past affected in anyway the manner by which citizens see the EU and whether such Eurosceptic sentiments were reflected in EP elections. In order to answer such question the usage of various hooks and journal articles was used in order to analyze the transition of Central and Eastern European Countries from being Communist to becoming EU members. Apart from this, the analysis conducted aided in identifying whether the Communist past of these countries impacted in anyway the form of Euroscepticism in these countries, especially during their accession negotiations and later membership. Apart from this, there was an amalgamation of Quantitative and Qualitative data in order to form an idea of the impact of European Integration in Central and Eastern European Countries, and whether Euroscepticism is dominant in European Parliament elections. This was conducted through an analysis of various national Parliament elections and a European Parliament election from two countries: Poland and Czech Republic.