European Politics Behind Closed Doors: The Origins of Euroscepticism in Slovenia

Authors

  • Jure Gašparič Institute of Contemporary History
  • Andrej Pančur Institute of Contemporary History
  • Jure Skubic Institute of Contemporary History

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.51663/pnz.63.2.02

Keywords:

EU, Euroscepticism, politics, voter outreach, elections

Abstract

Euroscepticism is a common political problem in many EU member states or potential candidates. There is a general belief that the EU is a giant bureaucratic structure and as such distant, colossal and suspicious, which creates a growing distance between the EU and its citizens. Such ambivalent sentiment towards the EU could be noticed also in Slovenia after it gained independence from Yugoslavia and started the process of joining the EU. The general public opinion about the EU was rather low – people were generally sympathetic about the EU but never completely enthusiastic about it. What attributed to such attitude was also the fact that politicians adopted several regulations without properly informing the public therefore leaving people uninformed about potentially important issues. In this paper, we argue that the threat to representative democracy is not so much in politicians not keeping their promises but rather in politicians not telling their constituents what they are working on and adopting more regulations than communicated with public. Our analysis of election manifestos, public opinion and press releases uncovers two fundamental problems of the Slovenian government between 2000 and 2004. The first one is an almost routine adoption of EU regulations without serious public debates and the second government’s failure to communicate relevant matters with public in a timely manner, problematize them and bring them closer to people. Although the analysis focuses on events that happen around 20 years ago, we believe that our findings are highly relevant also for the state of Slovenian politics today.

References

Alibert, Juliette. "Euroscepticism: the root causes and how to address them." (2015).

Alvarez, Robert. "Attitudes toward the European Union: The role of social class, social stratification, and political orientation." International Journal of Sociology 32, No. 1 (2002): 58–76.

Am Orde, Sabine. “Desinformation von der Stange.” Taz, September 2, 2022, https://taz.de/Social-Media-Kampagne-gegen-Baerbock/!5878877/.

Becoming a Republic. “From elections to elections...” accessed May 11, 2023. http://www.slovenia25.si/i-feel-25/timeline/becoming-a-republic/from-elections-to-elections/index.html.

Bizjak, Andrej. “Vpliv volilnih sistemov na sestavo in delovanje parlamentov s poudarkom na delovanju Slovenskega parlamenta.” (diplomsko delo, Univerza v Ljubljani, 2003).

Kastelic, Brane. “Evropa v 2004: ne samo leto širitve,” BBC Slovene.com, December 30, 2004. https://www.bbc.co.uk/slovene/news/story/2004/12/041230_europe2004.shtml.

Cobb, Michael D., Brendan Nyhan, and Jason Reifler. "Beliefs don't always persevere: How political figures are punished when positive information about them is discredited." Political Psychology 34, No. 3 (2013): 307–26.

Euractiv, “European Parliament Elections 2004: Results,” June 30, 2004. Accessed 8. 5. 2023. https://www.euractiv.com/section/elections/linksdossier/european-parliament-elections-2004-results.

Fairbanks, Jenille, Kenneth D. Plowman, and Brad L. Rawlins. "Transparency in government communication." Journal of Public Affairs: An International Journal 7, No. 1 (2007): 23–37.

Gilbert, Mark and Daniele Pasquinucci. Euroscepticisms, The Historical Roots of a Political Challenge (Brill Publisher, 2020).

Gulmez, Seck. "EU-scepticism vs. euroscepticism. re-assessing the party positions in the accession countries towards EU membership." EU Enlargement. Current Challenges and Strategic Choices Europe plurielle–Multiple Europes 50 (2013).

Hooghe, Liesbet and Gary Marks. "Sources of euroscepticism." Acta Politica 42 (2007): 119–27.

Kaal, Harm and Jelle van Lottum."Applied History: Past, Present, and Future." Journal of Applied History 3, No. 1-2 (2021): 135–54.

“Kaj je izbris? | Izbrisani. Accessed May 15, 2023, https://www.mirovni-institut.si/izbrisani/opis-izbrisa/index.html.

Kocjan, Aleš and Uroš Esih. “Bob Geldof na Lentu: Ne razumete se, ker ste zajeb*** idioti,” Večer, June 29, 2017. https://vecer.com/prosti-cas/bob-geldof-na-lentu-ne-razumete-se-ker-ste-zajeb-idioti-6275625.

Lipicer Kustec, Simona, Kropivnik, Samo, Deželan, Tomaž and Alem Maksuti. Volilni programi in stališča. Ljubljana: Fakulteta za družbene vede, 2011.

Lo, James, Proksch , Sven-Oliver Proksch and Jonathan B. Slapin. "Ideological clarity in multiparty competition: A new measure and test using elections manifestos." British Journal of Political Science 46, No. 3 (2016): 591–610.

Luthar, Breda. "Oslepljeni in ohromljeni od nevtralnosti." Mit o zmagi levice: Mediji in politika med volitvami 2000 v Sloveniji, (2000): 201–12.

Luthar, Breda. Mit o zmagi levice: Mediji in politika med volitvami 2000 v Sloveniji (Ljubljana: Mirovni inštitut, 2001).

Manifesto Project Database. Accessed May 10, 2023. https://manifesto-project.wzb.eu/information/documents/informatio.

“Manifesto Project Database. Accessed May 10, 2023. https://manifesto-project.wzb.e

Mašanovič, Božo. “Do vstopa v EU še veliko dela.” Slovenski almanah (2001): 23–24.

Mudde, Cas. "The populist zeitgeist." Government and opposition 39, No. 4 (2004): 541–63.

Pančur, Andrej. “Sustainability of Digital Editions: Static Websites of the History of Slovenia – SIstory Portal.” Prispevki za novejšo zgodovino 59, No. 1 (2019): 157–78, accessed May 18, 2023, https://ojs.inz.si/pnz/article/view/348.

Pančur, Andrej. Seje vlade Republike Slovenije, distributed by DIHUR GitLab, accessed May 18, 2023, https://dihur.si/parl/seje_vlade.

Sanders, Karen, and María José Canel. Government Communication: Cases and Challenges. London: Bloomsbury academic, 2013.

Tavčar, Rudi. "Mnenjska raziskava o priključitvi k EU.” University of Ljubljana, Ljubljana, (2002). https://doi.org/10.17898/ADP_EUACC00_V1.

Text Encoding Initiative, P5: Guidelines for Electronic Text Encoding and Interchange, Version 4.6.0, April 4, 2023, accessed May 18, 2023, https://tei-c.org/release/doc/tei-p5-doc/en/html/index.html.

Thomson, Robert. "Parties’ Elections Manifestos and Public Policies." (2020)

Toš, Niko. "Slovensko javno mnenje 2001/1: Stališča Slovencev o pridruževanju Evropski Uniji in Mednarodna raziskava o delovnih aktivnostih." Ljubljana: Univerza v Ljubljani, Arhiv družboslovnih podatkov. ADP-IDNo: SJM011. https://www. adp. fdv. uni-lj. si/opisi/sjm011 (2001).

UK Parliament. “Elections manifestos.” Accessed May 10, 2023. https://www.parliament.uk/site-information/glossary/manifesto/

Vlada Republike Slovenije, Sporočila za javnost. Accessed May 18, 2023, http://vlada.arhiv-spletisc.gov.si/delo_vlade/sporocila_za_javnost/index.html.

Volkens, Andrea, Burst, Tobias, Krause, Werner, Lehmann, Pola, Matthieß, Theres, Regel, Sven, Weßbels, Bernhard, Zenther, Lisa. The Manifesto Data Collection. Manifesto Project (MRG/CMP/MARPOR). Version 2021a. (2021). Berlin: Wissenschaftszentrum Berlin für Sozialforschung (WZB). https://doi.org/10.25522/manifesto.mpds.2021a.

Zajc, Drago, Kropivnik, Samo and Kustec Lipicer, Simona. Od volilnih programov do koalicijskih pogodb (Ljubljana: FDV, 2012), 90, 91, 98, 99, 114.

Zakon o zdravljenju neplodnosti in postopkih oploditve z biomedicinsko pomočjo (ZZNPOB). Act - September 7, 2000. Accessed May 11, 2023, http://pisrs.si/Pis.web/pregledPredpisa?id=ZAKO2518#.

Downloads

Published

2023-06-13

Most read articles by the same author(s)

1 2 3 4 5 > >>