The European Parliament Elections and Czech Political Parties: Much Ado About Nothing?
Keywords:
Czechia, European Union, European Parliament elections, Election programs, Political parties, EuroscepticismAbstract
The paper inquires divergences in electoral programs of four Czech political parties (the ČSSD, KDU-ČSL, KSČM, and the ODS) as delivered for all the previous European Parliament elections. The aim of this study is to compare the use of national and European themes as delineated in programs. It is assumed that, in many cases, the programs contain topics and aspects which are specific and valid for elections on the national level instead. Thus, the paper elaborates on one of the characteristics of the second-order elections theory as exemplified in the Euro-elections. Results of the analysis showed a significant superiority of national affairs over the European issues in the examined samples. Although the number of political parties varies in individual periods, the study has also confirmed the assumption drawn from the theory of second-order elections. Therefore, political parties utilize political programs for the European Parliament elections as of national interest with domestic affairs, not European. Furthermore, the study considers dissimilarities among political parties in positive and negative attitudes toward the EU. Hence, sundry approaches to European affairs may be identified across the Czech political parties.
References
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BLONDEL, J., SINNOTT, R., SVENSSON, P. (1998). People and Parliament in the European Union: Participation, democracy, and legitimacy. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998, 308 pp.
DRISKO, J. W., MASCHI, T. (2015). Content analysis. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015, 208 pp.
EIBL, O. (2011). Politický prostor a témata v České republice v letech 2006-2008. Brno: Centrum pro studium demokracie a kultury, 2011, 213 pp.
EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT. (2018). European Parliament elections: Final scores of turnouts (1979-2014). [online]. Available at: <http://www.europarl.europa.eu/elections2014-results/en/turnout.html>. [Accessed 9 December 2018].
FEREBAUER, V. (2018). Vztah Čechů k EU za patnáct let ochladl. In: iDnes. [online]. Available at: <https://www.idnes.cz/zpravy/domaci/vztah-cechu-k-evropske-unii-uprchlicka-krize-prijeti-do-eu-kritika-unie-lisabonska-smlouva.A180515_111811_domaci_fer>. [Accessed 9 December 2018].
HAVLÍK, V. (2009). České politické strany a evropská integrace: Evropeizace, evropanství, euroskepticismus? Brno: Mezinárodní politologický ústav, 2009, 200 pp.
HLOUŠEK, V., PŠEJA, P. (2009). Europeanization of political parties and the party system in the Czech Republic. In: Journal of Communist Studies and Transition Politics. Vol. 25, No. 4, 2009, pp. 513–539.
HIX, S., NOURY, A. G., ROLAND, G. (2007). Democratic politics in the European Parliament. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007, 260 pp.
KOVÁŘ, J. (2014). Europeizace volebních programů pro volby do EP. In: Politické vedy. Vol. 17, No. 3, 2014, pp. 32–67.
KRIPPENDORFF, K. (2004). Content analysis: An introduction to its methodology. London: SAGE Publications, 20104, 472 pp.
LEŠKA, D. (2015). The Europeanization of Slovak political parties. In: Slovak Journal of Political Sciences. Vol. 15, No. 1, 2015, pp. 31–58.
LINEK, L., LYONS, P. (2014). Dočasná stabilita: Volební podpora politických stran v České republice v letech 1990–2010. Praha: SLON, 2014, 222 pp.
MANSFELDOVÁ, Z. (2003). Obsahová analýza volebních program českých politických stran. In: DVOŘÁKOVÁ, V., HEROUTOVÁ, A. (eds.). II. Kongres českých politologů, Praha: ČSPV, 2003, pp. 470-478.
MARINESCU, V., NOWAK-TETER, E., BRANEA, S., FOX, B., MERKOVITY, N., MIHÁLYFFY, Z., DEŽELAN, T., MAKSUTI, A. (2017). In search of common patterns: Political advertising in Central and Eastern Europe. In: Holtz-Bacha, C., Novelli, E., Rafter, K. (eds.). Political advertising in the 2014 European Parliament elections, London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017, pp. 135–152.
MARSH, M. (1998). Testing the second-order elections model after four European Elections. In: British Journal of Political Science. Vol. 28, No. 4, 1998, pp. 591–607.
MAŠKARINEC, P. (2017). The Czech Pirate Party in the 2010 and 2013 parliamentary elections and the 2014 European Parliament elections: Spatial analysis of voter support. In: Slovak Journal of Political Sciences. Vol. 17, No. 1, 2017, pp. 5–33.
NIELSEN, J. H., FRANKLIN, M. N. (2017). The Eurosceptic 2014 European Parliament elections. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017, 265 pp.
NORRIS, P. (1999). Recruitment into the European Parliament. In: Katz, R. S., Wessels, B. (eds.), The European Parliament, the national parliaments, and European integration. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999, pp. 86–104.
PROCHÁZKOVÁ, I., HLOUŠEK, V. (2013). Významnost tématu evropské integrace: obsahová analýza programů českých stran pro parlamentní volby 2006 a 2010. In: Evropská volební studia. Vol. 8, No. 2, 2013, pp. 113–132.
REIFF, K., SMITT, N. H. (1980). Second-order national elections: A conceptual framework for the analysis of European election results. In: European Journal of Political Research. Vol. 8, No. 1, 1980, pp. 3–44.
RIISHØJ, S. (2007). Europeanization and Euroscepticism: Experiences from Poland and the Czech Republic. In: Nationalities Papers. Vol. 35, No. 3, 2007, pp. 503–535.
RINGE, N. (2010). Who decides, and how? Preferences, uncertainty, and policy choice in the European Parliament. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010, 233 pp.
SOMER-TOPCU, Z., ZAR, M. E. (2014). European parliamentary elections and national party policy change. In: Comparative Political Studies. Vol. 47, No. 6, 2014, pp. 878–902.
STAVRIDIS, S., IRRERA, D. (2015). The European Parliament and its international relations. London: Routledge, 2015, 304 pp.
STOYANOV, D. (2017). Central and East European Euroscepticism in 2014: Domestic politics matters. In: Nielsen, J. H., Franklin, M. N. (eds.). The Eurosceptic 2014 European Parliament elections. London: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 103–124.
ŠARADÍN, P. (2008). Teorie voleb druhého řádu a možnosti jejich aplikace v České republice. Olomouc: Univerzita Palackého, 2008, 162 pp.
ŠIMUNJAK, M., MILANOVIĆ, L. (2017). The first time for everything: Political advertising in a new member state. In: Holtz-Bacha, C., Novelli, E., Rafter, K. (eds.). Political Advertising in the 2014 European Parliament Elections. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017, pp. 153–168.
TERPAN, F., SAURUGGER, S. (2019). The CJEU and the Parliament’s external powers since Lisbon: Judicial support to representative democracy? In: Costa, O. (ed.), The European Parliament in times of EU crisis: Dynamics and transformations, Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019, pp. 77–98.
WEBER, R. P. (1990). Basic content analysis. London: SAGE Publications, 1990, 96 pp.
WERNER, A., LACEWELL, O., VOLKENS, A. (2011). Comparative Manifesto Project: Handbook of coding instructions, 4th Edition. [online]. Available at: <https://manifesto-project.wzb.eu/down/papers/handbook_v4.pdf>. [Accessed 15 December 2018].
WRING, D., GRILL, C., MEKOVITY, N., DEACON, D. (2017). Populist politics and the ‘radical right’ in 2014 elections. In: Holtz-Bacha, C., Novelli, E., Rafter, K. Political advertising in the 2014 European Parliament elections. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017, pp. 97–118.
SCRUTINIZED ELECTION PROGRAMS
ČSSD’s EP election program (2004). Obtained from the ČSSD’s Archive via: <archiv@socdem.cz>.
ČSSD’s EP election program (2009). [online]. Available at: <http://www.evropskezpravy.cz/soubory/dokumenty/cssd-jistota-ep2009-917.pdf>. [Accessed 3 March 2017].
ČSSD’s EP election program (2014). [online]. Available at: <http://www.cssd.cz/data/files/manifest.pdf>. [Accessed 3 March 2017].
ČSSD’s EP election program (2019). [online]. Available at: <https://www.cssd.cz/data/files/volby-do-ep-argumentar.pdf>. [Accessed 24 March 2020].
KDU-ČSL’s EP election program (2004). [online]. Available at: <http://preview.kdu.cz/Dokumenty/Volby/2004/Volby-do-Evropskeho-parlamentu/2004/Evropsky-volebni-program-KDU---CSL.aspx>. [Accessed 3 March 2017].
KDU- ČSL’s EP election program (2009). [online]. Available at: <http://www.roithova.cz/soubory/Volebni_program_KDU-CSL_do_EP_2009-2014.pdf?fid=1241961694>. [Accessed 3 March 2017].
KDU-ČSL’s EP election program (2014). [online]. Available at: <http://www.volbydoep.cz/getmedia/b2402746-09d9-4fef-956f-aaff11b92712/Europrogram_KDU_2014.pdf.aspx>. [Accessed 3 March 2017].
KDU-ČSL’s EP election program (2019). [online]. Available at: <https://www.kdu.cz/aktualne/ruzne/program-kdu-csl-pro-volby-do-evropskeho-parlamentu#2>. [Accessed 24 March 2020].
KSČM’s EP election program (2004). [online]. Available at: <https://www.kscm.cz/nasestrana/kscm-a-volby-dokumenty/volby-2004/evropsky-parlament/28372>. [Accessed 3 March 2017].
KSČM’s EP election program (2009). [online]. Available at: <https://www.kscm.cz/volby-a-akce/volby-do-ep-2009/volebni-program>. [Accessed 3 March 2017].
KSČM’s EP election program (2014). [online]. Available at: <https://www.kscm.cz/volby-a-akce/evropsky-parlament2/program>. [Accessed 3 March 2017].
KSČM’s EP election program (2019). [online]. Available at: <http://www.nenechmetotak.cz/katalog-obrazku/clanek-68/527-kscm-volebni-program.pdf>. [Accessed 24 March 2020].
ODS’s EP election program (2004). [online]. Available at: <http://www.ods.cz/docs/programy/program_2004e.pdf>. [Accessed 3 March 2017].
ODS’s EP election program (2009). [online]. Available at: <http://www.ods.cz/docs/programy/program_2009ep.pdf>. [Accessed 3 March 2017].
ODS’s EP election program (2014). [online]. Available at: <http://www.ods.cz/docs/programy/program-volbyEP2014.pdf>. [Accessed 3 March 2017].
ODS’s EP election program (2019). [online]. Available at: <http://zahradil.cz/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/ODS_program_final.pdf>. [Accessed 24 March 2020].
BLONDEL, J., SINNOTT, R., SVENSSON, P. (1998). People and Parliament in the European Union: Participation, democracy, and legitimacy. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998, 308 pp.
DRISKO, J. W., MASCHI, T. (2015). Content analysis. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015, 208 pp.
EIBL, O. (2011). Politický prostor a témata v České republice v letech 2006-2008. Brno: Centrum pro studium demokracie a kultury, 2011, 213 pp.
EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT. (2018). European Parliament elections: Final scores of turnouts (1979-2014). [online]. Available at: <http://www.europarl.europa.eu/elections2014-results/en/turnout.html>. [Accessed 9 December 2018].
FEREBAUER, V. (2018). Vztah Čechů k EU za patnáct let ochladl. In: iDnes. [online]. Available at: <https://www.idnes.cz/zpravy/domaci/vztah-cechu-k-evropske-unii-uprchlicka-krize-prijeti-do-eu-kritika-unie-lisabonska-smlouva.A180515_111811_domaci_fer>. [Accessed 9 December 2018].
HAVLÍK, V. (2009). České politické strany a evropská integrace: Evropeizace, evropanství, euroskepticismus? Brno: Mezinárodní politologický ústav, 2009, 200 pp.
HLOUŠEK, V., PŠEJA, P. (2009). Europeanization of political parties and the party system in the Czech Republic. In: Journal of Communist Studies and Transition Politics. Vol. 25, No. 4, 2009, pp. 513–539.
HIX, S., NOURY, A. G., ROLAND, G. (2007). Democratic politics in the European Parliament. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007, 260 pp.
KOVÁŘ, J. (2014). Europeizace volebních programů pro volby do EP. In: Politické vedy. Vol. 17, No. 3, 2014, pp. 32–67.
KRIPPENDORFF, K. (2004). Content analysis: An introduction to its methodology. London: SAGE Publications, 20104, 472 pp.
LEŠKA, D. (2015). The Europeanization of Slovak political parties. In: Slovak Journal of Political Sciences. Vol. 15, No. 1, 2015, pp. 31–58.
LINEK, L., LYONS, P. (2014). Dočasná stabilita: Volební podpora politických stran v České republice v letech 1990–2010. Praha: SLON, 2014, 222 pp.
MANSFELDOVÁ, Z. (2003). Obsahová analýza volebních program českých politických stran. In: DVOŘÁKOVÁ, V., HEROUTOVÁ, A. (eds.). II. Kongres českých politologů, Praha: ČSPV, 2003, pp. 470-478.
MARINESCU, V., NOWAK-TETER, E., BRANEA, S., FOX, B., MERKOVITY, N., MIHÁLYFFY, Z., DEŽELAN, T., MAKSUTI, A. (2017). In search of common patterns: Political advertising in Central and Eastern Europe. In: Holtz-Bacha, C., Novelli, E., Rafter, K. (eds.). Political advertising in the 2014 European Parliament elections, London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017, pp. 135–152.
MARSH, M. (1998). Testing the second-order elections model after four European Elections. In: British Journal of Political Science. Vol. 28, No. 4, 1998, pp. 591–607.
MAŠKARINEC, P. (2017). The Czech Pirate Party in the 2010 and 2013 parliamentary elections and the 2014 European Parliament elections: Spatial analysis of voter support. In: Slovak Journal of Political Sciences. Vol. 17, No. 1, 2017, pp. 5–33.
NIELSEN, J. H., FRANKLIN, M. N. (2017). The Eurosceptic 2014 European Parliament elections. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017, 265 pp.
NORRIS, P. (1999). Recruitment into the European Parliament. In: Katz, R. S., Wessels, B. (eds.), The European Parliament, the national parliaments, and European integration. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999, pp. 86–104.
PROCHÁZKOVÁ, I., HLOUŠEK, V. (2013). Významnost tématu evropské integrace: obsahová analýza programů českých stran pro parlamentní volby 2006 a 2010. In: Evropská volební studia. Vol. 8, No. 2, 2013, pp. 113–132.
REIFF, K., SMITT, N. H. (1980). Second-order national elections: A conceptual framework for the analysis of European election results. In: European Journal of Political Research. Vol. 8, No. 1, 1980, pp. 3–44.
RIISHØJ, S. (2007). Europeanization and Euroscepticism: Experiences from Poland and the Czech Republic. In: Nationalities Papers. Vol. 35, No. 3, 2007, pp. 503–535.
RINGE, N. (2010). Who decides, and how? Preferences, uncertainty, and policy choice in the European Parliament. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010, 233 pp.
SOMER-TOPCU, Z., ZAR, M. E. (2014). European parliamentary elections and national party policy change. In: Comparative Political Studies. Vol. 47, No. 6, 2014, pp. 878–902.
STAVRIDIS, S., IRRERA, D. (2015). The European Parliament and its international relations. London: Routledge, 2015, 304 pp.
STOYANOV, D. (2017). Central and East European Euroscepticism in 2014: Domestic politics matters. In: Nielsen, J. H., Franklin, M. N. (eds.). The Eurosceptic 2014 European Parliament elections. London: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 103–124.
ŠARADÍN, P. (2008). Teorie voleb druhého řádu a možnosti jejich aplikace v České republice. Olomouc: Univerzita Palackého, 2008, 162 pp.
ŠIMUNJAK, M., MILANOVIĆ, L. (2017). The first time for everything: Political advertising in a new member state. In: Holtz-Bacha, C., Novelli, E., Rafter, K. (eds.). Political Advertising in the 2014 European Parliament Elections. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017, pp. 153–168.
TERPAN, F., SAURUGGER, S. (2019). The CJEU and the Parliament’s external powers since Lisbon: Judicial support to representative democracy? In: Costa, O. (ed.), The European Parliament in times of EU crisis: Dynamics and transformations, Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019, pp. 77–98.
WEBER, R. P. (1990). Basic content analysis. London: SAGE Publications, 1990, 96 pp.
WERNER, A., LACEWELL, O., VOLKENS, A. (2011). Comparative Manifesto Project: Handbook of coding instructions, 4th Edition. [online]. Available at: <https://manifesto-project.wzb.eu/down/papers/handbook_v4.pdf>. [Accessed 15 December 2018].
WRING, D., GRILL, C., MEKOVITY, N., DEACON, D. (2017). Populist politics and the ‘radical right’ in 2014 elections. In: Holtz-Bacha, C., Novelli, E., Rafter, K. Political advertising in the 2014 European Parliament elections. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017, pp. 97–118.
SCRUTINIZED ELECTION PROGRAMS
ČSSD’s EP election program (2004). Obtained from the ČSSD’s Archive via: <archiv@socdem.cz>.
ČSSD’s EP election program (2009). [online]. Available at: <http://www.evropskezpravy.cz/soubory/dokumenty/cssd-jistota-ep2009-917.pdf>. [Accessed 3 March 2017].
ČSSD’s EP election program (2014). [online]. Available at: <http://www.cssd.cz/data/files/manifest.pdf>. [Accessed 3 March 2017].
ČSSD’s EP election program (2019). [online]. Available at: <https://www.cssd.cz/data/files/volby-do-ep-argumentar.pdf>. [Accessed 24 March 2020].
KDU-ČSL’s EP election program (2004). [online]. Available at: <http://preview.kdu.cz/Dokumenty/Volby/2004/Volby-do-Evropskeho-parlamentu/2004/Evropsky-volebni-program-KDU---CSL.aspx>. [Accessed 3 March 2017].
KDU- ČSL’s EP election program (2009). [online]. Available at: <http://www.roithova.cz/soubory/Volebni_program_KDU-CSL_do_EP_2009-2014.pdf?fid=1241961694>. [Accessed 3 March 2017].
KDU-ČSL’s EP election program (2014). [online]. Available at: <http://www.volbydoep.cz/getmedia/b2402746-09d9-4fef-956f-aaff11b92712/Europrogram_KDU_2014.pdf.aspx>. [Accessed 3 March 2017].
KDU-ČSL’s EP election program (2019). [online]. Available at: <https://www.kdu.cz/aktualne/ruzne/program-kdu-csl-pro-volby-do-evropskeho-parlamentu#2>. [Accessed 24 March 2020].
KSČM’s EP election program (2004). [online]. Available at: <https://www.kscm.cz/nasestrana/kscm-a-volby-dokumenty/volby-2004/evropsky-parlament/28372>. [Accessed 3 March 2017].
KSČM’s EP election program (2009). [online]. Available at: <https://www.kscm.cz/volby-a-akce/volby-do-ep-2009/volebni-program>. [Accessed 3 March 2017].
KSČM’s EP election program (2014). [online]. Available at: <https://www.kscm.cz/volby-a-akce/evropsky-parlament2/program>. [Accessed 3 March 2017].
KSČM’s EP election program (2019). [online]. Available at: <http://www.nenechmetotak.cz/katalog-obrazku/clanek-68/527-kscm-volebni-program.pdf>. [Accessed 24 March 2020].
ODS’s EP election program (2004). [online]. Available at: <http://www.ods.cz/docs/programy/program_2004e.pdf>. [Accessed 3 March 2017].
ODS’s EP election program (2009). [online]. Available at: <http://www.ods.cz/docs/programy/program_2009ep.pdf>. [Accessed 3 March 2017].
ODS’s EP election program (2014). [online]. Available at: <http://www.ods.cz/docs/programy/program-volbyEP2014.pdf>. [Accessed 3 March 2017].
ODS’s EP election program (2019). [online]. Available at: <http://zahradil.cz/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/ODS_program_final.pdf>. [Accessed 24 March 2020].
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Published
2020-04-15
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Mocek, O., Petlach, M. and Hudečková, Z. (2020) “The European Parliament Elections and Czech Political Parties: Much Ado About Nothing?”, Slovak Journal of Political Sciences, 20(1). Available at: https://sjps.fsvucm.sk/index.php/sjps/article/view/122 (Accessed: 21 November 2024).
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