Masaryk University Faculty of Social Studies

MASARYK UNIVERSITY FACULTY OF SOCIAL STUDIES

Department of International Relations and European Studies

Euro-attitudes in the Czech Republic A new way to measure distance between political parties in relation to the EU

Master‘s Thesis

Dániel Péter

Supervisor: PhDr. Petr Kaniok, Ph.D. UČO: 432433 Study field: European Politics Year of Enrollment: 2014 Brno, 2016

I hereby declare that this thesis I submit for assessment is entirely my own work and has not been taken from the work of others save to the extent that such work has been cited and acknowledged within the text of my work.

05.05.2016, Brno Dániel Péter

Acknowledgements

First and foremost, I would like to thank PhDr. Petr Kaniok, Ph.D. for supervising my thesis from the beginning and helping me with constructive remarks all along, even in the last moment. Without his suggestions, I could not have transformed my ideas into actual content. Secondly, I would like to express my gratitude for the International Visegrad Fund for the generous scholarship that they awarded me for the entire duration of my Master's studies. Last, but not least, I wish to say a big Thank You to my family for the unconditional support, patience and love that I receive from them every day.

Contents

Introduction ...... 7 1. Euroscepticism ...... 9 1.1. Difficulties of conceptualization and usage ...... 9 1.2. Defining Euroscepticism ...... 11 1.2.1. Step 1 - Conceptualizing the European Union as a political system ...... 11 1.2.2. Step 2 – Identifying specific and diffuse support of the EU ...... 12 1.2.3. Step 3 - Locating Euroscepticism in the dimension of diffuse support ...... 14 1.2.4. Applicability of the definiton ...... 15 2. Political parties and European integration – theories and classifications of support and opposition ...... 17 2.1. Explaining negative postures – strategy or ideology? ...... 17 2.2. Typologies of support and opposition – the state of the art ...... 22 2.3. Single-scale typologies in previous literature ...... 26 2.4. Combining single scale typologies for empirical use ...... 34 2.5. Conclusion: single-scale vs. multi-scale typologies ...... 38 3. Analytical part: testing the modified scale on the party system of the Czech Republic ....40 3.1. Choosing the subject of analysis ...... 40 3.2. Previous research of Euro-attitudes in the Czech Republic ...... 42 3.3. Methodology of the research ...... 44 3.4. Czech Social Democratic Party ( ČSSD) ...... 47 3.4.1.Official election documents ...... 47 3.4.2. Self-expressions by individual representatives ...... 48 3.5. ANO 2011 ...... 51 3.5.1.Official election documents ...... 51 3.5.2. Self-expressions by individual representatives ...... 54 3.6. Dawn - National Coalition (Úsvit) ...... 56 3.6.1.Official election documents ...... 56 3.6.2. Self-expressions by individual representatives ...... 58 3.7. TOP 09 ...... 60 3.7.1.Official election documents ...... 60 3.7.2. Self-expressions by individual representatives ...... 63 3.8. Czech Communist Party (KS ČM) ...... 65 3.8.1.Official election documents ...... 66

3.8.2. Self-expressions by individual representatives ...... 68 3.9. Christian Democratic Union (KDU-ČSL) ...... 70 3.7.1.Official election documents ...... 70 3.7.2. Self-expressions by individual representatives ...... 72 3.10. Civic Democratic Party (ODS)...... 74 3.10.1.Official election documents ...... 74 3.10.2. Self-expressions by individual representatives ...... 76 3.11. Summary ...... 78 Conclusion ...... 81 References ...... 83

Content of figures

Figure 1. Measurement of positions of the described non-scale typologies ...... 25 Figure 2. Scale of attitudes towards European integration ...... 27 Figure 3. Patterns of Radical Right Opposition to European Integration ...... 28 Figure 4. Results of the PERC analysis illustrated on a scal ...... 32

Figure 5. Comparison of three single-scale typologies ...... 35 Figure 6. Previous categorization of Czech parties with representation in the Chamber of Deputies since 2013 ...... 42

Figure 7. Party positions on the modified scale of Flood-Ushwerood ...... 79

List of Abbrevations

CFSP Common Foreign and Security Policy Commission European Commission Council Council of the European Union ČSSD Ceská strana sociáln ě demokratická DK Demokratikus Koalíció EMU European Monetary Union EP European Parliament EU European Union KDU-ČSL Křes ťanská a demokratická unie – Československá strana lidová KS ČM Komunistická strana Čech a Moravy LMP Lehet Más a Politika MEP Member of European Parliament MP Member of Parliament MSZP Magyar Szocialista Párt ODS Ob čanská demokratická strana

Introduction

Euroscepticism is a term that has flooded both political literature and mass media in the past two decades. We could read about the growing influence of Eurosceptic party groups, an increasingly Eurosceptic public opinion, the “Eurosceptic earthquake”, “Eurosceptic challenge” or “Eurosceptic victory” - just to mention a few news headlines from recent years. 1 The adjective has become so frequent that journalists, politicians, or the average European citizen no longer requires an explanation of the concept, because they believe – and are often left to believe - that its meaning is obvious. In reality, the complete opposite is true. Academic research about Euroscepticism since the 1990s has come up with so many definitions, theories, and classifications that its meaning has become blurred, overtly negative and far too inclusive. 2 Nevertheless, as soon as opposition towards certain aspects of the European Union or to European integration in general is analysed, scholars tend to stick both to the concept itself and to those 10 or 15-year old methods which aimed to define this opposition and separate Eurosceptics from „non-Eurosceptics”. The first goal of this thesis is to challenge this tendency by pointing out the inherent discrepancy that lies behind the term Euroscepticism and those schemes of classifications that have tried to identify separate dimensions of support and opposition in relation to European integration. Instead of proposing another line of division between positive and negative attitudes, I will turn my attention to a different type of measurement that has been largely ignored in scholarly literature so far. Typologies which intended to use one, single scale to measure positions of political parties without separating dimensions of support and opposition offer an interesting alternative to the widely-known methods which have already faced problems of inconsistency and inapplicability. However, a true comparison between these two types of classification can only be possible if substantial empirical data are available. Although single-scale typologies have not been applied to entire party systems so far and there has not been a properly devised method to gather necessary input for such a research, the results of a recent Hungarian study has brought inspiring observations to the field. By using a huge source of information about political parties, the so-called PERC method has managed to locate the subjects on a single scale and reveal relative distance between them, which traditional typologies could not show until now. Despite the novelty of

1 For examples, see The Guardian (2013), BBC News (2014a, 2014b), Reuters (2015). 2 See definitions of various scholars in subsequent chapters of this study. The problematic character of Euroscepticism was pointed out by numerous authors, e.g. Arató & Kaniok (2009), Leconte (2010, 2015), De Wilde (2010: 2-3)

7 these results, several methodological problems have been detected, which would render the applicability of this scheme rather questionable. Therefore, the second goal of this study will be to find out whether it is possible to address the revealed problems and use the gained experience and the abundance of sources from the PERC research to create a single scale typology which combines all the advantages of the existing, but so far untested models. After presenting the theoretical background for composing this modified scale, the second part of the thesis will be devoted for empirical analysis. As the area of testing, I have chosen the party system of the Czech Republic. The recent emergence of new political formations in the country provides a relevant basis for the research, as a comprehensive work covering all relevant parties and their behaviour towards the EU has not been published yet. By using multiple sources, I will not only be able to present the summary of the latest election manifestos, but to trace possible alterations between those documents and the respective party’s self-expessions as well. Consequently, apart from reflecting on the state of art about Euroscepticism and answering the main question about the applicability of our modified scale, the implementation of this method will contribute to the existing literature on Czech political parties and their attitude vis-á-vis European integration. The thesis consists of three chapters. Chapter 1 will first of all introduce the problems behind the term and definitions of Euroscepticism, before proposing an alternative way of conceptualization. Chapter 2 then reflects on the existing typologies of support and opposition on the level of political parties, while concentrating more on the single-scale models in political literature. After devising the proper methodology behind the modified and combined scale of Flood and Usherwood (2005), Vasilopoulou (2011) and the PERC model (Kocsis et al., 2012, 2014), Chapter 3 will give space for the analysis of 7 Czech parties. Here, next to the election documents a wide variety of primary sources is used, including press releases, commentaries, personal blogs and video footages. At the end of the chapter, a summary is drawn and the analysed subjects will be depicted on our scale. This will be followed by a general conclusion, where the final remarks about the applicability of our method will be given. Although Euroscepticism is a well covered in academic journals of political science, I believe that this study will bring an added value by showing a new perspective in the form of reflection and utilization of single scale typologies and thereby presenting a possible impetus to a similar research agenda in the future.

1. Euroscepticism

The purpose of this chapter is to give an overview about the main theoretical deficiency behind the term Euroscepticism, its existing definitions, and its rather cumbersome applicability. By combining the works of Easton (1975) and Kaniok (2006, 2012), I will argue that the only accurate and efficient way to apply this concept is by narrowing down its meaning to a well-defined minimum. Having reached this definition at the end of the chapter, I will explain why I wish to depart from using any form of the word Euroscepticism in the analytical part of my study altogether.

1.1. Difficulties of conceptualization and usage

Although its roots date back to the 1980s 3, Euroscepticism entered political discourse only in the middle of the 1990s. Initially, it was almost exclusively used as an expression, which focused on all kinds of opposition, critique and negative posture vis-á-vis the EU and the progress of European integration, irrespective of the fact, whether the meaning of that opposition or critique was carefully defined or was left unattended. As different scholars approached the concept from alternative angles, contradictory definitions and classifications started to appear and proliferate – a process that has not stopped even today. To explain the high level of fragmentation in the literature written about the topic, I would like to highlight three characteristics, which ultimately prove that the whole concept of Euroscepticism is not only inherently problematic, but that in many cases, it should have been used more carefully and/or avoided completely in academic journals. (Arató & Kaniok, 2009: 6-8; Crespy & Verscheuren, 2009: 381-383; Leconte, 2010: 254) Firstly, the word itself originates from British journalism, and not from the field of political or social sciences. Even though it entered those fields and acquired a tangible framework of meanings, it has never lost its embeddedness in the world of media, where its user does very rarely have to meet any standards of factuality, neutrality and preciseness. By projecting a different picture for political scientists and for the average citizens, Euroscepticism could never get rid of its unscientific, propagandistic and blurred character, and thus it could not imply the need to be properly explained outside the realm of scholarly papers. The dangers of this are apparent: there is no limitation as to who and on what basis can be called a Eurosceptic in the press, and

3 According to Harmsen and Spiering (2004: 15-16) the adjective “Eurosceptic” has appeared as a product of British journalism and was used interchangeably with the older them “anti-marketeer”in an article of The Times from 1985. Alternatively, Milardović (2009: 40) refers to another source from 1986, where the adjective is applied to Margaret Thatcher, who “was seen in most of the EEC as Eurosceptic at best”.

9 what perceptions it will induce in the target audience. This also leads us to the second characteristic, which is closely connected to the uncontrolled usage of the adjective “Eurosceptic”, that is, to the essentially normative implication of the term. Since the first appearance of this concept in everyday use, a person or a party that was associated with Eurosceptic ideas has been deliberately stigmatized and put out of the sphere of legitimate politics. (Fuchs, 2009: 10; Kaniok, 2009: 34) Up until the middle of the 2000s, opposing, rejecting or criticizing certain policies of the European Union or the direction of the integration was interpreted as a reaction against the “normal” state of art. Euroscepticism was perceived as pathology, an undesired by-product of European integration that needed to be confronted, not only by “pro-European” politicians, but by political scientists as well. (Leconte, 2010: 255) However, substantial changes can be traced in the usage of the word, especially after the failure of the constitutional process in the second half of the 2000s. Whereas political parties were often avoiding and objecting to be called Eurosceptic and thereby becoming stigmatized throughout the '90s (except for peripheral and single-issue parties), in the past 10 years even mainstream parties have identified themselves publicly with Eurosceptic positions, which clearly indicates a shift of meaning and perception of European integration. Even though this normative turn is visible in election results, especially in respect of the growing number of Eurosceptic formations of the European Parliament, reasoned critique against the EU has still not been accepted as a fully legitimate and necessary part of European decision-making to date. (Treib, 2014: 1551) The third, and from our perspective, the most relevant characteristic and flaw of the term is its inability to be objectively conceptualized. Despite the hundreds of articles, conferences and edited books written about the topic in the past 20 years, no consensus has been reached about the exact meaning of this phenomenon. Ranging from the most minimalist interpretations that considered Euroscepticism as simply a lack of support for European integration, up to very specific approaches that tried to limit its scope to the absolute rejection of the project itself, definitions had one huge fault that eventually caused the theoretical side of the research to come to a deadlock at the beginning of the 21 st century. According to Kaniok (2012: 43-44), the main reason for this failure lies in the method how these definitions were created. He suggests that Euroscepticism can only be explained once we have determined the object of that scepticism a priori. In other words, to find out who is Eurosceptic and who is not, we have to explain what kind of polity the European Union is, identify the concept of support for such an entity and only then can we move on to search for the types of opposition that exists.

The majority of the definitions and classifications have, however, failed to follow this logic and tried to grasp only the negative spectrum of attitudes, without specifying support and drawing the contours of the European Union itself. As a result, several different, yet overlapping types and versions of Euroscepticism emerged, based on what elements, institutions, policies and principles of the Union the respective authors have chosen as the object of their analysis on one hand and how inclusive their interpretation about opposition was, on the other. Some of their underlying concepts like “the EU as it is” (Kopecky & Mudde, 2002) “unqualified opposition”, or “core policies areas of the EU” (Szczerbiak & Taggart, 2003) – just to mention a few - are not only subjective and vague in meaning, but are impossible to compose the fundaments of any proper framework for further elaboration and reflection as well. (Crespy & Verscheuren, 2009) As I have found Kaniok's observation accurate in this matter, I intend to conceptualize Euroscepticism using his theoretical approach in my thesis. Therefore, our first task in the process of definition is taking a step backwards, and to explain, how the European Union can be interpreted.

1.2. Defining Euroscepticism

1.2.1. Step 1 - Conceptualizing the European Union as a political system

After presenting many possible options for describing the polity dimension of the EU, including federation, regulatory state or confederation, Kaniok identifies the European Union as a political system. (Kaniok, 2012: 37-38) Although the concept was devised by Easton almost 60 years ago, its neutral and minimalistic character on one hand, and its ability to capture dynamic processes without imposing any finality (unlike the term federation or confederation) on the other makes it a usable definition to work with in case of a complex entity such as the EU. By default, a political system has the following characteristics: a stable set of institutions for collective decision-making system; decisions of these institutions do have impact on distribution of economic resources; citizens seeking to realize their political desires through this decision-making system; and presence of continuous interaction between political outputs and new demands. (Kaniok, 2012:37, based on Easton, 1957) Even though this very simplified view about the EU does not tell us anything about the multitude of layers, inputs and outputs that compose the polity dimension, it provides a defensible and solid basis for our next step, which is the identification of support in relation to this political system.

1.2.2. Step 2 – Identifying specific and diffuse support of the EU

At this point, however, I will not continue with a minimalistic description of support that Kaniok (2012: 42) has used, but instead I will approach the concept from a broader viewpoint, using Easton's differentiation between specific and diffuse support in relation to any political system. The Eastonian method is practical for our analysis, as the author identifies support as an attitude, by which a person orients himself to an object either favourably or unfavourably, positively or negatively. (Easton, 1975: 436) As the definition incorporates a whole spectrum of attitudes, even negative ones, there is no further need to locate the meaning of “opposition” and consequently, to separate Euroscepticism from the rest of the scale, as both positive and negative positions are part of the same dimension. What can and should be separated, is the two ways in which support is understood. Firstly, by specific support Easton means the perceived outputs and performance of political authorities. In other words, it measures how decisions, policies, actions, utterances or the general style of these authorities affect one's opinion. (Ibid, 437) In terms of the European Union, specific support can be measured in relation to the decisions produced by European institutions; public speeches and performance of representatives of these institutions (members of European Parliament, European Commission, etc.), or the effectiveness of certain policies (e.g. monetary policy, the CAP, external and internal policies). Consequently, the critique of these outcomes are also considered a part of specific support, namely of its negative side. Soft Euroscepticism (Szerbiak & Taggart, 2003), instrumental Euroscepticism (Lubbers & Scheepers, 2005), policy-based or functional Euroscepticism (Riishøj, 2007), utilitarian or economic Euroscepticism (Dalton & Eichenberg, 2007; Sørensen, 2008) have all referred to this dimension of support, either fully or partially. The relevant word here is “output”, which indicates that those definitions of Euroscepticism that focus on negative reactions to a specific institutional, financial or policy outcome and the general performance of the European Union at a given time do not tell anything about the standpoint of an individual/political party towards the principles, goals and legitimacy that constitute the basic pillars of the EU's existence (the inputs). Consequently, identifying Euroscepticism as the negative evaluation of any specific decision or of the performance of any EU institution is more than problematic. The result will be a non-measurable label that anyone may get for simply voicing any dissatisfaction towards the Union. Alternatively, if the term Euroscepticism is to be used at all, it should definitely refer to a different kind of support, or more precisely, the lack of such support. This is where the

12 concept of diffuse support becomes relevant. According to Easton, diffuse support refers to “what an object is or represents” and not “what it does”. It consists of attitudes that help members of a political system accept or tolerate outputs to which they are opposed, or the effects of which they see as damaging to their wants. In reality it means, that irrespective of our evaluation regarding policy outcomes or general performance, the underlying acceptance of the given political system does not change, because we still support it for its own sake. (Ibid, 444-445) Therefore, diffuse support is more long-term, more value-based and less likely to fluctuate than specific support. If we apply the theory on the European Union, diffuse support can be understood as the acceptance of the principle of European integration on one hand (legitimacy) and trusting its institutions to “do their job” and get the preferred outcomes from them without intervention, on the other (trust). These two dimensions – legitimacy and trust - are deliberately differentiated by Easton himself, and for the better, as in terms of the EU, these concepts indeed refer to objects that should be measured separately. Following this line of thoughts, defining Euroscepticism as lack of diffuse support for the European Union could theoretically be captured from two perspectives. First of all, it means that a certain individual or political party does not support and/or rejects the principle of European integration. Secondly, Euroscepticism could also be manifested in the lack of support and/or rejection of the regime of the EU, that is, a lack of trust in the institutional structure and the belief that the current form of the Union is incapable of giving the preferred outcomes. (Based partially on Fuchs 2009: 22-23) At this point, however, it is necessary to look deeper into these definitions. While identifying Euroscepticism with the first dimension seems accurate 4, the second interpretation might cause some problems. First of all, how can we truly capture the meaning of the regime of the EU or how do we measure trust in certain institutions? Although public surveys, such as the Eurobarometer are capable of showing “levels of trust” for the Commission, the European Parliament or, towards the EU in general, these results cannot be used in our analysis, as they are left without any definition. On the other hand, the general attitude towards the effectiveness of institutions to produce the preferred outcomes is very close to the definition of specific support. Even Easton (1975, 448- 450) himself admits that empirically, trust - as the second type of diffuse support - can easily shade into specific support and therefore he leaves the task of finding appropriate measures to

4 Fuchs (2009.25) uses the dichotomy of European integration/national sovereignty as the core point at this type of diffuse support, while Kopecky & Mudde (2002) define it as the “general ideas of European integration”. In short, both of these interpretations are in line with the definition that I use.

13 make the distinction between them for further research 5. Acknowledging the above-mentioned vagueness of the whole concept of “regime of the EU”, I suggest that the “trust” dimension is not suitable for measuring Euroscepticism because of its likely “spill-over” into specific support. From this point, my focus will be on the legitimacy dimension, which, on the other hand, offers a much safer and supportable ground to build my research on.

1.2.3. Step 3 - Locating Euroscepticism in the dimension of diffuse support

As I have identified legitimacy in terms of the EU's political system as accepting or rejecting the principle of European integration, the question arises, what that principle really is. Giving an adequate definition in this case is crucial, as one of the main flaws of the Eurosceptic research so far has been a too narrow interpretation of this question, which was a result of an inherently one-sided perception about the history and finality of the European project itself. Once we start analysing the historiography of the integration, it becomes clear that the majority of the works dealing with the development of the European Communities and then the EU have simply concentrated on one single explanation about the origins and the outcome of the process: the neo-functionalist narrative. From that perspective, European integration is a linear development with the specific aim of achieving a fully integrated political union at its end point, through the gradual transfer of competencies from national to supranational level. Consequently, the principle of intergovernmental co-operation and those statesmen, who were propagating a more decentralized view of Europe with less power transferred to Brussels, while keeping the primacy of the nation state, have been stigmatized as anti-European simply because they wanted to slow down or modify the direction of the process. (Crespy & Verscheueren, 2009: 379-380) This rather limited perception about the definite purpose of the integration has left a significant mark on the study of attitudes towards the EU since the very beginning. As most of the scholars dealing with Euroscepticism have not questioned the legitimacy of this narrative (or not even mentioned it) and accepted the gradual “communitarization” of competences as the only correct way of integration, every attempt to oppose further transfers of national sovereignty or to return to an earlier stage of the integration has been seen as a manifestation of Euroscepticism. There are numerous flaws in this interpretation. First of all, both the institutional design and the political development of the Union is a mixture of supranational and

5 Kopecky and Mudde (2002: 300) have encountered the same problem in their conceptualization, where by specific support they identify “the EU as it is and as it is developing” despite the fact that support for the general regime of the EU should be considered as part of trust, that is, of diffuse support (based on Fuchs 2009: 22)

14 intergovernmental elements, which have been driving the whole process simultaneously, often through the contention of the two main institutions: the Commission on one side and the Council on the other. By ignoring those periods in the history of integration where intergovernmental institutions (the Council and the European Council) had the main role in directing the process, one will arbitrarily build his research on a biased choice. Moreover, considering the critique of the neo-functionalist and federal narrative as a sign of rejecting the whole project is not far from denying one of the key elements of every political system that has the power to make decisions: the right of disagreement and legitimate debates concerning the way those decisions are made. (Kaniok, 2012: 35, 42) In the literature of Euroscepticism, the re-evaluation of this narrative started only in the late 2000s. The scholars cited earlier in this chapter (Crespy and Verscheuren 2009, Kaniok 2006-2012, Leconte, 2010-2015) had made a significant contribution in addressing this previously unnoticed shortcoming that affected the majority of definitions and typologies to a great deal. To avoid the inclusion of attitudes that in reality cannot – based on the works of these authors – be associated with the opposition to the underlying principle of European integration, I will define the object of legitimacy dimension within diffuse support as follows: despite previous interpretations, the main principle of European integration is not the gradual and irreversible transfer of sovereignty to a centralized, European level of decision-making, but rather the very idea of giving up part of the national competences to a supranational entity and accepting the decisions of that entity, irrespective of how the decisions are made. (Kaniok, 2006: 76) Hence, the main line of division in this definition lies in the act of accepting or rejecting the existence of an authority, which supersedes that of the nation state. If we return to our initial approach, by which I intended to locate Euroscepticism on the negative side of diffuse support, we can finally identify the concept in a precise way: Euroscepticism is the lack of diffuse support for the underlying principle of European integration; a set of positions, attitudes and reactions, whose main element is a rejection to the idea of giving up parts of national competences to a supranational entity and accepting the authority of such entity.

1.2.4. Applicability of the definition

Having established this definition as the result of the logic described above gives us an advantage of clarity and simplicity, not to mention that every step and choice in the process of identification can be supported by arguments of scholars, who have not been proven wrong about the validity of their theories up to date. Nonetheless, it does not mean that this method

15 of definition could replace the existing ones in the foreseeable future, for two reasons. First of all, despite the detailed and well-argued critique of Szczerbiak & Taggart's (2001) seminal work, the vast majority of the empirical studies about Euroscepticism have applied and are still applying their definition and their division of Hard and Soft Euroscepticism. Although many alternatives have appeared in the past 14 years to tackle the obvious deficiencies of this binary typology, its “attractiveness” has remained uncontested, contrary to all efforts. Secondly, the general applicability of my definition (and of those that it was built on) is largely unlikely in a field, where the term Euroscepticism has become almost inseparably connected to any and all forms of criticism towards the European Union. Proposing a very minimalistic definition and limiting its range to the opposition of only one, specific aspect of European integration will cause confusion when any reference is made to other works which use the term in a more encompassing way. This problem is also a crucial point to tackle in case of my thesis. In this chapter I have already used the adjective Eurosceptic in a broad sense and the analysis of typologies will also require me to do the same in the fothcoming one, causing possible misunderstandings and inconsistency. Moreover, whatever definitions we might use, it must be noted that Euroscepticism not only refers to the phenomenon itself that is being studied, but also to a quasi-separate field of political science, which consequently uses Euroscepticism as terminus technicus, or an umbrella expression for all works which deal with oppositions towards the EU. Therefore, to completely avoid a wide range of ontological problems, I have decided not to use the word Eurosceptic or Euroscepticism and any definition thereof in the analytical part of this study at all. Besides the possible pitfalls described above, the very goal of this thesis itself is to test the applicability of a method that deliberately tries to overcome the shortcomings deriving from the overuse/misuse of Euroscepticism in literature. My decision does, on the other hand, not apply for the next chapter, as the analysis of the existing typologies requires me to use the expression in the following meanings: • whenever a typology is being discussed, I will use the word Eurosceptic and Euroscepticism based on the meaning that the respective author or authors have assigned them • whenever the topic under discussion has to be placed into the broader category of research which refers to the term Euroscepticism as a field of study, I will use the word in its all-encompassing sense.

2. Political parties and European integration – theories and

classifications of support and opposition

Even though public Euro-attitudes received outstanding attention in the beginning of the 1990s 6, it is no coincidence that the majority of scholars have shifted their focus towards the examination of parties. Measuring party attitudes has proven to be a more tangible and comprehensible topic for political scientists than a research agenda built on public surveys and referendum results, which cannot be considered very accurate in relation to European questions. (Crespy & Verscheueren; 2009: 378; Leconte, 2015: 253) Although attempts have been made later on to conceptualize popular patterns of opinion, most typologies of behaviour in relation to the EU have appeared in articles that analysed political parties. Since my research will also contribute to this group of works, I will move on to present the specific side of the research focusing on party-based Euroscepticism. Once again, we must clarify that there is a contradiction between the broadness of this expression and the multitude of academic works that either deliberately or by reference fall under this category. Although the research about party attitudes indeed started in the mid-1990s as an analysis of only negative postures, later works have expanded their agenda by including both support and opposition connected to the European Union. As the label still prevails for both types of works, I have also identified the research in this thesis as a contribution to party-based Euroscepticism, because it largely builds on the critique of already existing classifications, despite its broader focus. Before evaluating any of these existing typologies, it is important to note that from the moment when the first articles appeared, two main questions have started to dominate the discourse. The first was dealing with the underlying reasons and explanations for a party's negative posture (why?), while the second one was connected to the possible ways this opposition can be manifested and measured (how?). (Szczerbiak & Taggart, 2003: 5) Going through the relevant works in the field, I have identified and summarized the possible answers to both questions.

2.1. Explaining negative postures – strategy or ideology?

One of the first explanations was given by Taggart in his already cited article from 1998, where he analysed political parties of Western European states and concluded that

6 Scholars agree that the Treaty of Maastricht has changed public perception about European integration drastically by politicising the so-far purely economic character of the European Communities. (Dalton & Eichenberg, 2007: 132; Vasilopoulou, 2011: 225)

Euroscepticism – which he identified as the idea of contingent and qualified opposition, as well as incorporating outright and unqualified opposition to the process of European integration (Taggart, 1998: 366) - is predominantly manifested in protest-based, anti-systemic and extremist parties on the peripheries of domestic party systems. As these parties have little chance of gaining access to real power in government, they use anti-EU rhetoric as a tool to differentiate themselves from mainstream ones and thereby gaining more protest votes. For these parties, Euroscepticism is not more than “an ideological appendage to a more general systemic critique” or a proxy, through which an already existing ideological predisposition towards the political establishment can be expressed. (Taggart, 1998: 372) Taggart also observed that parties closer to the centre of the party systems are less inclined to show Eurosceptic tendencies, which – if such tendencies are present - are mainly a result of internal party factionalism and its influence is hard to measure objectively. His observations implied two important points for further research: 1. With the exception of small, single-issue anti-EU formations, Euroscepticism is not driven by new ideological considerations. 2. Parties at the peripheries (extreme right and left) are more disposed to Eurosceptic attitudes than central ones, which implies that Euroscepticism is not dependent on the party’s rightist or leftist orientation generally. The idea that opposition (whether qualified or unqualified) is mostly influenced by a party's position in its party system and is a result of tactical or strategic considerations is also shared by Nick Sitter, who argues that European integration cannot be interpreted as a new political cleavage (based on the Lipset-Rokkan model) that reshapes domestic party competition, but is rather a result of “politics of opposition”. (Sitter, 2002) According to this theory, as the integration process is largely driven by state governments, opposition to certain policy outcomes or measures is the privilege of non-government parties, who can use critical remarks vis-á-vis the EU when competing with the governing coalition, or can ultimately avoid Euroscepticism completely when aspiring for government participation. In this sense, not only extremist parties might take up Eurosceptic positions for strategic reasons, but pro- integration ones as well, although to a much more limited extent. (Sitter, 2002: 12) Whether and to what degree an opposition party decides to take on a critical posture towards the EU depends on four factors: the weight of the party's identity and ideology, the implications of its pursuit of core policy preferences, the incentives it faces in its pursuit of votes and the constraints of coalition politics. (Sitter, 2003: 249) Although Sitter admits that ideology has a long-term impact on a party's stance towards integration, he concludes that competition

18 between government and opposition gives a better and more up-to-date indication about a party's position in relation to the EU. While party strategy and inter-party competition can indeed influence a party's decision to take up Eurosceptic attitudes, other scholars have found a more significant correlation between a party's ideological position on the Left-Right dimension and their scope of EU- criticism. Unlike Sitter or Taggart, who described Euroscepticism as a phenomenon surpassing the traditional cleavages, Hooghe et al. (2002: 971-972) have come to the conclusion that Left/Right contestation can explain party positions on certain EU-wide policies that are connected to redistribution and market regulation. In this sense, centre-left parties are prone to support integration in social policy, unemployment policy, environmental regulation and strengthening the powers of the European Parliament, whereas right-wing formations generally vote only for further market integration, but oppose the above- mentioned, “leftist” policies that attempt to regulate capitalism. Thus, if we do not count extremist parties from both sides of the axis which are generally anti-EU, the authors definitely find right-of-centre groups more Eurosceptic than centre-left ones. They elaborate this thesis further on by stating that certain ideological dispositions on the so-called “new- politics” or materialist/post-materialist dimension7 can be used as an even more precise indication to a party’s stance: so-called TAN (traditional/authoritarian/nationalism) parties have a much bigger inclination to take up Eurosceptic positions as protectors of national sovereignty than GAL (Green/Alternative/Libertarian) parties, which are not driven by clear antipathies or defensive strategies, but rather by policy goals that do not interfere with those of European integration in general. (Hooghe et al., 2002: 975-976) However, these findings have been recently challenged in a study by Van Elas and Van der Brug, who came to a different conclusion with regard to left-right position and Euroscepticism. Having conducted a longitudinal analysis over a period of almost four decades, the authors have shown, that while during the 1970s and 1980s Euroscepticism was primarily a phenomenon on the left, the Maastricht Treaty has changed this tendency, making right-wing parties take up Eurosceptic positions as well, and transforming this linear relationship into a U-shaped one by the end of 1990s. (Van Elsas & Van der Brug, 2015: 210- 211) The fact that this change has occurred as a result of the steps taken in Maastricht indicates that new developments in the integration process can modify the attitude of the parties, irrespective of their position on the left-right scale. The authors explain this not only

7 which brings up questions related to ecology, immigration or national sovereignty

19 by describing the EU as a moving target, but also by acknowledging the same characteristic of the ideological dimension, which constantly gives both the political Left and Right new meanings and policies to focus on, as the integration progresses. With such results, the paper concludes that it is not possible to identify a clear connection between Euroscepticism and party ideology, as it may vary over time, leading to a different U-shape in different periods. (Van Elsas & Van der Brug, 2015: 211) After presenting these rather contradictory assumptions about the main driving forces behind Euroscepticism, the question remains, whether it is possible to come up with a single explanation, emphasizing the role of either party strategy or ideology. Instead of concentrating on only one or the other, some scholars have tried to integrate both elements into their theoretical approach. Taggart and Szczerbiak (2003: 19) explain Eurosceptic posture with a party's wider ideological profile and values on one hand, and the perceived interests of its supporters on the other. However, while they attribute a clear role to ideology, they also highlight the impossibility of “reading off” a party's position on the EU based only on their party families and Left-Right orientation. In other words, they still consider inter-party competition as a more influential element, while grasping the effect of ideology is rather impossible with their methodology. This was one of the main motives behind Kopecky's and Mudde's work, who deliberately devised a typology that is capable of distinguishing the effects of ideology from that of party strategy, by creating a matrix with horizontal and vertical axes, measuring these two components separately. By pinpointing the position of parties both in Western and in Central-Eastern Europe in this system, the two scholars have concluded that ideology plays the main role in determining a party's attitude towards the idea of European integration as such, but strategy can greatly influence their stance on the specific support of the EU's current and future trajectory. (Kopecky & Mudde, 2002: 319-320) Even though these two models date back neither almost 15 years already, neither these, nor any additional conceptualization has brought any consensus to the debate over the role of ideology/strategy since then. On the contrary, Mudde (2011) has even attempted to draw the outlines of two separate intellectual schools connected to Euroscepticism, which exist parallel to one another without much interaction. According to him, the so-called North Carolina School comprises those scholars that derive Eurosceptic attitudes from traditional and post- materialist cleavages, therefore putting the stress on party ideology and the above-described GAL-TAN dichotomy (Hooghe et al. as the main contributors), while the Sussex School is home to those, who emphasize the impact of a party’s position in its local party system and inter-party competition – Sitter, Taggart and Szczerbiak being the key publishers, but

Topaloff (2012) should also be mentioned here. Ironically, by the time Mudde has come up with the idea of the two schools, the discussion about the possible sources of party-based Euroscepticism has considerably lost its previous salience, which is also visible from the references that the author used in his paper: there is no article or book listed after the year 2009. Indeed, publications from the end of the 2000s onwards have either accepted the influence of both elements without further elaboration, or simply ignored the question altogether 8. As an exception, Kaniok (2006: 38) mentions in an additional factor of influence: a certain society’s degree of Europeanization. Based on this hypothesis, certain socio-political factors 9 can reaffirm or discourage the success of Euroscepticism in a specific country. Accordingly, differences between national party systems and the way a nation’s own cultural and historical characteristics are perceived by political parties have been analysed by many scholars, but to what extent these variables influence levels of Euroscepticism, has proved to be rather intangible and non-measurable. After summarizing the findings mentioned above, we can answer our initial question regarding the sources of party-based Euroscepticism, which was defined here as a broader term, covering different levels of opposition. Based on previous works, a party’s decision to take up Eurosceptic attitude may depend, to different degrees, on the following factors:

• A party’s underlying ideological background; cultural, historical, national and social values that determine its main profile, its perception of traditional and post-materialist cleavages • A party’s position in the national party system – proximity to the centre in the given system or to the extreme poles, both on Left and the Right • A party’s position in government or in opposition • The party’s opinion about the political establishment – being a mainstream or an anti- system party

To summarize it, searching the possible reasons for a party’s Eurosceptic posture did not provide all-conclusive results, but at the same time has identified a whole range of factors that can influence the type and strength of this opposition. Most of the classifications that I am evaluating have built on rather selectively chosen arguments of the ones descrbied above,

8 For the former, see Leconte’s summarization (2010: 106-111). Among other recent works, neither Fuchs (2009), nor De Prat (2013) focuses on the effect of ideology/strategy on party-based Euroscepticism. 9 E.g. dominant religion, the country’s relationship with European integration from the beginning of the process, activism or isolationism in international politics.

21 while other typologies disregard the underlying reasons completely and focus only on the manifestation and measurement.

2.2. Typologies of support and opposition – the state of the art

As soon as the first definitions of Euroscepticism appeared in literature in the end of the 1990s, there was a need to create methods by which this opposition can be measured and compared within a political system. The result was the quick establishment of numerous typologies and system of classifications within a few years' time, using different methods to operationalize and gauge support and/or opposition. Based on the logic of their approach, I have identified two main types of classifications that comprise all the relevant theories published in academic journals. The principle of distinguishing them is the nature of relationship between the sub-types or labels within the respective typology. Accordingly, we can talk about the following scenarios:

• single-scale typologies: the sub-types or labels in the typology are part of one single continuum, and there is a measurable degree of difference between them. There is no separation of support and opposition. • multi-scale typologies: the sub-types or labels in the typology cannot be located on one single continuum and/or there is no measurable degree of difference between them. Support and opposition is described by separate labels.

Apart from this method of distinction, we could also group the typologies by considering the dimension of attitudes they cover (only opposition, or both support and opposition), but I have found the connection between the labels and the existence/non-existence of a single continuum a more influential factor when comparing the results. In this section, I will summarize the most commonly cited multi-scale typologies and give an overview about their main deficiency. Since these methods of classifications have been well analysed and criticized in previous literature 10 , I will focus only on one aspect that is relevant for my research: on the specific way they conceptualized dimensions of support and opposition. Then, I will devote the next part of the chapter to introduce and propose alternative methods in the form of a single-scale typology which will be used in the empirical part of the thesis. Whenever party-based Euroscepticism is disussed in a study, the first theoretical approach that is reflected upon is the work of Szczerbiak and Taggart (2003), who set the direction of research itself and stirred intellectual debates with their typology of Hard and Soft

10 For detailed studies see Kaniok (2006, 2012) and Fuchs et al. (2009).

Euroscepticism. The reason for distinguishing between a principled (Hard) and a contingent (Soft) type of opposition was the early recognition that certain parties ab ovo reject the whole idea of transferring competences from national to supranational level and joining/being part of the EU, while others project a much milder scepticism, mainly towards specific policy areas or decisions. (Szczerbiak & Taggart, 2003: 6) While keeping the original binary division between dimensions of opposition, Conti and Verzichelli (2003) has expanded this typology with three more categories, in order to mirror the whole scale of party positions, including support and neutrality as well. Two of the added labels, namely Functional Europeanism and Identity Europeanism became mirror images of Soft and Hard Euroscepticism, as the former measured contingent support 11 , while the latter covered principled support 12 for European integration. A similar typology was devised by Kopecky and Mudde (2002: 300), who also worked with both support and opposition, but their typology went one step further and differentiated between the principle of European integration and the current manifestation of that principle in the form of the European Union. The authors explained the separation of the idea of integration from today's form of EU by using the already analysed theory of Easton about diffuse and specific support, whereby supporting or rejecting the principle is measured as diffuse support, while supporting or rejecting the EU “as it is” can be explained as specific support. Using these two dimensions, the authors created a matrix of two axes with four possible prototypes of party positions which combine the mentioned versions of support and opposition. Even though the scholars cited above have interpreted certain phenomena differently, the method they used to establish the categories - irrespective of their number – is essentially the same: they build on the differentiation between the concepts of principled and contingent support/opposition 13 . However, the problem with this approach is visible in all three cases: whereas identifying principled support and principled opposition towards integration is relatively easy 14 , the actual manifestation of contingent/unqualified/specific support and opposition vis-á-vis the EU cannot be grasped in a consistent manner. Based on the definitions that these authors proposed, Soft Euroscepticism (or Euroscepticism in Kopecky

11 There is no commitment to further integration, unless it is proved to serve domestic interests or different party goals. (Conti, 2003: 17) 12 There is claim in favour of further competence shift from the national to the supranational arena, of Federal Europe and of a European citizenship. Further integration is a fundamental party goal. (Ibid) 13 Although Kopecky and Mudde defined these as diffuse and specific support, these concepts refer to the same dimensions. 14 It is infact a binary decision between accepting the transfer of sovereignty to supranational level or rejecting it altogether.

23 and Mudde's typology) can mean any objection towards “one or more policy areas”, or towards the “current and future shape of the EU”. In that case, the question might arise, where can we draw the line between a Soft Eurosceptic party and a Functional Europeanist one, for instance? What degree or type of criticism is needed to classify a political formation as Eurosceptic, and alternatively, what degree of support will qualify as Europeanist/Euroenthusiast? To address these methodological deficiencies, Kaniok (2006) proposed a typology, which defines Euroscepticism in a precise and clear manner 15 and makes it possible to draw a visible line between real Eurosceptics and those parties that criticize certain policies or decisions of the EU. Moreover, it acknowledges the existence of both the neo-functionalist and the intergovernmental paradigm of European integration, which have been influencing the process parallelly since the very beginning, but was still completely disregarded in previous theorizations. Finally, by incorporating these two paradigms into the labels which represent support for European integration, and not opposition, the typology proved that attitudes defined as Soft Euroscepticism or Euroscepticism in the previous typologies cannot and should not be considered as a milder and softer version of principled opposition. To finish the description of the most referenced typologies in literature, I will now share some common observations. As we could see, all 4 multi-scale typologies have built their methodology on the differentiation between opposition and support towards European integration, establishing labels or sub-categories which measured either certain versions of support or certain types of opposition. Only Kopecky and Mudde's typology has the ability to merge together the two sides, but doing so has led to a bold simplification of specific support into the binary choice of being either EU-optimist or EU-pessimist 16 . Conti and Verzichelli's method grasps the differences better between degrees of support (functional vs. identity), but does not link together the categories of support and opposition in any way. Kaniok, on the other hand aims for the opposite: not to link, but to properly separate dimensions of principled support from that of principled opposition. However, building the concept of support entirely on paradigms of integration has also resulted in two broad categories where parties with very diverging Euro-attitudes can be grouped together.

15 Our definition in Chapter 1 followed the logic that Kaniok introduced in his thesis. 16 That is, either supporting the EU „as it is” or not.

Typology Measurement of positions

Szczerbiak & Taggart, principled and contingent opposition 2001-2003

Kopecky & Mudde, diffuse support, diffuse opposition, specific 2002 support, specific opposition

Conti & Verzichelli, principled support, principled opposition, 2002 contingent support, contingent opposition

principled support and principled Kaniok, 2006 opposition

Figure 1. Measurement of positions of the described non-scale typologies – Source: author

There is an interesting pattern in the way these typologies have reflected on the previous ones and how they tried to overcome the supposed weaknesses by first incorporating the broadest possible dimension of positions, only to arrive back to a more narrow interpretation in the end. The conclusion that I would like to draw from this observation is that typologies whose primary purpose was to separate a broad pattern of opinions and classify them in terms of support and opposition have encountered several difficulties which made me question their utility and coherence in empirical use. 17 Therefore, based on the critique that I presented for the described typologies, I have three final remarks:

1. Categorizing various positions towards European integration by separating dimensions of specific/qualified/contingent support and specific/qualified/contingent opposition gives the false impression that political parties are coherent units with stable attitudes (either positive or negative) which can be captured by broad and vaguely defined labels. 2. The only coherent and uncontested category of the above analysed typologies is the one which refers to a principled opposition towards the transfer of competences from the nation state towards a supranational entity. Although this position is captured by alternative labels (Hard Eurosceptics/Eurorejects/Eurosceptics), they describe the same phenomenon. Separating this category from the rest in any typology (even in a binary method) is substantiated and necessary. 3. Taking these two points into consideration, I conclude that these multi-scale typologies are only able to differentiate coherently between principled opposition and

17 It is also no surprise that other, less-known multi-scale typologies do not even include references to support, but only establish further categories for Euroscepticism. (Riishøj, 2007: 508-509; Leconte, 2010)

the rest of the attitudes en bloc, while capturing any other position will lead to problems of definition.

If multi-scale typologies indeed suffer from these shortcomings, would it be possible to overcome them by using a single scale of attitudes which do not separate opposition and support from each other, but measures them in the same dimension? This is the main question that I would like to answer in the next section of the chapter.

2.3. Single-scale typologies in previous literature

Instead of creating a system of separate categories for support and/or opposition, or establishing a matrix around two axes, the 3 typologies described in this section are using a single scale or continuum with fixed minimum and maximum points, between which various positions can be pinpointed and assigned with a label, based on the author's choice. The “oldest” single-scale typology has its origins in the beginning of 2000s, from around the same time when the previously analysed non-scale typologies were created. Although it was originally devised by Flood (2002), he later published a more elaborated version with the help of Usherwood. (Flood & Usherwood, 2005). Not surprisingly, the idea of creating a single scale came after the criticism of Szczerbiak and Taggart's and Kopecky and Mudde's typologies. Apart from the problems that we have already summarized with connection to both classifications, Flood and Usherwood highlight some additional shortcomings. For example, they state that Hard Euroscepticism “blurs the important distinction between groups which argue that their country should be (more or less) outside the EU and those which argue for a return to the status quo ante of treaty provisions which pertained prior to some modification which the groups find unacceptable” (Ibid, 3) In terms of Kopecky and Mudde's model, they value the fact that it is able to distinguish between ideology and strategy as two separate motives, but at the same time they consider it a disadvantage that the authors reduced the ideology dimension into a simple, binary variable. What the authors propose instead, is a thin and value-neutral typology, which deliberately leaves out the questions of ideology and strategy from the system and does not use any normative labels that might presuppose a negative connotation for the reader.

pushing integration as far and as fast as is feasible Maximalist towards the practical realisation of a chosen model

endorsing advance of integration, subject to remedying Reformist the deficiencies of what has already been achieved

accepting advance of integration, as long as it is slow Gradualist and piecemeal

accepting the status quo, but wanting to limit further Minimalist integration as far as possible

wanting to return to an earlier state, usually before a Revisionist treaty revision

outright refusal of integration, coupled to opposition to Rejectionist participation

Figure 2. Scale of attitudes towards European integration – Source: Flood & Usherwood, 2005:6

We can deduce from the rather vague definitions behind each label, that the authors have avoided giving any specific meaning or content on purpose. As the typology is as minimalistic as possible, it does not even imply that these categories should be used in a general way, describing only a party's overall judgment about the EU. Rather, they can be applied separately to specific policy areas (e.g. EMU or CFSP) or in combination, measuring a general posture on one hand and a specific attitude towards policy dimensions, on the other. (Ibid, 6) One of the biggest advantages of this typology is definitely the complete avoidance of the word Eurosceptic or any version thereof, thus establishing a system which does not have to deal with the definition and delimitation of this term in any way. Another positive point compared to multi-scale typologies is the fact, that it can measure the dynamism of party politics. Whereas it is almost impossible to map very specific and policy-oriented changes in party attitudes in systems where they are put into strictly-defined categories, Flood and Usherwood's scale can measure the degree and direction of these changes at different time periods. Moreover, due to the fact that the labels can be used in combination, a party may acquire more than one at the same time, e.g. being Gradualist in the broad sense – that is, an advocate of a slow pace of integration, but having a Rejectionist attitude towards the introduction of the Euro in the given country. Of course, this duality can also make the whole typology non-usable at the same time. Because, we might ask, which position is more suitable for a party, when it expresses three different degree of support/opposition for different policy areas while having a fourth opinion about the speed and direction of the integration in general. As Flood and Usherwood's classification has never been used in empirical studies for whole

27 party systems, we cannot give a proper answer to this question. A possible remedy and answer might be obtained through the analysis of another single-scale typology and the results it has brought. However, before we turn towards the so-called PERC method, a third categorization will be presented, which can be linked very closely to Flood and Usherwood's work. Vasilopoulou's scale does not measure support, but concentrates on different degrees of opposition that the author observed in extreme-right parties. Firstly she identified four aspects of European integration that these parties can oppose: a cultural aspect, including religious and historical bonds among European nations; the principle aspect referring to a the idea of multilateral co-operation within the EU framework; the practice of the EU including the institutional and policy system; and the future aspect, relating to the creation of an ever closer union. (Vasilopoulou, 2011: 229-231) Based on acceptance or rejection of these dimensions, she differentiates among three possible positions for extreme right parties.

Aspects of European integration

Patterns of Policy Future of EU Cultural Principle opposition practice polity

Rejecting In favour Against Against Against

Conditional In favour In favour Against Against

Compromising In favour In favour In favour Against

Figure 3. Patterns of Radical Right Opposition to European Integration – Source: Vasilopoulou, 2011: 234

Rejecting Euroscepticism comprises a position when there is no opposition towards the cultural aspect of Europe in general, but the party in question does not accept any type of co- operation where decisions are not made on the national level. Consequently, this type of party objects to the current status quo of EU decision-making and institutions, and any future step towards a unified European polity. Conditional Euroscepticism refers to parties, which accept the principle of supranational decision-making in a very limited form. However, the current status quo of the EU compromises national sovereignty, and therefore it is opposed. No support for more integration and a closer union is possible. Compromising Euroscepticism comprises parties which admit that certain transfer of competences is necessary for the general prosperity of the state, especially on economic areas. It also accepts the status quo of the system, while aiming to reform the institutional structure

28 towards a more intergovernmental direction. An ever-closer union is, on the other hand, not acceptable because of its essentially supranational character. (Ibid, 232-233) Even without reading the detailed definitions, we can guess the gradual character of the typology only by looking at the figure above. As we move from Rejecting towards Compromising Euroscepticism, the level of support increases, reaching its maximum with the acceptance of the current status quo of European integration. If we compare the graduality and the logic of these three categories with the first three labels of Flood and Usherwood's scale, the similarity is undeniable. Rejecting Euroscepticism matches perfectly the Rejectionist label, as both comprise positions that do not accept the basic principle of the integration that is the ceding of sovereignty away from the national level. Conditional Euroscepticism has incorporated the acceptance of this principle but does not approve of the way the EU functions; therefore it opposes the status quo. The Revisionists in the previous typology do not accept the status quo either, but since they have no objection towards the principle, the only way for them is one or more step backwards, to a stage of status quo ante in the process of integration. Finally, both the Compromising and the Minimalist categories share the same important step compared to the previous stages: the acceptance of the current form of institutional structure, or “the rules of the game”, even though they want to implement reforms connected to them. The match of Vasilopoulou's categories with those of Flood and Usherwood's has also been acknowledged by the author herself: “It is worth mentioning that the Eurosceptic patterns identified below may be seen as overlapping with Flood’s rejectionist, revisionist and minimalist categories.” (Ibid, 228) At the same time she highlights the difference between them, by reminding the reader that Flood's categories were not intended to incorporate any specific content. Nevertheless, if we remove the dimensions of the four aspects that ultimately filled these categories with specific meaning, there is still a perfect match between the respective categories and labels in the way they position themselves against the status quo of the integration. In this respect, the elemental dimension of the matching categories can be described with the following three positions:

• Position Zero : no co-operation on the principle of European integration is accepted, no participation is possible. Not strictly part of the scale itself, as no support is projected. • Position “Status Quo Ante” : the principle of the system is accepted, but but the current stage of affairs is unacceptable • Position “Status Quo Pro” : the principle of the system and the current stage of affairs is accepted, albeit possible reservations.

What we can conclude from this comparison is the fact that the first part of any scale, which measures attitudes between “no integration” and “maximum integration”, up until the point of the current stage of the process (the status quo) is possible to conceptualize without much difficulties, as these three positions will always be present, due to the character and progress of European integration. Whether the second part of the scale (ranging from the Pro Status Quo position up to the Maximalist one) has similarly pre-definable positions or not, is hard to tell, as I have found only one single-scale typology in scholarly literature which has empirical results. After introducing this typology, I will return to answering this question at the end of this chapter. The PERC method (an abbreviation for Party EU-attitude Report Card) was created by an independent research group with the purpose of describing the attitudes of political parties in the Hungarian National Assembly towards the EU. After conducting extensive studies with a detailed methodology first between 2009-2012 and then between 2012-2014, the authors have created a single-scale typology, where they have distributed the individual party evaluations and presented them separately for the two periods, making the results of the two research phases comparable. The scale itself is extremely fine-grained and meticulous as it works with 10 different types of attitudes in relation to European integration. (Kocsis et al., 2012: 25-26)

1. EU Destructive: denies the legitimacy and advantages of the EU, obstructs its functioning with all possible means. Campaigns against accession/for leaving the EU. Nationalist, isolationist, anti-globalist, anti-liberal. Does not represent itself in the EP, as participation would legitimize the institution. Would like to see the EU disintegrated, has a coherent idea about the method of this and a clear idea about the world after the EU 2. EU-phobe: For geopolitical reasons it accepts the existence of the EU, but considers it harmful for national sovereignty. Formulates the idea of a future secession from the EU. Fights against common policies, opposes the creation of new ones. Takes part in EP elections, but only from domestic political considerations. Considers any expansion of the EU as an act of imperialism. 3. Hard Eurosceptic: Accepts the existence of the EU for historical reasons, but fights against further transfer of competences. Supports only those policies which bring financial benefits, would re-nationalize the rest of them. Uses national veto, hinders unification in policy areas where its opinion is neutral.

4. Soft Eurosceptic: Accepts the existence of the EU but considers it a burden. The most important goal is obtaining the financial resources. Complies with a minimum level of Community regulations. Would re-nationalize certain policies and restrict certain basic rights (e. g. purchase of lands). Opposes the Euro, ignores the CFSP. 5. EU-pessimist: Accepts a selection of European values, but applies them selectively. Views integration from a short-term, utilitarian perspective. Would re-nationalize certain competences, inclines for protectionism. Supports only domestic taxation. Denies the necessity of further deepening. 6. EU-pragmatic: Considers the EU a power to be reckoned with. Concentrates only on “useful” aspects of the integration (cohesion funds, agrarian subsidies). Accepts certain common policies (e.g. environment protection). Does not object to the EU taking a global role. Denies the need for a political union 7. Soft EU-pragmatic: Considers the status quo of integration important. Supports further unification when it is not contested too much. Does not oppose the introduction of the Euro, yet a multi-speed EU is also acceptable. Supports the global role of the EU. Doubts the necessity of a political union 8. EU-constructive: Firm supporter of common policies, supports introduction of the Euro as soon as possible. Supports further expansion, a bigger EU budget. Supports a fiscal union. Does not consider national sovereignty as a value on its own. Criticizes the EU for excessive state control only. 9. EU-optimist: Supports a federal Europe in the future, the harmonization of common policies. Would extend the powers of the EP and end the Commission, would create new supranational institutions. Supports subsidiarity, would push the national decision-making level out of the system, for the sake of a Europe of Regions. 10. Federalist: considers the EU as a value on its own. The ultimate goal is a United States of Europe, where all powers are concentrated on supranational level. Has a coherent vision of a federal union. Its critique is always constructive.

This typology has several deficiencies, even at first sight. By establishing 10 very specifically defined labels, the authors have left any flexibility out of the method, making the whole scale practically inapplicable for multiple party systems, as there is no indication that the patterns of attitudes defined under each label will always be pursued by a randomly chosen party in the selected country. Moreover, there is no theoretical reasoning and explanation behind the creation of these labels. The authors do not substantiate the choice of any characteristics

31 covered by each category, which gives the impression of a rather arbitrary selection. Also, the names of the labels themselves contain strong normative predispositions. By using adjectives with clear positive or negative connotations (destructive, pessimist, constructive, optimist) the authors do not even try to create a value-neutral categorization, despite the well-known problems of normativity in previous typologies. However, given the nature of the NGO that undertook the research – that is, the Hungarian Europe Society -, we cannot expect value neutrality in terms of European integration, when the organization's explicit aim is to “promote the idea of a unifying Europe and common European values both in Hungary and abroad.” (Ibid, 9) Despite the numerous critical points, the reason why I have considered introducing this typology here is the extensiveness of the research itself and the rather surprising results it brought. Instead of applying the traditional method of using only official party manifestos when determining a party's position, the authors have broadened the scope of analysis by observing and analysing interviews and various media appearances in the on-line and printed press and speeches both in the National Assembly and in the European Parliament. With each of these fields and with every specific opinion (even a sentence) within these fields, the authors have assigned a number ranging from 1-10, based on the definitions above. At the end, they summarized the results and gave every analysed party an average number, which indicates their general position on the scale. By conducting the research first between 2009- 2012, then repeating it in 2012-2013, changes of party positions became visible and measurable.

Figure 4. Results of the PERC analysis illustrated on a scale – Source: Kocsis et. al. (2012, 2014) A few observations must be mentioned with respect to the displayed positions on both scales. Firstly, there is no political party identified with the extreme points (1 and 10) of the

32 continuum. In fact, it is also visible that the closest positions to the minimum and maximum of the scale (grade 2 and 9) have not been occupied either, which leads to the conclusion that principled opposition to and undisputed support for European integration in the Hungarian party system is absent. Secondly, with the exception of Jobbik (3), parties on both scales are distributed among four categories only (ranging from 5 to 8), indicating that differences in their EU perception is not as clear-cut and determinative as previous typologies have suggested. The most alarming example is the case of Fidesz and MSZP/DK 18 , where the former have been put into the categories of Soft Eurosceptics (Szczerbiak & Taggart, 2002: 14; Batory, 2008) or Eurosceptics (Péter, 2013: 34-35 based on Kopecky & Mudde, 2002) and would belong among Eurogovernmentalists as well; while the latter has originally been considered as a Euroenthusiast or Europeanist party according to the same criteria 19 . Yet, based on the overall grade they received in the PERC research (6 and 7), their attitudes towards the EU do not differ substantially. The third observation to be noted is the changing position of Fidesz (from 6 to 5) and LMP (from 8 to 6) on the second scale, which means that both parties have altered their attitude in about a year's time that passed between the end of the two research periods. Subsequently, Fidesz has acquired an equal distance between the extreme rightist Jobbik (3) and the social-democratic, traditionally EU-friendly MSZP/DK (7), while LMP has turned from the most EU-supportive political force in the sample to a position which has been earlier obtained by Fidesz. These observations are highly relevant for my research from two perspectives. On the one hand, the position of Jobbik contradicts the generally accepted assumption that radical right parties project the same type of principled opposition towards the EU; hence they should be treated as monoliths.20 On the other hand, the position of MSZP and DK defies the picture of social democratic parties supporting European integration and a federal Europe “for its own sake”. (Kopecky & Mudde, 2002: 320) Whereas these results became instantly visible on the scale above, I argue that none of the multi-scale typologies would have been capable of pointing them out, for the following reasons:

18 DK (Democratic Coalition)has been formed from a brakeaway fraction of the Hungarian Socialist Party (MSZP). 19 It is necessary to note that the original classification of these parties were done shortly before and after Hungary's EU accession in 2004. However, while Fidesz has changed a lot its rhetoric against the EU since then, MSZP and the breakaway DK has kept its traditional positive, mostly uncritical approach towards the EU. 20 Vasilopoulou's case studies about selected radical right parties also support my argument (2011: 243-244).

• Based on the definitions of Hard and Soft Euroscepticism 21 and the collected data of the research above, all of the analysed parties in the given period could be classified as Soft Eurosceptic, which would then become an empty label, inappropriate for scientific use • Based on the Kopecky and Mudde's theory, Jobbik would be classified as a Eurosceptic party, while the rest of them would occupy a non-definable space between Euroenthusiasts and Eurosceptics • Based on Kaniok's typology, Jobbik and Fidesz would be identified as Eurogovernmentalist parties, while the rest of them as Europeanists, whereas differences within the categories would become non-measurable. Moreover, even though Fidesz (5) obtained the same distance from Jobbik (3) and MSZP/DK (7) in the second PERC research, this important piece of information would not be reflected in this typology • As indicated before, Conti and Verzichelli's typology does not draw clear differences between Soft Euroscepticism and Functional Europeanism, therefore a mixture of these two categories could be applied to all the presented parties, rendering the typology rather inappropriate in the given empirical example as well

Before drawing any conclusions, I need to point out that the precise location of party positions mentioned above must be treated with caution, due to the reservations that I have previously formulated in connection with the whole methodology of the PERC model. Still, I argue that there is a clear visibility of the PERC scale's empirical advantage in showing and measuring relative proximity among Hungarian parties and their possible changes of position compared to all the multi-scale typologies mentioned in this thesis so far.

2.4. Combining single scale typologies for empirical use

The question that has to be answered at this point is whether we can reproduce the utility of the PERC scale in other party systems without encountering the described methodological problems: excessive number of categories, inflexibility, inherent normativity behind the labels, overlapping and subjective definitions. To address each of these concerns, I intend to propose a scale which combines the advantageous elements of all three single scale typologies previously presented in this chapter. As a starting point, the table below captures the positive and negative aspects of the three methods.

21 Including both the original (Szczerbiak & Taggart, 2001) and the reformulated ones (2003).

Advantages Disadvantages (+) value-neutral labels (-) no clear definitions behind the labels --> overlapping categories (+) applicable for general (-) hard to apply the labels Flood & Usherwood, attitudes and towards specific simultaniously (which one is 2005 policies as well more relevant?) (+) measures the most (-) has not been used to important aspect of integration: measure entire party systems less/more transfer of competences (+) clear definitions behind the (-) building on 4 aspects of labels European integration Vasilopoulou, 2011 (+) empirically tested on (-) measures only opposition, radical right paries while disregards support

(+) has been used twice to (-) normative labels, too measure an entire party system specific definitions with irrelevant variables (+) robust source of information (-) integrating party PERC (Kocsis et al., behaviours that are not 2012, 2014) connected to European integration (-) too fine-grained scale with 10 overlapping positions

Figure 5. Comparison of three single-scale typologies. - Source: author

With green colour I have highlighted those positive points that I consider essential to be incorporated in any new typology, while the red ones indicate those weaknesses that I would definitely avoid. To comply with these set criteria and to reach the most suitable version, I decided to combine the typologies in the following manner. The scale will comprise the six labels of Flood and Usherwood's system: Rejectionist, Revisionist, Minimalist, Gradualist, Reformist, and Maximalist. By keeping these labels, the value neutrality of the scale will be guaranteed, while the number of categories will not go beyond a sensible level of practicality and simplicity. The scale will measure one dimension of European integration, namely the act of transferring certain national competences to a supranational level, embodied by the European Union and its separate institutions. The continuum that the six labels cover will have a minimum point (no transfer of sovereignty is possible) and a maximum point (all possible elements of sovereignty shall be transferred to European level). The positions that the scale will measure are as follows.

Rejectionist: outright refusal of the principle of ceding parts of sovereignty away from the national level. No membership in the EU and/or its institutions is accepted. If the country is already a member, the Rejectionist party campaigns for leaving the EU. Co-operation between European nations is only supported in a strictly intergovernmental form. Revisionist: there is no principled objection towards the idea of giving up certain competences to a supranational level. However, the overall number of competences and the level of integration as captured in the current status quo are not acceptable. The Revisionist party aims to return to an earlier form of integration that is encapsulated in previous treaties or treaty revisions. Should such reforms not happen, the party might campaign against membership/for leaving the Union. Also described as the position “status quo ante”. Minimalist: the current status quo of integration is accepted, albeit with possible reservations. No further transfer of competences is desired. While the incumbent treaty and the institutional structure is not opposed, certain reforms might be required, including the re- nationalization of one or two key competences. Membership in the Union is not conditional, the Minimalist party does not consider leaving the EU. Also described as position “status quo pro”. Gradualist: further transfer of sovereignty to the European level is accepted, as long as the competence is proved to be handled more effectively on supranational level than on the national one. The principles of subsidiarity and proportionality are to be enforced. A federal Europe with centralized institutions is, on the other hand, not desired. Reformist: further transfer of sovereignty is endorsed. Establishment of new supranational institutions on the EU level and extending the powers of existing ones is supported. A federal Europe in the future is accepted/not directly opposed. Maximalist: Achieving a federal Europe with the majority of the competences on supranational level is desired. The speed of the integration should be as fast as possible. When modifying the original categories of Flood and Usherwood, I took into consideration the meanings behind the matching labels in Vasilopoulou's typology, which are now incorporated into the first three categories of our modified scale. This way the Rejectionist, Revisionist and Minimalist labels are filled with specific content, thereby tackling the vagueness of the original Flood-Usherwood typology, while keeping its overall minimalistic character at the same time. Among the 6 labels, the position of Gradualist and Reformist has been the most problematic in the original interpretation. The difference between “slow and piecemeal integration” and “endorsing advance of integration” was impossible to grasp and therefore had to be reformulated. Therefore, I have drawn the main

36 line between these labels by acknowledging party positions which support further deepening to a certain extent but consider national interests superior on one hand, and parties that do not explicitly object and/or support more centralization in the future and do not necessarily consider national sovereignty a value on its own. Another alteration from the original typology has been made by reducing the applicability of these labels to measure only overall attitudes, without assigning them to specific policy areas. I decided to do so because of the apparent scenarios in which a party could acquire several labels at the same time if single policies are also analysed. Accordingly, the defintions of the labels have been redefined in such a way that they can only refer to overall opinions and not to specific policy areas. After explaining what exactly this combined scale is able to measure, I find it important to state the other huge advantage of this modified typology, namely those aspects that it does not measure. Firstly, it does not measure Euroscepticism. Either defined in a broad manner or used in the minimalistic sense, this scale does not use this concept in connection to either of the labels or the party positions analysed, for the reasons that I have previously described in Chapter 1. Although the Rejectionist category clearly matches my understanding of Euroscepticism, no “levels” of such attitude can be quantifiable, because of the absolute negation that this concept implies for the whole idea of European integration. Since one of the virtues of this scale is its value neutrality, I see no reason to change the Rejectionist label to an adjective which has clear negative connotations. Secondly, the scale does not measure positions, which sensu stricto do not relate to the issue of European integration. For instance, remarks such us “The EU is destroying our national culture” might appear as strong anti-EU arguments in a speech and will most probably compel scholars to put the party into a (Hard) Eurosceptic category instantly in any non-scale typology. Yet, a sentence like that does not contain any measurable element that would indicate whether the party rejects the principle of integration itself or just criticizes the current status quo. Therefore, instead of incorporating manipulative remarks when assessing a party's position, we would only have to search for variables that truly reflect the content behind each label, reducing the scope of such research to a narrow, but well-substantiated minimum. Lastly, our scale does not measure specific support/opposition in the Eastonian sense. It means that any critique towards a policy outcome, an act of legislation or the efficiency of any measures that do not reflect the question of more/less integration or the EU's competences will be disregarded from a party's position. As a concluding remark for the practical application of the scale, I have to note that the meaning of “status quo of integration” in the typology must always be defined before any data are analysed. Since European integration is a dynamic process and each treaty revision has

37 brought about a new status quo, the scale in a longitudinal study must always be adjusted according to the given time period in order for the results to reflect the true positions of a party at two different points in time. 22 As multi-scale typologies cannot reflect on these changes because of their static categories, this aspect also stresses the practicality of this method and its worthiness for testing.

2.5. Conclusion: single-scale vs. multi-scale typologies

Throughout this chapter I have given a very detailed picture about 4 multi-scale and 3 single- scale typologies. After carefully analysing them and pointing out their strengths and weaknesses, I have arrived to the following conclusions. Repeating my observations regarding multi-scale typologies, I note once again that separating opposition from support when measuring attitudes towards European integration - be it either contingent or principled - has led to inconsistent, broad and static categories. Since the only coherent, clearly definable position in those classifications has been that of principled opposition, I argued that multi- scale typologies are unable to grasp and measure any additional attitude without facing problems of definition and practical challenges. In order to find out whether this problem can be overcome, I turned my attention to a different methodology in the form of single-scale typologies. Although the concept of using only one dimension for measurement seems to address this concern in theory, verified empirical data are not available to support this argument, as either the necessary results are missing or the obtained data cannot be fully trusted for methodological problems (PERC research). Therefore, the main question that I wish to answer in the analytical part of this study is the following:

Q1: Is the modified version of Flood and Usherwood’s typology suitable in empirical use to analyse a wide range of party positions vis-á-vis European integration in a given country?

In order to avoid being too simplified while answering this question, I have divided it into two separate dimensions:

• Q1.1: Is the typology able to show the precise position of all analysed parties on the modified scale? • Q1.2: Are the six labels in the typology sufficiently defined to avoid overlapping party positions?

22 For example, a party might take a Gradualist position in relation to the Maastricht Treaty in the 1990s, but does not accept the changes that the Lisbon Treaty has imposed, therefore it will project a Revisionist stance after 2010.

Since the spatial limits of this Master's thesis does not allow me to test the method on multiple targets, the research questions will only be applied on one selected party system, which have been chosen based on multiple criteria. The rest of this study will therefore be devoted to the empirical analysis.

3. Analytical part: testing the modified scale on the party system of the Czech Republic

3.1. Choosing the subject of analysis

There are numerous reasons why I have chosen the Czech party system as the area of testing. First of all, there is a consensus among political scientists dealing with Czech politics that the country was a unique example – both on the level of public opinion and in its party system – of a rather high level of anti-EU sentiments, already in the 1990s. 23 More precisely, the phenomenon should be rather described as “euro-apathy”, considering that it was not outright opposition against the integration that fuelled these attitudes, but instead a general scepticism that is deeply rooted in the Czech perception of their own national history. 24 Even though the consecutive Czech governments throughout the '90s have undoubtedly pursued full membership in the EU as a main objective, the prominent party of the Czech centre-right and its leader, Václav Klaus has drawn early attention for having a reserved and critical posture of the Union, first as prime minister (1993-1998), then as president (2003-2013). Compared to other Central-European candidate states, where consensus about EU membership was only occasionally disturbed by weak extremist voices from the fringes of the politics, the Civic Democratic Party's (ODS) mainstream EU-criticism was an odd phenomenon. By applying our scale on the current party system of the Czech Republic, we can find out whether such statements about Czech politics in general and about ODS in particular still apply today. Accordingly, our first research question in this section will be as follows:

Q2.1: Are the occupied positions of the political parties on our scale closer to the Rejectionist end of the continuum than to the Maximalist one?

Secondly, I chose the Czech Republic because it does not belong to the “old” EU Member States. Before the Eastern enlargement, Szczerbiak and Taggart (2002: 32) made a number of general observations regarding all then-candidate states in comparison with the EU15, and suggested that “parties taking Eurosceptical positions in central and Eastern European candidate states are predominantly on the right of the ideological spectrum whereas the

23 See Kopecky & Mudde (2002), Kopecky (2004), Péter (2013: 18-24), Kaniok (2014:1), Dostál & Hloušek, (2015: 87). 24 Since the Czech territories have belonged to larger, German-dominated empires since the middle ages, one of the basic elements of the Czech identity was a self-identification against this greater power. Events of the 20th century (the Munich Agreement, the Prague Spring ) have only exacerbated Czech fears of having no control over their sovereignty, while greater powers have decided about the nation's fate. (Beneš, 2010: 2-3)

Eurosceptical parties of the member states are more evenly spread across the left-right divide.” As these countries have been full members in the EU for 12 years already, this observation needs to be re-checked. The Czech Republic, as one of the latecomers can be an ideal candidate for testing the validity of this argument and see whether a less positive attitude towards the integration can still be connected more closely to the political right. Accordingly, our second question is devoted to this particular hypothesis.

Q2.2. Are right-wing parties in the Czech party system less inclined to support further and deeper integration than Leftist ones?

Thirdly, recent developments in the Czech party system has made it necessary to re-evaluate the results of all previous studies which have classified political parties based on their pro/anti-EU attitudes. With the emergence of TOP 09, ANO 2011, the Party of Free Citizens (Svobodní) and Dawn – National Coalition (Úsvit) as new formations, and with the radically diminishing position of ODS on the centre-right, Czech politics has undergone severe changes since the 2010 and 2013 general elections to the Chamber of Deputies. Although the new parties have been subject to scholarly attention since then 25 , there has been no general study published which measures the difference between their positions on European integration. My research aims to fill this apparent gap in literature. Lastly, apart from the timely need of presenting an up-to-date picture about the Czech political arena, there is a definite advantage of using the Czech parties as subjects, because of the diversity of ideology they present. Apart from the traditional social democratic (ČSSD) and centre-right parties (TOP 09, KDU-ČSL, ODS) a centrist-populist (ANO 2011), a right- populist (Úsvit) and a communist party (KS ČM) are also represented in the lower chamber of the Czech Parliament. A special attention should be devoted to the fact, that the Czech Republic is the only post-socialist EU member state, where a communist party has secured a stable position for itself in both chambers of parliaments and in municipal councils since 1993. Conducting our analysis in such a diverse ideological milieu might lead us to interesting findings in terms of anti-establishment and fringe parties and their perception of European issues. When choosing the actual subjects from the Czech party system, only one criterion has been set: the given party must have a representation in both chambers of the Czech Parliament in the legislative period 2013-2017. With this condition we can avoid including political groups that cannot be considered relevant in domestic Czech politics. Therefore, the following

25 Mostly in single case studies only. For examples see Vavrda (2015), Kaniok (2014).

41 parties will be analysed and classified in the rest of this chapter: ČSSD, ANO 2011, KDU- ČSL, ODS, Úsvit, KS ČM and TOP 09.

3.2. Previous research of Euro-attitudes in the Czech Republic

Existing literature about Czech party attitudes towards the EU have largely focused on the level of Europeanization of the individual parties on one side, and the general posture of parties for/against Czech EU membership on the other. (Vykoupilová, 2006: 61) Although the majority of the authors have used party programmes as the main sources for their research, relevant examples of combined approaches can also be found. 26 Classifying the parties based on either new or well-known typologies has also been done by Czech and foreign political scientists, the result of which is summarized in the table on page 39. I have modified the original summarization from Vykoupilová's dissertation so that it would include only those parties that are still represented in the Chamber of Deputies from 25 November 2013 up till now (April 2016), corresponding to the time span of my analysis. Moreover, I have extended the number of typologies with those that have been devised and used after 2006 as well. It is worth noticing, that apart from the “traditional” typologies mentioned in Chapter 2, Czech experts have come up with alternative classifications on their own, even though the overall patterns of individual party opinions did not differ significantly from the results of the old methods. The only problematic case here is the Communist party (KS ČM), which quite visibly has caused trouble for every single typology so far – a challenge that our modified typology might face as well. What is missing from this chart is the categorization of those newly emerged parties that made their way into Czech politics after 2010 and are still present: TOP 09, ANO 2011 and Úsvit. Describing the attitude of these parties towards Europe has not been done yet, except for the case of ANO 2011.27 As stated before, one of the aims of this study is to fill this hiatus in political literature that appeared after 2009, both in terms of the missing description of new parties and the re-evaluation of the results produced by earlier typologies.

26 Vykoupilová (2006) has used election manifestos and interviews with party representatives, while Havlík (2009) has combined official documents with expert surveys. 27 Michal Vavrda (2015) has meticulously analysed the position of ANO 2011 towards the EU, based on election programmes and public speeches of its party leader, Andrej Babiš.

Hloušek & Havlík, 2006 Kopeček, 2004 (based on Kopecký & Kopeček & Dürr, Marek, Šaradin, (based on Vykoupilová, 2006 Szczerbiak & Havlík, 2009 Mudde, 2002 Šedo, 2003 2004 Conti-Verzihelli's Taggart's typology typology)

Supports Pro-European Pro-European / ODS Eurosceptic Soft Eurosceptic Intergovernmentalist Soft Eurosceptic economic with reservations Intergovernmentalst integaration

Supports Functional Consistent Pro- Pro-European / Supranationalist / economic and ČSSD Euroenthusiast Europanist European Federalist Federalist political integration

Supports Functional Consistent Pro- Pro-European / Supranationalist / Not economic and KDU-ČSL Euroenthusiast Europeanist European Federalist Federalist political integration

Hard Supranationalist / Euroreject / Eurosceptic Reserved Anti- Hard / Soft Does not KSČM Anti-European Federalist – only in Europragmatist (tendency European Eurosceptic support either theory towards Soft)

Figure 6. Previous categorization of Czech parties with representation in the Chamber of Deputies since 2013 – Source: Vykoupilová, 2006: 63, modified and extended version

3.3. Methodology of the research

After identifying the subjects for our testing, the next step must be choosing the proper method of gaining the necessary data, based on which we will classify the political parties. For this task, I have chosen Leonard Ray's (2007: 14-18) and Vlastimil Havlík's (2009: 28-49) theoretical summary, who have presented 4 main approaches to measure party positions in relation to European integration:

1. Behavioural measures (analysis of the actions of political parties) 2. Textual approaches (analysis of party programmes) 3. Self-reported positions (analysis of the opinion of party representatives/voters) 4. Reputational measures (survey measuring the reputation of political parties)

All four types have their advantages and disadvantages, which makes it a difficult task to choose the most suitable method. After briefly describing the variety of tools that are available for each of them, I will make my decision based on the credibility and previous experiences of a given method. In case of behavioural measures, certain actions of a political party must be observed. There are two general ways to obtain such data: by analysing a party's membership in transnational party structures (e.g. membership in a Europe-wide party family and membership in a party fraction within the EP) and by analysing roll-call votes (either in national parliaments or in the EP.) (Ray, 2007: 17-18) However, as Havlík (2008: 33-37) points out, both methods are problematic from several perspectives, which renders their utility questionable at best. 28 In contrast, textual approaches are used extensively and without much difficulty in the large majority of academic studies. Election programmes, general party manifestos, or founding documents are viable sources for official party positions in terms of European integration. Here the question is how the information from such documents can be decoded and transformed into measurable data on one hand, and how much these documents actually resemble the party's actions, on the other. Moreover, when comparing party documents we must also decide how we interpret the differences in their length; that is whether a 50-page election programme has the same data value as a 4-page leaflet. (Ibid, 39) Self-reported positions of a party can be obtained either by measuring the opinion of a party's electorate vis-á-vis the EU through public surveys or by asking certain representatives from the party itself via interview or a questionnaire. However, in case of the first method, we

28 For Havlík's arguments see pp. 33-37 of his thesis.

44 cannot be sure whether the voters of a party indeed share the same values and ideas that the party they vote for, therefore the second method could be more useful for such a study, even though identifying the right people from within the party can also be a difficult task. The last tool we can apply is the gauging of the reputation of a party. Unlike the previous three methods, this one does not build on primary data sources, but rather takes into account the opinion of experts or the general public It means that individuals (either randomly chosen during a public survey or an expert from the field) are asked to judge the given party based on their own criteria. Although the relevance of results from general respondents are rightfully doubted (coming from non-professionals), expert surveys have been commonly used for measuring party attitudes in relation to European integration and can be considered the second most popular method after analysing party documents. 29 (Ibid, 40-48) Building on the the above-mentioned practices, I have decided to use two ways out of four to get the necessary data about the analysed parties. As the basis of the research, I will use the textual approach, which gives a firm picture about the party's official position. For that purpose, the party's latest election programme for both the Chamber of Deputies 30 and the European Parliament will be considered. To fill the contingent gap between the official position stated in these documents and the real actions of the party, I will also rely on a party's self-reported position. In this case, I will diverge from those methods that Ray and Havlík have mentioned and will choose four alternative sources. The primary data set will be composed of press releases and general articles from the party’s official website. In my opinion this specific source is able to show how political preferences may or may not change compared to the ideas laid down in election manifestos. In case the number of suitable press releases and article is too low (0-2 items per party)31 , personal press releases (if applicable) and commentaries of individual party members will be analysed. Only those commentaries will be elegible here which can be accessed from the party’s or the representative’s official webpage either directly or through a link. 32 Priority is given to the party’s MEPs, who are in direct contact with the institutions and decision-making procedure of the EU. However, relevant self-expressions from other party

29 Despite their popularity, I consider any expert survey very subjective, as both choosing the expert and the methods he/she is going to use is already a matter of personal choices, which can inevitably influence the outcome of the results 30 Although the Czech Parliament consists of two houses, elections to the Senate and the programmes prepared do not tackle European topics. Therefore, these manifestos will not pose part of this research. 31 This scenario is possible, as the analysed parties might deal with European questions very differently and might not provide the same amount of space for such news on their websites. 32 The aim is to consider only those media appearences, interviews or expressions that the party representative him/herself or the party finds relevant and valid enough to refer to them

45 members (e.g. party leader, MP, Senator) are also considered, if available. The advantage of this method is that it doesn't focus solely on one, pre-selected individual, but also takes into account a multitude of representatives who can express a multitude of views about European integration. Since the information gathered will be strictly limited to those manifestations which refer to the current stage, speed or the direction of integration and the (re)transfer of competences, the data pool will be effectively reduced by using suitable keywords 33 during the search. After interpreting the preliminary results which brought back a very concentrated set of opinions by only a handful of individuals, I have decided that a last, supplementary source shall be added to the data set in the form of a survey, which had 13 questions altogether. The questionnaire that was filled out by a high number of MEP candidates in 2014 of all our analysed parties 34 and the received answers are available on the website Volby do EU 2014 (Volbydoeu.cz). Although the majority of the issues in the questionnaire focused on specific policy areas, the question about supporting a deeper political integration and the introduction of the Euro 35 has brought interesting results to our study. The information that we gained from the official documents and the various self- expressions will be assessed in separate sections in case of each test subject, under the titles “Official election documents” and “Self-expressions by individual members”. Within each section, I will assign a label to specific sentences or comments based on their content and the criteria of our typology. At the end of both sections, one of the six classifications (Rejectionist-Maximalist) will be applied, which means that every party is going to obtain a label for the election manifestos and another one for self-expressions. The final position of a party on our scale will be determined based on the comparison of both sub-labels. The actual time period of collecting the necessary data starts at 25 November 2013 (with the first session of the newly assembled House of Deputies after the elections) and ends at 28 April 2016. As a final remark before the actuial analysis, I argue that the “status quo of integration” shall refer to distribution of competences as it is set in the Treaty of Lisbon.

33 I have been using the following Czech keywords in various grammatical cases to find the necessary information on every analysed website: „evropský, EU, Unie, Brusel, prohloubení, prohlubování, integrace, kompetence, hlubší, suverenita, národní úroveň, Euro, společná měna, federace, federalizace, volný trh, fiskální pakt.” 34 The number of candidates in case of each party: ANO 2011 (4), ČSSD (8), KDU-ČSL (9), KSČM (5), ODS (10), TOP 09 (4), Úsvit (2). 35 The actual questions were: „1. Are you the supporter of the EU’s deeper integation or do you rather lean towards the model of a community of sovereign states established on the idea of free trade, no customs, and the spread of democratic values?” and „ 7. Should the Czech Republic in the next 5-10 years introduce the Euro? In that case, should the country also join the European Stabilization Mechanism?” Source: Volbydoeu.cz

3.4. Czech Social Democratic Party (ČSSD)

ČSSD defines itself as a modern, social democratic party which advocates standard, left-wing social and economic policies. After the fall of socialism, and the separation of Czechoslovakia, the party was “renewed” 36 under the current name in 1993. (Vykoupilová, 2006: 65-66) Since that time, the party has consistently projected a very supportive view about the European Union and endorsed the country's membership up until now without any reservations. (Ibid, 73-74) Following the 2013 elections, the Social Democrats have emerged as the winning party, which now leads the coalition government under the leadership of party leader Bohuslav Sobotka. Building on the previous classifications that unambiguously put the party into categories of strong Euro-support 37 , I expect that ČSSD's final position will be between the Gradualist and Maximalist labels.

3.4.1. Official election documents

Starting with the programme of ČSSD for the preliminary election of 2013 to the Chamber of Deputies, we find two short references to European integration, one rather general and one specific. In the part where the party's taxation policy is presented, one of the points states that the Social Democrats support European initiatives about imposing a financial transaction tax throughout the EU, the revenues of which should become a direct income for the European Union. ( ČSSD, 2013: 17) Apart from this, the chapter dealing with foreign policy goals contains the following sentences: „Our national interest is to successfully continue the process of European integration. We are going to be active participants in the debates surrounding the further development of the European Union, where we shall be advocating the social and cultural dimension of European integration” . At this point we can already presuppose that ČSSD will occupy a post-Minimalist 38 position, since proposing EU-wide taxes and referring to further integration in such a positive way would definitely invoke new competences on supranational level. As a more precise evaluation from this programme could not be made, we must move on to the party's EP election manifesto. Contrary to our expectations, this document did not provide sufficient new inputs to decide the question more convincingly, either. In the 2-page leaflet only a very schematic picture is presented, mainly describing ČSSD's social policy goals that the party wishes to promote on the EU level. From these goals, two can be relevant

36 The party considers itself as a successor of the Czechoslovak Social Democratic Party, whose origins date back to 1874. 37 See chart on page 39. 38 One of the following positions on our scale: Gradualist, Reformist, Maximalist.

47 for this study. The first refers to the harmonization of taxation systems in the EU, with the aim of “strengthening our common market, to attract investors and workers and to end the exploiting tax competition among EU Member States.” (ČSSD, 2014: 2) The other point urges improvements in the regulation of the banking sector in the EU, but no further explanation is provided with regard to the means and extensiveness of such regulations. These policy preferences imply once again a post-Minimalist approach, but it is impossible to decide whether a Gradualist, Reformist or Maximalist label would be more suitable in this case. Although certain criticism of the Union can also be found in the text, it is not applicable for our analysis, as it is very general and refers to detrimental bureaucratic mechanisms, a missing democratic control and the lack of sufficient measures for social inclusion – none of which relate to the distribution of competences on their own.

3.4.2. Self-expressions by individual representatives

In order to gain a more detailed picture about the Czech Social Democrats' Euro-attitudes, I have conducted a search among the party's press releases and the personal blog articles of party members which are accessible on ČSSD's official website. After browsing through 500 press releases and 220 blog articles from the period November 2013 – April 2016, I have found 12 items that contained relevant information in terms of European integration. Two of them are press releases, which are connected to party leader Bohuslav Sobotka, current Prime Minister of the Czech Republic. The first one was issued in April 2014, after Sobotka participated in a conference commemorating the 10 th anniversary of the Czech Republic's accession to the EU. The text highlights the government's policy turn vis-á-vis the EU, emphasising that a new pro-European direction has been taken by the country's accession to the Fiscal Compact. Moreover, it is mentioned that “the government supports measures for a deeper coordination of economic and fiscal policy […] and has re-evaluated the hitherto reserved posture against the common currency and financial co-operation.” At the end the text also adds that the Czech government in general puts much emphasis on deepening and extending the integration process. ( ČSSD, 2014b) A similarly constructive position can be detected in the other press release from April 2015, where the focus is put on a variety of topics. The article reports the acceptance of the document “Concepts of the Czech Republic's politics in the EU”, which sets the government's priorities towards an active and coherent membership in the Union. In connection wih this, the following points are mentioned: deepening the internal market, actively preparing for the Czech Republic's participation in the

Eurozone and starting the necessary political debates about introducing the Euro before 2020. (ČSSD, 2015a) Continuing with the results of the “Volby do EU” survey, we can say that the answers of 8 MEP candidates to the questions regarding deeper integration and the introduction of the Euro give a much clearer picture than the analysed documents above. With the exception of one candidate, all respondents expressed agreement with the idea of deeper political integration, although from different perspectives. 39 The common currency did not divide the candidates, either. Five of them argued that as soon the Czech economy will be ready, the Euro should be introduced (Keller, 2014; Poc, 2014; Technik, 2014; Vahálová, 2014; Bociánová, 2014), one candidate did not mention any delay (Brzobohatá, 2014), while Petr Šáda (2014) did not consider the question acute because of the “ prevailing scepticism” against the Euro in the Czech Republic. Only Petr Kolman (2014) expressed a separate view by proposing a referendum about the question. Kolman’s views can be considered unique among the candidates as his answers would reflect a Revisionist or Minimalist position instead, whereas the rest do not differ from the positions we noticed before. Moving on to personal blog articles by various party representatives, we find a wide array of topics covered ranging from a general support for further and deeper integration, through promoting more effective military cooperation, to introducing the common currency. Although the arguments that the authors use in their articles largely overlap, emphasis is often put on different aspects. For instance, in the text of Lubomír Zaorálek (2014), Antonín Sed'a (2014) and Tomáš Prouza (2015) we can identify the same advocacy for joining those areas that the Czech Republic has so far avoided (Eurozone, Fiscal Compact, Banking union), while Pavel Poc and Martin Pros bring arguments specifically in favour of the common currency, and Dana Váhalová and Mr. Sed'a (in another article) raise questions about the EU's desired military capacities. In terms of the common currency, Mr. Poc and Mr. Pros attempt to address the most typical concerns driving the anti-Euro sentiments in Czech politics. They argue that the Euro is necessary for a well-functioning internal market and an independent Czech Koruna and monetary policy cannot protect the country from speculations and possible recessions. (Poc, 2016; Pros, 2015) They also share the position of their colleagues that it would be important for the country to fully participate and shape decisions of the Eurozone, which strongly influence the Czech Republic as well (Zaorálek, 2014, Sed'a, 2014) In the

39 For example by explicitly supporting federalization (Poc, 2014), shared sovereignty (Technik, 2014), or simply stating that nation states alone cannot face challenges (Sáda, 2014; Váhalová, 2014). In the meantime, Petr Kolman (2014) answered that he supports the community of sovereign states built on free trade and no customs, which rather resembles a Revisionist posture.

49 meantime, Váhalová (2015) and Sed'a (2015) ponder about the need for building up a common, European army under supranational control and the establishment of a rapid reaction force independent of the now existing Battle Groups. Both authors vindicate the proposals with the recent situation caused by the migration crisis. Contrary to these, I have found two fields, where ČSSD explicitly objects to giving further competences to the EU. Reacting to the Commission's proposal of a permanent redistribution of refugees, Váhalová (2016) raises the question, whether losing control of “who we want to let in to our country and with whom we want to live together means that we will become a mere province of the EU?” Although Poc (2016b) does not use the same harsh rhetoric, he also opposes “proposals that would pull parts of sovereignty from national level to a centralized, European stage in terms of asylum policy.” Apart from this, Roman Vá ňa (2016) states in a press release that he does not agree with the proposed European limitation on acquiring and bearing arms, which are in accordance with the internal regulations of Member States. Clearly, these positions would rather fit a Gradualist or a Minimalist party, as keeping certain competences on national level are desired. However, these two topics arose only as exceptions compared to all other areas where the Social Democrats endorsed deeper integration and transferring authority. What we can deduce from the analysis of the press releases and personal expressions is that the number of articles dealing with European Union in general is very low, and from that the number of items actually expressing clear statements about European integration and its future is extremely small. On the other hand, it is also clear that party representatives in various functions share the same ideas about the future of the EU and support further integration in the fields of fiscal co-ordination, tax harmonization, monetary policy and defense without serious reservations or eagerness to protect national sovereignty. Altough the issue of compulsory redistribution of refugees was met with serious objections, I believe that the Social Democrats’s reaction addressed rather the decision and its implementation itself than the fact of giving up this competence to the EU. Consequently, as the analysed self- expressions reaffirm the points and goals of the official documents, we can confirm that a Reformist label is appropriate for the party

3.5. ANO 2011

As an organization, ANO 2011 40 was registered first in 2011 under the name “Action of Dissatisfied Citizens 41 ”, but became a political movement that is allowed to participate in elections only in May 2012. Although the movement had barely 1,5 years to prepare for the 2013 elections, it surprisingly finished as the second most popular party, right behind the Social Democrats in October 2013. From 2014 it has become part of the coalition government together with ČSSD and KDU-ČSL, with party leader Andrej Babiš serving as Minister for Finance and first Vice Premier. ANO can be considered as a populist-centrist party, since it presented itself as an apolitical, anti-corruptionist movement, which is different from „ordinary politicans” and strives to operate the state as if it were a corporation. The popularity of the party has further risen since their first election, as the results of the EP voting indicated: ANO has reached 16,13% of the votes and ranked as first before all other parties. (Vavrda, 2015: 12-13) As a result of the party’s recent emergence, I have found only one study, where ANO’s attitude towards the EU has been analysed. Apart from the typical classifications, Vavrda (2015:71-72) has also applied Flood and Usherwood’s original scale in his thesis, whereby he located the party between the Gradualist and Reformist labels. Although the definitions in my scale are different, I expect the results to be close to Vavrda’s observations.

3.5.1. Official election documents

Similarly to the programme of ČSSD for the 2013 elections, questions related to European integration are only minimally present in ANO’s manifesto. In the chapter “Foreign Policy”, there are only two remarks which are not generally connected either to specific policies or the effective use of European fonds for various purposes. The program states that ANO will deepen and strengthen the country's membership in the EU and NATO and will become “an active, constructive, yet critical but not capricious member of the Union” , then heavily criticizes the practice of previous governments which has been “faulty, even ludicrous and above all, self-damaging at times.” (ANO, 2013) Even though this short remark does not tell anything about the party's closer position, the verbs “deepen and strengthen” and the adjectives “active, constructive” may suggest a “post-Minimalist” posture on our scale. ANO's election programme to the European Parliament offers much more input for us, both qualitatively and quantitatively. Right at the beginning the document starts by rejecting a

40 From now on, I will refer to the movement as „ANO”, following the general practice in Czech media and the party’s use of their own name. 41 In Czech: „Akce nespokojených občanů“, hence the abbrevation ANO, which in Czech language means „Yes.”

51 commonly cited anti-EU argument by saying that the EU's essence “is not the bureaucrats in Brussels, but those nearly thirty democratic countries.” A few lines later it states that a stable and economically successful European Union is a deep national interest for the country, while elections to the European Parliament mean opportunities “to bring new impulse, strength and ability to influence the shape of the EU and our country's representation within it.” (ANO, 2014) Throughout the next few paragraphs, the programme concentrates on the critique of the previous Czech governments and quality of their representation in the institutions of the EU, emphasizing the main idea of the whole manifesto: the so-far ineffective utilization of Czech membership, primarily in terms of financial resources and the severe lack of co-operation among Czech EU-representatives in all institutions. An important comment can be found in the section “European Union in the interests of the Czech Republic”, where the text expresses support for a multi-speed Europe by saying that “it is legitimate when some countries decide not to participate in certain fields of integration, based on their own will or by the inability to fill the criteria (e.g. accepting the Euro). In the expanding Union this trend might become stronger, even if only temporarily in certain cases.” The acceptance of different levels of integration for individual countries is in contrast with the idea of federalization, which would demand the same extent of participation from all members. Therefore, this remark would draw a Gradualist or a less-likely Reformist character for the party. The probability of a Gradualist position is re-enforced later on, for example by a comment that identifies the idea of a European constitution “an artifical ideological construct, which is distant for citizens” . Right after this, the party expresses its views that the EU's actions must be conducted within the framework of the three main principles 42 : conferral of authority, subsidiarity and proportionality. Prioritizing these principles suggests a clear Gradualist position as well. The document expresses a wish to finish the liberalization process in those areas where it is not sufficient enough or where full implementation has been delayed yet, mainly in the fields of services and the energy sector. Moreover, ANO suggests the establishment of a “fifth freedom” - additionally to the basic four 43 - in form of the free movement of knowledge: “it is necessary to strengthen the mobility of academic workers in the EU, attract leading scientists from third countries, build up a modern scientific infrastructure and connect universities with the needs of the entrepreneurial sector.” Supporting liberalization in general is part of the party's overall political agenda, and even though it is not strictly connected to the question of

42 Laid down in Article 5 of the Treaty on European Union. 43 Freedom of goods, services, capital and workforce within the Single Market.

52 competences, there is a clear desire to demount the existing barriers on a European level, which implies a constructive posture. In terms of monetary and fiscal policy, the programme is more reserved. Although it acknowledges the advantages of the common currency, it considers the Czech economy unprepared for giving up the Czech koruna at the moment. Waiting for the right moment for such a step is important because it is not clear yet “how exactly will the safe mechanisms in the Eurozone work and to what extent will its future form diverge from the one stated and accepted in the accession treaty by the Czech Republic.” Despite this last remark which implies a sense of conditionality in terms of accepting the Euro later on, the party expresses a firm stand not to be left out of the decisions made by Eurozone members, which subsequently affect the whole EU. Therefore, ANO strive to be as close to decision-making as possible. When it comes to fiscal competences, the party states that “a step in integration that would transfer fiscal policies from national level to the Union with all its consequences would be troublesome even to imagine, and would be in contrast with the will of the majority of Europeans.” This opinion suggests an overall Gradualist approach as well, as it does not support further integration on this specific level. With regard to foreign policy dimensions, ANO finds it important that the EU should enhance its role in the world and become capable “to contribute to securing peace, security and adherence to international law.” A concrete expression of such support is given at the end of the programme, where the party promotes the development of the European External Action Service and for its further effectiveness. To summarize both analysed programmes of ANO, we can draw the image of a party that not only supports the principle of European integration and accepts its existence, but also shows an overall constructive and active attitude towards it, with the explicit wish to let its voice heard in decision making and policy formulation. The manifesto prepared for the EP elections approaches the topic from a practical perspective, mainly concentrating on the notion of effectiveness – both in terms of representing the Czech Republic's interests and in boosting the EU's competitiveness financially and politically. However, the generally constructive approach for further integration is projected only in those cases, where an EU- wide policy solution is in accord with the perceived Czech national interest. The party's position on the introduction of the Euro or transferring fiscal competences to supranational level supports this argument. Moreover, propagating a multi-speed Europe and identifying the idea of a European constitution as an artificial construct suggests that ANO does not stand for a federal structure, where every Member State is equally integrated. These points lead to the

53 conclusion that based on the official party programmes, ANO should be labeled as a Gradualist party, for it supports further transfer of competences, but only in specific cases, without advocating a clear vision for federalization. Reference in the programme to the principle of subsidiarity and proportionality seems to confirm this thesis.

3.5.2. Self-expressions by individual representatives

After carefully going through the News, Press Releases and Blogs sections of the party's website, I have found only 4 articles that were suitable for my analysis. In order to gain more information, I extended the search for the personal websites of the party's 4 MEPs as well (accessible from ANO's website) and managed to find additional data, even though the final number of usable items is still very low: 7 articles altogether. The topics covered in these texts tackle only a handful of issues: migration, defense co-operation, support for a new Europe-wide institution and general statements about federalization. Not surprisingly, the question of defense and national sovereignty appeared together with the topic of migration crisis. Both Pavel Teli čka and Andrej Babiš have expressed the need for the EU to have its own military capacity under one command as both inside Europe and in its close vicinity serious security concerns have arisen, which only a strong and united defense policy can tackle. (Teli čka, 2015a, 2015b) In the party's press release “Steps to solve the migration crisis” the same solution is presented, with the additional support for establishing a European Defense Union with integrated defense units by 2025, which would work as part of NATO forces. (ANO, 2015) Despite the fact that these statements propose new competences for the EU in one specific area, the issue of migration has also brought comments from party representatives that are more inclined to protect national sovereignty. In her commentary, Ivana Dobešová (2016) strongly opposes any solutions to the crisis that does not respect sovereign rights of states “to decide who they accept and whom they want to help.” Moreover, she believes that the Commission's proposal to redistribute asylum-seekers among Member States and the entire way of solving the situation is a tool in the hands of certain European elites to speed up federalization. “Should we accept such a decision, we would lose control over our own territory and we would become a province of Europe. […] We need to consequently reject the federalization of Europe and support an EU of sovereign states. National parliaments should obtain more authority.” - she states. In addition, Mrs. Dobešová defines the EU as primarily an economic community, which suggests a much more negative – and a definitely Minimalist - posture against the EU than either the official programmes or the other analysed

54 commentaries suggested. Although these remarks are clearly more radical than expected, her rejection of the idea of federalization is an opinion shared by other party representatives as well. In an interview, ANO's leading MEP Pavel Teli čka answers that unlike President Zeman, he is not a eurofederalist: “It is not my concept, I do not think that it would work. There are definite areas which we can manage better on national or regional level. […] I believe that we should deepen co-operation in the EU where we alone are not sufficient, for example in the field of security or the internal market.” (Teli čka, 2016) Opposing federalism, while supporting integration in the “necessary” fields are clear examples of a Gradualist position, which largely perceives advantages of the EU still from the perspective of the nation state – as opposed to ČSSD's Reformist stance, where national sovereignty has not been part of the party's argumentation. The same pattern is visible in Alžbeta Vl čková's blog entry, where she stands for a strong and stable Europe, but adds that “we are fighting for the best conditions for the Czech Republic while strongly promoting our own interests and identity and rejecting unnecessary bureaucracy, administration, unjust laws and regulations.” (Vl čková, 2014) Answers from other MEP candidates to the survey “Volby do EU” underline the same pattern. When asked about deeper integration, Petr Ježek (2014) responded that he does not consider the process „ideologically, such as a goal, but rather as a tool.” He believes that in the next few years Member States should concentrate on a number of social and economic reforms to stop the ageing of the population, but „for that, there is no need for deeper integration.” Jan čárek (2014) also added that in certain areas, deepening co-operation is important, while in others it is not, then he referred to the principle of subsidiarity. In contrast, Indrá ček’s (2014) response was more confusing, as he envisioned 3 possible ways for the EU to be more effective: giving back competences to nation states, giving even more competences to Brussels or modifying the procedures of decision-making, which would „make the process faster but does not necessarily lead to deeper integration. This is the way I would choose.“ This last opinion is hard to classify as the candidate did not specify how he imagines such a change. On the other hand there is no general objection to deeper integration, only the belief that it might not be needed. To summarize the obtained data from self-expressions of ANO's representatives, we can confirm that the analysed comments and remarks correspond to the Gradualist position that characterized the party's official election manifestos. Even though Mrs. Dobešová's opinion could be considered as a Minimalist stance, it did not influence the overall picture of the party, as other members clearly expressed support for further integration in security and

55 defense policy, the internal market or the establishment of the office of European Public Prosecutor (Válková, 2014). Finally, a consequent rejection to federalization by these individuals is another sign of ANO's Gradualist posture.

3.6. Dawn – National Coalition (Úsvit)

Úsvit was founded in 2013 by Tomio Okamura, an independent Senator and businessman, with the original name “Dawn of direct democracy of Tomio Okamura”. One of the main priorities of the new movement was to propagate the general use of referendum, as a way of controlling “corruct politicians”. Although Dawn has performed unexpectedly well during the 2013 elections and gained 14 seats in the lower chamber of the parliament, it could not keep the same level of popularity afterwards. Accordingly, Úsvit is the only party in this analysis, which has not gained any mandates to the European Parliament in 2014. Even before and after the election Dawn has experienced main scandals, which lead to the ousting of Okamura himself in 2015 and the party’s later transformation into “Dawn – National Coalition”. (Vránková, 2015: 46-51) With regard to the very recent foundation of the movement, Úsvit has also skipped academic scrutiny so far, therefore, there is no point of comparison with previous typologies.

3.6.1 Official election documents

In the 2013 election manifesto of Dawn, there is only a short paragraph which refers to the topic of European Union: “We do not want to give up power to Brussels. We are going to protect sovereignty on the fields of taxation and budgetary policies. We are against banking socialism, against sending money to cracking foreign banks and against rampant European bureaucracy.” (Úsvit, 2013: 3) Apart from these lines, the concise programme does not refer to any specific policy or competence in terms of the EU. The above-quoted remark can be interpreted in itself as a Minimalist opinion, as it clearly objects to any further transfer of sovereignty, but does not include the revision of already ceded competences. When we move on to the party’s election manifesto for the European Parliament, instead of a detailed programme, we only find a short list of arguments, put under the labels “We are for” and “We are against”. Above the list, an introductory paragraph is enacted, where it is stated that the party does not want to destroy “the idea of the European integration of the Czech Republic”, but instead they would like to transform the EU into a “functional democratic organ, which […] respects the local and regional uniqueness of communities living in individual states.” Once we start going through the separate points listed in the two

56 categories, we will get mixed results. Despite the fact that the first point under the label “We are for” urges for the protection of Czech national identity and sovereignty, the majority of the arguments are overall constructive and express support for a common European defence policy , a strict control of food quality within the scope of the EU and „a common economic area, common scientific projects, fight against crimes and tax evasion.” (Úsvit, 2014) Supporting co-operation on the mentioned areas does imply that Dawn not only tolerates solving common problems on a European level, but actually finds it correct that these issues are not tackled on the national level. This posture definitely excludes the party from the Rejectionist group and likely from the Revisionist one as well, since new policy areas are proposed and there is no clear wish to renationalize any of the existing ones. Once we compare these points with those listed under “We are against”, we will get more mixed results, but the overall orientation of Dawn on our scale would definitely revolve around a Minimalist stance. Here, the following issues are opposed among others:

• Introduction of the Euro without a referendum, based on false facts. “We are against the mutual liability of individual EU members for the debts of other states” • “We are against the current system of subsidies, which are the sources of corruption and squandering. We want to simplify administration and reform European subsidies.” • “We are against the weakening of the Czech authorities, we do not agree with the transformation of nation states into provinces with limited powers, we do not want to be the serves of the European Union”

If we disregard the populist remarks (“serves of the EU”, “dictates”) in the text, we can differentiate between those points where the party would like reforms – such as the field of subsidies and administration – and those where Dawn does not want to give up any more competences. In terms of the common currency, there is no clear rejection against the introduction of the Euro, as long as a referendum will be initiated, however, the second part of the point, referring to the liability for another Member State’s debt, is unclear. The sentence might oppose the Czech participation in the European Stability Mechanism 44 as such, or might serve only as a populist, simplifying figure of speech. In case the party refers indirectly to the ESM, rejecting the participation in the intergovernmental treaty which has already been

44 Upon introducting the Euro, the Czech Republic will have to contribute to the European Stability Mechanism (ESM), which provides assistance to Eurozone members having financial difficulties. According to a statement by State Security for European Affairs Tomáš Prouza, this contribution might be 34 billion Czech Koruna. (http://www.ceskenoviny.cz/zpravy/sobotka-pro-prijeti-eura-potrebuje-cr-zlepsit-verejne-finance/1308829)

57 signed by the Czech Republic could be interpreted as a Revisionist attitude, since an existing obligation connected to the European Union would be reverted. Should we assess all the gained information from the official programs of Dawn, we can come to the conclusion that the question of European integration does not have a major relevance in the party’s agenda. The lack of any proper document for the European Parliament elections and the very schematic description of the overall party goals support this argument. If we build on the available information, we can notice a mixed attitude of Dawn. On one hand, there is a clear desire to protect Czech sovereignty and keep authority on the national level. The idea of a European federation is definitely out of question for the party, as it is stated in the last point of the “We are against” section. With regard to specific competences, however, Dawn does not express outright rejection to a Europe-wide solution even in such an important area as defense policy. Moreover, the party does not oppose the introduction of the common currency by default, it would only like to tie it to a referendum. The only mentioned area where we can note a clear desire to withdraw from an already agreed obligation is the “liability for the debt of other states”, which I have indirectly connected to the question of participating in the ESM. This is the only point so far where the party resembles a Revisionist approach and does not accept participation in an institution that is otherwise compulsory for current and future Eurozone members. However, there is no space provided in the documents for further clarification as to how exactly the party imagines adopting the Euro without submitting to the standing stipulations. Because of this and taking into account the rest of the points, I conclude that Dawn should be classified as a Minimalist party, as it does not express outright rejection for supranational co-operation and neither strives to renationalize competences and return to a previous stage of the integration (except for the above mentioned point). The Minimalist label is appropriate even though we have noticed a constructive, attitude in certain cases. However, since Europe-wide co-operation on the fields of defense policy, scientific projects or food quality standards is already existent, advocating these areas without an explicit wish for extending competences does not meet the conditions for a Gradualist label. Higher categorizations cannot be applicable either, as the party does not accept any form of federalization.

3.6.2. Self-expressions by individual representatives

In case of Dawn, we have gathered the necessary information from the sections of Press releases and Blogs on the party’s official website. Altogether 12 articles have been found which contain usable data for this study, revolving around the topics of the common currency,

58 fiscal control on supranational level and the federalization of the EU. Despite the number of articles, the actual number of new information has been very low, due to constant repetition of the same arguments which essentially originate from a robust desire to protect Czech national sovereignty. Accordingly, the rejection of giving up further competences to Brussels while emphasising the preservation of a sovereign, autonomous Czech state is the most commonly noted remark that we have found in 11 cases out of 12. Expressing opposition to joining the Eurozone is the second „most popular” comment and recurring element in the texts, despite the fact a high level of inconsistency can be perceived in the individual reasoning behind it. Whereas in some articles the author outrightly objects to the Euro, as it is not economically advantageous (Sámková, 2014) or the large majority of people do not want it (Škrabánek, 2014d), and because it would mean accepting the stipulations of the banking union (Škrabánek, 2014a), we can also find references to a desired referendum that would leave the question open (Škrabánek, 2014b; Úsvit, 2014b). What is more, an article has even described the common currency as beneficial for the Czech Republic in the future. (Šarapatka, 2014) In general, holding a referendum seems to be the party’s most useful weapon against giving up further competences, therefore Úsvit promotes giving the decision about the Fiscal Compact, the redistribution of refugees (the quotes) or even membership in the EU into the hands of the public. (Úsvit, 2014b, Černoch, 2015a, Úsvit, 2015) This last example, however does definitely not comply with the definition of a Minimalist position that we assigned to the party based on the official manifestos. Questioning Czech membership in the Union indicates a clear shift towards a Revisionist attitude in the qutoted press realeases and blog entries. The tendency is also observable based on the more radical rhetorics and the exclusively negative remarks concerning any chosen elements of European integration. The Revisionist label is also confirmed in case of the following comment, which was shared by Úsvit’s two leading MEP candidates: 45 “The Union has to be an area of free trade, travelling and entrepreneurship. A place, where individual states work together in a friendly manner. This is the EU that we are going to fight for.” (Samková, 2014; Škrabánek, 2014e) The same meaning can be traced in Radostová’s answer (2014) that she gave to the respective question of the Volby do EU survey. By merging together the idea of a free trade area and the possibility to withdraw from the Schengen zone 46 and from the EU in certain cases, we can conclude that the selected self-expressions of party representatives do not match the

45 Klára Samková was later recalled from nomination because of a corruption scandal. Her position as leading MEP candidate was taken by Roman Škrabánek. (Okamura, 2014) 46 In his commentary, Marek Černoch proposes leaving the Schengen zone if protection of national borders will no longer be possible. (Černoch, 2015b)

Minimalist position that Úsvit obtained earlier. Although the party’s election programmes were Therefore, the overall label of the party would be the Revisionist one.

3.7. TOP 09

TOP 09 definies itself in its statue as a conservative democratic party which originates from “the Judeo-Christian tradition of Europe.” (TOP 09, 2015) Soon after its foundation in 2009, the party became the third biggest group in the Chamber of Deputies after the 2010 elections and obtained positions in the ODS-led government, where they could lead five ministries, including finance and foreign affairs. (Lidovky.cz, 2015; TOP 09, 2016) However, TOP 09’s support has declined during the next election from the previous 16,7% to 11,9% of the votes and thus moved to opposition since 2013. (Volby.cz) On the other hand, the party achieved better results again during the 2014 EP elections and managed to send 4 MEPs – the same number as ANO and ČSSD. Despite the party’s quick rise to popularity, there has been no study conducted about TOP 09’s relationship with the EU so far, therefore we have no basis of presumptions as to which position will the party occupy on our scale.

3.7.1. Official election documents

Similarly to the parties analysed above, the election programme of TOP 09 for 2013 predominantly focuses on domestic agendas, whereas the topic of European integration does not have a high priority. Although the word “European” appears several times throughout the text, its meaning is primarily used in either a general context or referst to the utilization of European funds. (TOP 09, 2013) The only exception can be found on page 21, where the party advocates for the Czech Republic’s accession to the Fiscal Compact and incorporating the fiscal stipulations into the constitution. As such an obligation would mean the acceptance of the enhanced competence of European Court of Justice in imposing financial sanctions on countries failing to implement these rules, this step would gain TOP 09 a Gradualist label at minimum. However, further information relevant for our research could not be found in this election programme, therefore, we move on to the party’s manifesto for the EP voting in 2014. The 20-page document starts by defining the Czech Republic’s position vis-á-vis the EU and explaining how the party perceives this relationship: “A strong support of European integration does not mean that we are looking at the EU through pink glasses.” (TOP 09, 2014a) This positive, but not excessively optimistic viewpoint is further elaborated in the following parapgraphs, where TOP 09 promotoes a Europe of states and citizens, in which

Member States do not give up their sovereignty, but rather exercise them together on the level of the EU, which is directly connected to its citizens. (Ibid, 5) The last part of the argument referring to the direct connection is to be ensured - among others - by TOP 09’s suggestion that voters should already know the names of the candidates who would be nominated for President of the European Commission in advance, at the time of the EP voting. Moreover, the party puts forth the reform of the European Citizens’ Initiative, so that the Commission would be obliged to draft a legislation based on the claims of the successful initiative. The next point that the programme tackles is the question of monetary and fiscal policy. TOP 09 argues that “contributions from the Member States should remain the main and pivotal source of the EU budget. A unified European tax is logical and substantiated only in those cases when it is accompanied by an already existing common policy on the given field. We are advoocates of the idea of tax competition. Direct taxes should remain within the competences of the Member States and should not be unified.” This quoted excerpt contains relevant inputs in terms of TOP 09's Euro-attitudes. It is evident that the party considers taxation primarily as a national competence and does not plan further harmonization, except for a few areas where Europe-wide policies are already implemented. This would definitely qualify as a Gradualist opinion, as the nation state is still viewed as the main authority and there is a clear opposition for centralizing direct taxes in the EU. Keeping the primacy of national contributions to the EU budget also support this stance, as there is no desire to increase the share of direct income sources and thereby making the Union act more as a federal government. When it comes to the common currency, TOP 09 clearly acknowledges the need to enter the Eurozone once the conditions are fulfilled, but they add that this should happen only in case the Czech Republic will be prepared enough. In the meantime, however, the party expresses the wish to join the Euro Plus Pact and thereby participate in the Euro Summits. (Ibid, 6) This fact alone could be interpreted either as a Gradualist or a Reformist position, since the unconditional introduction of the Euro in the suitable moment and the participation in a non-compulsory, intergovernmental treaty which stipulates enhanced economic and fiscal co-ordination among members is a clear commitment for more integration. Another, clearly Gradualist feature can be noticed in the following sentences: “The Member States should have the final word in questions of education, culture and the organization of family and partnership relations. At the very least, the right of veto should be reserved in fields which have serious implications on the national budget, such as health protection, social policy, taxes, asylum and immigration policies.” (Ibid, 6) However, a few

61 paragraphs below, there is a slightly contradictory remark, as the party pledges not to use veto in cases when national interests are endangered and it was not possible to negotiate a more suitable solution from the Czech perspective. This statement lets us believe that TOP 09 does not intend to put the perceived national interest above a European one in all cases and is willing to let the decision of the majority prevail. Putting the two parts of the text together, we can still remain at the Gradualist label, as there is a great degree of flexibility in terms of common decision-making, despite the fact that clear limits have been drawn at certain areas to keep the primacy of national legislation. In Chapter 6 the party introduces its views about economic co-operation in more details. Firstly, TOP 09 requests that the Czech Republic accedes to the Fiscal Compact. Moreover, they consider solving fiscal responsibility on the European level necessary, because “there has to be a mechanism which is able to avert irresponsible tendencies on the EU level. They must be forcible measures, therefore we support deterrent sanctions against states that do not respect them.” (Ibid, 10) On the other hand, a few lines below it is also added that deepening integration on the field of budgetary policy cannot affect the sovereign power of states to determine the structure of their public expenses. The duality of proposing and accepting supranational solutions while strictly protecting specific national competences is traceable throughout the whole chapter. Another example for this can be found in terms of direct taxes, where TOP 09 supports the standardization of account regulations and proceedings, which would lead to the decrease of administrative burdens. On the other hand, they also pledge to protect the right of Member States to set independent rates and bases of direct taxes. At the end of the chapter, TOP 09 also propagates enhancing co-ordination of exchanging information between supervisory organs on national and European level, with the provision that “there must not be a transfer or competence from national to European organs without transferring accountability for the decisions as well.” When it comes to foreign and defense policy, we have picked two fragments from the respective chapter that is suitable for our analysis. Firstly, the document welcomes the establishment of the office of the High Representative for Common Foreign and Security Policy with the following argument: “a single voice of the Union in terms of foreign policy is crucial for pursuing common economic and political interests in the world.” (Ibid, 17) The party also proposes better co-operation between the High Representative, the President of the Commission and the President of the European Council, because a better clarity for the personal structure of foreign policy would be a cure for its fractionalism. The second comment is rather short, but nonetheless relevant: “... the EU should be able to face security

62 menaces on its own” We could associate from this sentence to the party's assent to develop the necessary capacities for the EU to act confidently without the help of the NATO and the USA. Altogether, TOP 09's points in terms of foreign and defense policy could be evaluated as a Reformist position as there is a clear desire to strengthen the already existing European institutions and capabilities and there is no mention about the limits of such competences and the primacy of the Czech interests To summarize the general posture of TOP 09 in all aspects of European integration, we would conclude that based on the official programmes, the party should be labeled as Gradualist, even though in certain cases Reformist characteristics can be also observed. As there is a strong tendency to protect national interests and sovereignty even in those areas where European competences are desired, support or federalization cannot be confirmed in the manifestos. Therefore, the Gradualist classification seems valid for TOP 09.

3.7.2. Self-expressions by individual representatives

Looking through the press releases, media appearances and commentaries that are accessible on TOP 09's website under the label “EU”, I have identified 12 items that contain the needed information for this section. The articles generally cover a wide range of topics including the Fiscal Compact, introduction of the Euro, the energy union, the EU's military capacities or taxation. The most commonly quoted representatives are the party's two MEPs Lud'ek Niedermayer and Ji ří Pospíšil, who together account for 7 of the analysed articles, while the rest of them are shared among other individuals. It is worth noting that none of the mentioned MEPs is an actual member of TOP 09, but still a high consistency can be confirmed in the overall Euro-attitudes of the representatives whose commentaries are analysed here. The only exception is the question of the common currency. While both the leader of the party, Karel Schwarzenberg, and the MEP candidates (see later) propagated the Euro and highlighted its necessity and future advantage for the Czech economy in accord with TOP 09's programme, Pospíšil would rather tie the date of introduction to a referendum. (Schwarzenberg, 2014; Pospíšil, 2014; Niedermayer, 2014c) Other than this, we have noticed only one minor difference in other policy fields which do not conform the statements in the election manifestos. In terms of a European army, Niedermayer points out that he has doubts about a unified military force, as “we are very far from it and the [currently] functioning organization is called NATO”, whereas Marek Ženíšek does not provide a clear answer but instead refers to the existing Battle Groups – which could technically not be considered as a permanent Euro-army. (Niedermayer, 2014d, Ženíšek, 2014)

TOP 09's slightly ambivalent attitude in its programme, which combines a firm commitment to protect national interests with the desire not to be “left behind” in the advancing integration process is also traceable in the presented data. While the quoted representatives explicitly support joining the Fiscal Compact and willingly submitting to strict EU-wide regulations and the jurisdiction of the ECJ (TOP 09, 2014b), they have reservations against the harmonization of taxes as this area is a clear national competence. (Niedermayer, 2014d) The same pattern is visible in case of opposing the establishment of a European Public Prosecutor' office on the basis that it would be a “centralized organ with an authority […] that diverges from the Member States' criminal law traditions.” At the same time promoting the strengthening of European competences in those policies where it is “more beneficial”, even though such steps are “not always welcome by citizens.” (Pospíšil, 2015; Niedermayer, 2015) Should we explain this tendency in TOP 09's rhetoric, we could say that the cited members and representatives support further integration in two cases. Firstly, in those areas where the majority of the Member States have already given up parts of their sovereignty, but the Czech Republic has not participated yet (e.g. monetary and fiscal policy), and secondly in fields where a deeper cooperation is in accordance with the Czech national interests (e.g. energy union, EU-wide border control). In every other case, such as taxation or social policy 47 , national competences are to be protected. (Niedermayer, 2014b, 2014c; Ženíšek, 2016) Results of the Volby do EU survey seem to support this tendency. All of the 4 candidates who filled out the questionnaire has given an affirmative answer to the question of deeper integration, but two of them explicitely stated that they are not proponents of fedaralization (Ifrah, 2014; Popov, 2014), while Czernin (2014) added that “there must be factual discussion about the parameters of such an integration.” The same positive, but conscious approach is present in the answers given to the question, whether the Euro should be introduced in the next 5-10 years: all of the candidates accepted and emphasised the country’s obligation to join the monetary union and its positive effects in the future, while they acknowledged the unpreparedness of the Czech economy at the moment and the experiences from the Eurocrisis. (Pol čák, 2014) To summarize the gained information, we can confirm that TOP 09's Gradualist position in its election manifestos are mirrored in the analysed utterances and commentaries of its representatives and are highly consistent in content. The quoted members/representatives do

47 In a television debate, Lud’ek Niedermayer noted that in areas of social policy which affect the free movement of workforce, „more Europeanization” would be needed. Otherwise, social policy in general should be kept as a national competence. (Niedermayer, 2014e)

64 not support a multi-speed integration with various levels of participation, but actively wish to go along with the majority of the Member States and promote giving up further competences as long as a supranational solution is more effective than a national one. Protecting and representing Czech interests and keeping the majority of national sovereignty is, on the other hand, a crucial point for the party. There is no desire for a more centralized or federalized European Union and the idea of such a “superstate” is also opposed (Niedermayer, 2014a, 2014d; Pospíšil, 2014) Taking all into consideration, the validity of a Gradualist classification is proven.

3.8. Czech Communist Party (KS ČM)

Analysing the position of the Czech Communist Party48 is a challenging task for two reasons. Firstly, this party is the only declared political organization in Central-Eastern Europe which has not transformed into a social-democratic party at the beginning of the 1990s and still managed to get significant number of votes to be represented in both chambers of the Czech Parliament in all subsequent legislative period so far. 49 Consequently, we have no way of comparing the attitudes it represents to those of similar parties in the region. Secondly, as the chart on page 48 indicated, this party has been the most problematic in terms of previous classifications, which have been unable to put KS ČM into their pre-defined groups without serious reservations.

3.8.1. Official election documents

KS ČM's election programme for 2013 contains only one short reference to the European Union: “Assuring equal representation of Member States in the EU's political institutions. Systematically refusing and disposing of far-flung bureaucratization and persisting democratic deficit in the EU's political decision-making.” (KS ČM, 2013: 6) Decoding relevant information from these sentences is hard, as the programme does not specify how equal representation should be implemented or how the democratic deficit must be tackled. The only thing that we can confidently state is that the party does not question Czech participation in the EU itself, despite clear desires for reforms. In this case, a Rejectionist position can be excluded. In order to get a better image of the party, we must move on to the European election manifesto from the year 2014.

48 Officially the party's name is Communist Party of Czech and Moravia, where „Czech” and „Moravia” refer to different geographical and historical units of the Czech Republic. 49 Data from Volby.cz

In the preamble of the document, the party presents its general opinion about the purpose and current stage of European integration and the position of the Czech Republic in it. It first admits that “whereas KS ČM was not in favour of the quick integration of the Czech Republic into the European structures, it has respected the will of the citizens. Therefore, we now consider it necessary to return to the meaning of European integration, to build it up from the bottom, dispose of injustices, strengthen trust in its institutions and increase so-far declining participation in European elections.” (KS ČM, 2014: 1) It is clear from this remark that KS ČM has modified its posture substantially since the time of accession and turned from an opponent of Czech membership towards the supporter of reforms, without the wish to leave the EU. Indeed, the paragraph continues with the statement that KS ČM supports a “mutually beneficial integration, but is critical towards the current form of European Union.” This critique, however, is not mainly connected to the distribution of competences and authority, but rather to the neo-liberal characteristics and tendencies of the EU, to which the party strongly objects. It goes on by saying that they promote deepening integration which contributes to the enforcement of higher social, economic and cultural rights of citizens and the advancement of peace. Based on the preamble of the programme, we can say that KS ČM does certainly not oppose the idea of integration, but on the contrary, would like to initiate reforms and supports further integration. This posture implies a Gradualist or a Reformist position at first glance. (Ibid, 1) In the first Chapter of the programme, titled “Human rights, conditions for citizens and regions”, the following points are closely connected to mentioned reform plans of the EU: • Democratization of European institutions, respecting the sovereignty of people and civic righteousness [..], to achieve a real, equal Union for citizens and states. • Strengthening the legislative powers of the European Parliament against the Commission, which centralizes power too much and lies far from the demands of citizens • Leveling the chances of Member States in the process of European decision-making, in order to overcome pressure and dominance of big European powers Evidently, the party perceives the current structure of legislature and distribution of power far too imbalanced and in favour of the more popular Member States on one hand and far too centralized on the other. However, we found no indication as to how KS ČM would like to implement such reforms or whether they would prefer a more intergovernmental framework altogether. Proposing more authority for the EP to the detriment of the Commission can be considered as a Gradualist position, as the aim is to make the EU more democratic, and

66 accountable to the national level, even though the essentially supranational character of decision-making is not questioned. In Chapter 2, which deals with the party's employment and social policies, we can find the following priorities among others: • The policy of Europe-wide minimal wages, which would bring more motivation to work and a dignified compensation based on the conditions of individual states. • To shorten the working week and working time in all Member States • To implement at least minimal standards for using health care services Although these goals are not closely connected to European integration as such, the EU is considered by the party as a tool to achieve these social goals, hence KS ČM is willing to give more competences to supranational level to harmonize and unify certain regulations in all Member States. As there is an expressed need for European solutions and these proposals seriously affect national employment policies, I consider these points as either Gradualist or Reformist. Since there is no mention of the protection of national sovereignty, a Reformist label would be more appropriate, but differentiating between these labels at this point is not clear. Concerning economic, financial and environmental policy, KS ČM also proposes European solutions in Chapter 3 in various areas. Firstly, it would like to see a revision of the the Stability and Growth Pact “in such a way that it would not be detrimental to social stability and economic growth, to deepen fiscal co-ordination and discipline.” Moreover, a unified financial framework is desired in Europe with a “fair harmonization of national taxation policies that would lead to restrictions on tax dumping and tax havens .” These regulations, on the other hand, must respect budgetary authority of national parliaments. In addition, the Communists propose implementing a transaction tax and a special European tax for huge properties and negotiating about the possibility of issuing long-term European bonds for financing development policies. Connected to banks, the party also suggests a democratic control for the European Central Bank, and a “single, public European supervision of all 8000 banks.” Here the pattern is similar to the previous points in the document: the EU is viewed in a utilitarian way, as a means of achieving certain policy goals deriving from the party's ideology. Some of the policy goals, however, are rather vague. Firstly, KS ČM does not specify how exactly it imagines the revision of the Stability and Growth Pact – by relaxing the public debt and deficit rules or ease on the terms of the Excessive Deficit Procedure. Although there is a need for revising the treaty, it cannot be considered as a Revisionist posture, because the party does not express any desire to nullify the Pact and return to any previous stage of integration, only to propose reforms. As for the rest, the idea of Europe-

67 wide taxes, tax harmonization and European supervisory organs to oversee banks imply a Reformist position, even though the second point referring to respecting national authorities could also be classified as a Gradualist notion. As for the last two chapters of the programme, we have found only two remarks that we can use in our analysis. The first one states that the power of the High Representative should be restricted when presenting the CFSP of the EU. Again, there is no explanation given why and to what extent this power must be limited and whether it means that KS ČM would like to leave more space for Member States in determining the EU's foreign relations. Should we accept the last explanation, this sentence describes a Minimalist position. The second one opposes the building up of military units within EU frameworks, because “foreign missions of the EU outside Europe should explicitly have only humanitarian and no military character.” (Ibid, 5) Once again we encounter a difficulty of interpretation, as in terms of military capacities an already existing competence of the EU becomes undesired, yet at the same time there is no clarification, whether the EU’s competences in humanitarian areas are endorsed/ are sufficient already and whether any military activity within Europe would be acceptable for the Communists. Based on the mentioned points from KS ČM’s election manifestos, we could not make a solid judgement on the party’s potential location on our scale. Although in several cases further integration is supported – especially in terms of social policy and financial regulations, references to national interests and restricting the competences of the High Representative or revising the Stability and Growth pact imply that such support is contingent and area-specific. I believe that a Gradualist label would be the most suitable for the Communist party, since the programmes have not contained any statements about re-nationalizing certain competences or stopping the integration process at all. On the other hand, the rather blurred meanings behind certain points and references such us “mutually beneficial integration” or “equal Union for citizens and states” make it hard to interpret real intensions of the party.

3.8.2. Self-expressions by individual representatives

Since I have been unable to find any press releases on KS ČM’s website which dealt with the question of European integration in such details as would be required for this study, I have moved on to my next available sources: to the press releases and commentaries of the party’s members and representatives. Most of the gathered data (9 articles or interview excerpts) originates from the webiste of the party’s two MEPs50 , while the rest has been obtained from

50 Although KSČM has 3 MEPs, I have not found any available and usable information on the website of

68 self-expressions of another two MPs. Altogether, 14 items have been used in this section of our study, not counting the short, individual answers of the Volby do EU survey, which has been completed by the 5 MEP candidates of the party. The topics covered by the quoted individuals include mainly the question of the regulation of financial institutions and general reforms in the institutional systems, including revising the Lisbon treaty and addressing democratic deficit. Unlike the parties analysed earlier, monetary policy has received a surprisingly little attention, while regulating banks was the most often recurring topic. The Communist representatives consequently supported establishing a strict control of financial markets, limiting the free flow of capital and creating effective supervisory organs of banks and a transparent system of banking on the European level. (Maštálka, 2014b; Kone čná, 2014b; Dolejš, 2014d) Although the wish to limit one of the four freedoms of Single Market could in itself be considered as a step back in integration, combined with a much higher regulation of the financial sector in general on the European level implies quite the opposite. Such a uniequivocal promotion for equipping Europe with more competences, however, cannot be traced in other areas. The rather inconsistent views about the common currency and the Czech accession to the Fiscal Compact is a good example in this case. Three of the representatives would request a referendum before introducing the Euro (Kone čná, 2014c; Dolejš, 2014b; Jane ček, 2014), while three then-MEP candidates (Maštálka, 2014d; Ransdorf, 2014; Skála, 2014) did not propose a public decision but referred instead to the premature stage of the Czech economy at the moment. Although Kone čná was in favour of the referendum, she personally considered it non beneficial for the country in the survey (Kone čná, 2014e), while Jirí Valenta (2014) outright rejected the idea of Czech Eurozone membership. Views about applying the common fiscal rules are equally fragmented: Jane ček (2014) has criticised the Fiscal Compact because “there is no organ which would control the data provided by individual member states” and because of the chance of paying high penalties in case of non-compliance, whereas Dolejš (2014c) supported the fiscal stipulations but would submit it to a referendum. Even more confusing is the various representatives’ opinion about the process and future of European integration. Based on the surveys of Volby do EU, all four candidates have expressed their support for deeper integration, although Kone čná (2014e) and Maštálka (2014d) added that they would only allow more transfer of powers on the fields of social policy and standards, while Ransdorf (2014) proposed a “free federation”, and Valenta defined himself as a “proponent of a looser arrangement, rather a sort of federalization than a concept of a union.” Returning to an earlier stage of integration or transferring back certain

69 competences to national level is opposed by Dolejš (2014b) and Maštálka (2014a), but at the same time the rejection and revision of the Lisbon Treaty (Maštálka, 2014a; Kone čná, 2014a) has also appeared in the analysed articles. To summarize the results of the data obtained from personal commentaries, interviews and the mentioned survey, we can say that the patterns lead to a very inconsistent position vis- á-vis the EU. Although deeper integration in social policies and regulations and even federalization is generally supported, participation in the monetary union, further integration in other fields (a common army, or the establishment of the European Public Prosecutor’s post) and the incumbent treaty itself is opposed. As an overall observation we can state that the sources analysed here have not brought us closer to determining the party’s Euro-attitudes than the official programmes. Representatives of the Communist party seem to consider the existence and the function of the EU truly beneficial only in terms of advocating social well- being and general peace on the continent. Because of the above mentioned reasons, a Gradualist label is the most suitable for KS ČM, however, only with great reservations, as both the official programmes and the quoted individuals have shown signs of Minimalist and Reformist positions. Still, considering the Communists’ desire to continue the process of integration on the proposed fields, the Gradualist label is vindicated.

3.9. Christian Democratic Union (KDU-ČSL)

The Christian Democratic Union identifies itself as a conservative party with roots in the Czechoslovak People’s Party, which dates back to the period of the First Republic (1918- 1938). Since 1993 until 2016, there has been only 4 governments (out of 13) that the Christian Democrats have not been a part of, which indicates that KDU is a stable player in the Czech political stage, despite their fluctuating elections results. In the current government, the party leads 3 ministries and during the EP elections they secured 3 seats in the European Parliament. Based on previous typologies (page 48), I expect that the party will take a position closer to the Maximalist end of the scale than to the Rejectionist one.

3.9.1. Official election documents

In the party's election manifesto for the 2013 elections, we can find the following thoughts connected to the EU: (KDU, 2013: 11)

• Accession to the EMU as soon as our economy is going to be ready for it • stricter EU-wide regulations for the financial sector, which caused the economic crisis

• development of police and justice co-operation within the EU, setting up the European Public Prosecutor's office for investigating frauds with European subsidies • establishment of common military capacities within the EU • EU-wide policies for research and education

All these points have the same goal – giving more power to the EU in multiple fields, be it either financial, judicial or military competences. Although there is a sense of conditionality for joining the Eurozone, the party does not question the obligation of adopting the common currency, only the timing of this step. A clear Reformist position can be captured here, as the proposed reforms advocate more unification and more effective tools into the hands of the EU, without even referring to the authority of nation states. Despite our expectations, KDU's European election programme did not offer much deeper insight about the Christian Democrats’ Euro-attitude. At the beginning of the 7-page- long manifesto, the party states that they consider the EU as an area for promoting Czech national interests, which have not been represented enough until now. Although they see certain shortcomings in the EU, they “would like to overcome in a constructive way, without leaving or harming the EU.” (KDU, 2014: 2) On the next page it continues with the following sentence: “We want a Europe which respects the uniqueness of every state and nation and at the same time solves global problems together.” It indicates that despite the general constructive attitude of KDU to pursue further integration, it does not support the EU only for its own sake and finds Czech and other national interests an important factor. The rest of the document is divided into shorter sections, on a thematic basis. Whereas the party proposes numerous policy goals, we have found only a handful of areas where a clear position on European competences can be traced:

• Civil and military missions for stabilizing countries, from where economic and political migrants have been coming • Common fight against terrorism – co-operation of police, courts and intelligence services • Establishing the European energy market, which allows for a bigger choice and cheaper energy prices • Introducing the Euro when it is beneficial for our economy, stricter economic discipline in the Eurozone, mainly by complying with the Stability and Growth Pact • Reducing or abolishing VAT in case of vital goods for children

If we go beyond these seemingly Reformist ideas, we will notice that with one exception, none of these points propose new competences for the EU that do not exist already. The party's suggestion about reducing or abolishing VAT in a certain area could be perceived as a direct intervention to national taxation systems, but otherwise these proposals can only be considered as manifestations of a Gradualist position. Since there is no desire to re-nationalize specific competences and stop with the process of integration on one hand, but there is no significant proposal for broadening the EU's authority in new fields (Reformist), either, the Gradualist label seems fitting. However, as the 2013 programme seems more Reformist in content, I could not decide about the overall evaluation of KDU-ČSL based on these two documents and will therefore make the final conclusion when additional data has already been analysed.

3.9.2. Self-expressions by individual representatives

In case of KDU-ČSL the total amount of the chosen articles, commentaries, press releases and referenced media appearances is 11 and is mainly connected to 4 individuals – 3 MEPs and party leader Pavel B ělobrádek. This has been supplemented with the results of the short survey, filled out by 9 MEP candidates. Regarding the results, we can confidently say that the attitudes of the party members are much closer to the Gradualist position than to the Reformist one, contrary to the Christian Democrats’ election programme from 2013. The main topics covered include the introduction of the Euro, defense policy, border protection and specific policy suggestions connected to social policy or fight against tax havens. Surprisingly, the question of the Fiscal Compact had not occurred even once in the analysed texts and debates and neither have we found statements about an EU-wide regulation of the financial sector or even the banking union. The most commonly mentioned concept was the principle of subsidiarity, which could be traced in all 5 commentaries of Michaela Šojdrová, one of the party’s three MEPs. Mrs. Šojdrová referred to subsidiarity in a generally positive sense when she stated that „the common policies of the EU are the CFSP, CSDP, social and economic policies, where these policies and members of the EP should respect the basic principles on which the EU has been created, that is the principle of subsidiarity.” (Šojdrová, 2014b) She has also mentioned the principle by supprting the right of individual Member States to decide about allowing GMOs in their territory, or in case of a common energy policy, where she promoted the EU’s coordinational role, but added that „the goals are the same, but conditions are different. Therefore, KDU-ČSL will protect the right for deciding about the energy mix.” (Šojdrová, 2014a). Even though it is not explicitely mentioned, the

72 same logic is visible in Pavel Svoboda’s speeches, in which he considers being part of the „hard core of integration as the highest level of Czech national interests” (Svoboda, 2014d), but at the same time he would like to deepen the integration only in two areas: co-ordination of economic policy and in the field of security without supporting the establishment of a single European army. (Svoboda, 2014a, 2014e) Views about a deeper integration among other MEP candidates have been quite distinct. Only two of the respondents have expressed an unconditional support for a deeper Union (Hladký, 2014; Ulrych, 2014), while 3 of them emphasised the importance of sovereign statehood, equality of nations and the primacy of economic co-operation (Hulicius, 2014; Heller, 2014; Málek, 2014) and one candidate answered with a definite „No” to the respective question. (Šteiner, 2014) Tomáš Zdechovský’s response was rather controversial: „Even if I was not [a supporter of deeper integration] , I could not do anything about it. Unfortunately deeper integration is already mentioned [in the accession treaty] . [..] If Europe wants to remain a leader in global economy, it has to be more interconnected and work closely together.” (Zdechovský, 2014b) From these statements we might assume that the Christian Democrats‘ posture is closer to a Gradualist one than to a Reformist stance. With regard to changing the Koruna to the common currency, 8 out of the 9 candidates have answered with an unconditional „yes“ to the question, whether the Czech Republic should enter the Eurozone and the ESM. Although Svoboda (2014e) argues here that such decision should be made by economists and experts and not by a referendum or individual petitions, in other cases he promotes adoption of the Euro, as soon as the state of the Eurozone has already been stabilised. (Svoboda, 2014b, 2014c) Zdechovský (2015) would also support postponing this step, as the majority of the Czech people are against it at the moment. Although he considers the Czech economy ready for the monetary union, this would be a „political suicide“ among such public contempt. Apart from these recurring topics, we have found proposals for enhancing the competence of the EU in the following fields: the fight against tax havens by establishing a supranational supervisory body (Zdechovský, 2014a), a collective border protection of the Schengen zone because “nation states cannot manage it anymore” (B ělobradek, 2015) or having common standards for maternity leave. (Šojdrová, 2015c) To summarize the gained results, we can conclude that the comments, speeches and proposals of the individual party members reflect a Gradualist position, for the following reasons. Firstly, the principle of subsidiarity is considered as a crucial basis of conduct in case of any EU competence. Secondly, national interests are referenced and taken into account in case of policy

73 suggestions. Thirdly, further integration and deepening is proposed only in certain fields, while the primacy of national competences in any other areas is to be left untouched. Comparing these results with those of the official programmes, I believe that the Gradualist label is the most suitable for the party in general, as the seemingly Reformist rhetoric that the election manifestos suggested could not be confirmed by real data, whereas the positions in this section have been much more informative in nature, underlying the Gradualist character of KDU-ČSL.

3.10. Civic Democratic Party (ODS)

Having emerged as the main political force and forming the first democratic government in the independent Czech Republic, the Civic Democratic Party (ODS) made sure that the question of European integration did not remain a silent taboo in Czech politics during the '90s and onwards, and repeatedly presented a skeptical attitude towards a constantly deepening and changing European Union. Although the liberal-conservative party has subsequently guarded its first or second position in the Czech party system between 1993 and 2010, the 2013 elections have brought only 16 mandates for the party in the 200-member Chamber of Deputies and 2 seats in the EP. (ODS, 2016) Since ODS has been characterized as a Eurosceptic/Soft Eurosceptic/Intergovernmentalist party by previous typologies, I expect that the party’s position on our scale will be closer to the Rejectionist end than to the Maximalist one.

3.10.1. Official election documents

The Civic Demorats' election programme from 2013 deals with EU-related questions in a more detailed manner than those of the above analysed parties. On page 29, the document describes the position of the Czech Republic in the EU in a very clear way. The party states that they do not want to irresponsibly leave the Union, “but it does not mean that we are going to accept everything from Brussels without thinking. We will assess every element of European integration through Czech eyes and from the perspective of our national interests. We want the Union to be an area of economic freedom and not a place for European bureaucracy.” (ODS, 2013: 29) In other paragraphs it is written that the Czech Republic cannot afford the Euro now as it would not be beneficial and that the Czech Koruna is more advantageous for the country in the future as well. ODS would tie the introduction of the Euro to a referendum and warns that “we do not want our elders to pay for the the Greek pensioners, who are much wealthier but have lived a luxurious life in the past few years

74 instead of sparing money.” Despite the critical voice, the party does not forget to highlight the positive features of integration, which it sees in the existence of the Single Market and the four freedoms: “Exactly in those four freedoms can we see the biggest potential of the EU's development and the greatest reserves.” Altogether, the opinion expressed in the document can be considered as Minimalist as best, for there are strong reservations against even the existing competences that the EU possesses. A more precise judgement, on the other hand, could not be made. In terms of ODS's election programme for the EP we can talk about the longest and most detailed Euro-manifesto of all presented parties in this study. The 28-page document contains extensive critique of the current state and the future of the EU. Already at the beginning, the party expresses its strong opposition to a federal Europe: “We are not afraid to stand up against the socalist-EPP majority, which constantly propagates the deepening of the integration process onwards and ignores the diverging attitude of the majority of European citizens and nation states.” ODS sees the EU as a concept for a flexible, economically open and constantly expanding unit, which leads to a flexible and variable integration. They add that this concept is in contrast with that of a unitary superstate. The programme goes on explaining this position in more details, highlighting that the Civic Democrats have been opposing the scenario of a “one-sided and rigid integration”, which is not in accord with the interests of Czech citizens. Therefore, the Civic Democrats have always opposed every initiative that was leading towards a fiscal or tax union as these would become tools in the hands of European bureaucrats for the establishment of a political union and would deprive the Czech government of reacting fast to domestic and global economic situations and secure the prosperity of the Czech Republic.” (ODS, 2014a: 3-4) Keeping fiscal competences on the national level is a stressed topic throughout the document. ODS makes it clear several times that it does not support any Europe-wide taxes, harmonized minimal wages, or unified pension systems. Furthermore, ODS clearly opposes the establishment of new, Europe-wide institutions and advocates for reducing the number of the already existing ones. The programme brings the example of the European diplomatic service, which the party consistently rejects. With regard to energy and environmental questions, the Civic Democrats object to issuing quotes for CO2 emission and other regulations that reduce the competitiveness of European and Czech enterprises compared to the rest of the world. (Ibid, 10) The question of the common currency is further elaborated in the programme. On page 13, the party states that they would like to negotiate a long-term opt-out from accepting the Euro and keep the Koruna instead

75 because the common currency would not only damage the Czech economy, but would compel the country to financially contribute to solving economic problems of irresponsible states. (Ibid, 13) When it comes to the external dimension of the EU, ODS clearly objects to a common European defense policy which would duplicate the tasks of NATO. Although the party supports co-operation in terms of fight against terrorism, such a common approach must not weaken the sovereignty of the individual states. If we assess the information gained from the two programmes of ODS, we can note that the party clearly objects to any further transfer of competences, would like to re-nationalize already existing ones and negotiate opt-outs from the monetary union. On the other hand, it supports a multi-speed integration, further liberalization of the Single Market, and in general to return to the idea of free trade, without overwhelming bureaucracy and regulations. Since the Civic Democrats specifically state that they would not like to exit the EU, only to implement serious reforms, we can rule out the ODS as a Rejectionist party. However, several parts in their programme points to the fact that the party does not accept the current form of integration and would like to return to the idea of pure economic co-operation, based on the idea of liberalization and deregulation. This posture undoubtedly makes us label ODS as a Revisionist party at this point.

3.10.2. Self-expressions by individual representatives

In case of the Civic Democratic Party, we had no difficulty to find the necessary amount of relevant data on the official website. The topic of European integration is fairly important in ODS’s rhetoric, which is visible from the fact that we did not have to relate to personal blog entries, as the 12 press releases and the filled surveys of the 10 prospective MEPs proved to be sufficient. The range of issues that the chosen texts cover is the most extensive from all subjects in this study, as almost every policy area and aspect of integration has been mentioned at least once: energy union, fiscal policy, monetary union, foreign and defence co- operation, internal market, and the purpose of the EU in general. The results here are remarkable for one more reason: it is visible that – bearing in mind the limits of our data set - the representatives of ODS have the most coherent visions about the purpose and desired shape of European integration from all analysed political parties in this study. Indeed, a good demonstration of this can be seen in the answers of the 10 MEP candidates for the question about deeper integration in the survey. In every case, the idea of a community of sovereign states is propagated, which is established solely on the principles of the four freedoms, but any further integration, especially the concept of a federation or centralization is outright

76 rejected. Surprisingly, in terms of the Euro, the responses have shown rather contradictory results. Although none of the candidates would like to change the Koruna to Euro in the next 5-10 years, their long-term perspectives differ greatly: three of the respondents would tie it to a referendum (Zahradil, 2014c; Tošenovský, 2014b; Tryl čová, 2014b), four would like to negotiate an opt-out and not enter the Eurozone at all (Kropá čová, 2014; Stárek, 2014; Kollman, 2014b; Vlasák, 2014), while the remaining three want to have the Eurozone stabilized first, but no clear answer is provided to further steps after that. (Hynek, 2014; Ku čera, 2014; Benda, 2014) Interestingly, these inputs indicate that the respondents do not necessarily share the complex official position of ODS, which constantly demands the Czech government to negotiate a permanent opt-out from joining the monetary union on one hand, campaigns for keeping the Koruna and saying “no” to the Euro in both the official documents and press releases, and would like to leave the final decision to the Czech citizens at the same time. (ODS, 2014c; Zahradil 2013a, 2014a, 2014b) The uncertainty behind the answers might indicate that the long-term position of the party in this question is still not as clear and consistent as the short-term ones. In terms of the other recurring topics, it would be much easier to describe what the party supports than what it opposes, since ODS’s opinion about any transfer of further competences to the EU is generally negative, as the examples of rejecting the banking union, the Single European Sky project, any attempts for common fiscal regulations, common border control, immigration or energy policy or the case of the European Public Prosecutor suggests. (Zahradil, 2013b, 2014b, 2014c; ODS, 2014b; Skope ček, 2014; Fiala, 2016, Grulich, 2016) In accordance with the points in the party’s official documents, the only areas where the Civic Democrats use a constructive, positive voice is the field of economic integration and the Single Market, which they consider the biggest achievement of the European project and therefore demand to return back to this stage of integration. (Van ěk, 2014a, 2014b; Kollmann, 2014a; Tryl čová, 2014a) Logically the question arises, how the party members wish to proceed at this point, when the EU no longer can be considered as an economic project only. Based on the collected answers, only one option is envisioned: the EU must return certain competences to the national states, cut back on its legislation and establish a flexible, multi- speed integration. (Van ěk, 2014a, Zmrazilová, 2014; Zahradil, 2016) Although we have found

77 one reference to a possible referendum with a vague explanation,51 party leader Petr Fiala (2014b) clearly expressed that “we do not see and neither seek any road outside the EU, but we would like to actively shape the EU and realize our expectations.” To summarize the analysed data, we can reaffirm the Revisionist position of the Civic Democratic Party. Despite minor inconsistencies in the MEP candidates’ answers regarding the Euro, the opinions reflected in the press releases, interviews and public appearances comply with the programme points of ODS’s election manifestos. The party and its members consequently oppose the current form of the European Union and would like to return to an earlier stage of integration, where supranational authorities have power only in those areas where regulating the four freedoms are necessary. On the other other hand, there is no desire to leave the EU and look for an alternative form of integration. Instead, the reforms must be implemented from within. Thus, we can say with high certainty that the Revisionist label is accurate.

3.11. Summary

Throughout the previous pages, 7 Czech parties have been studied, using a wide range of data. Before we move on to assess the results of the individual subjects, some general observations about the research itself and the available sources should be made. First of all, with regard to the official party documents we can conclusively state that questions of European integration and the EU in general have played a very marginal role in the election programmes that were devised for the 2013 preliminary election to the Chamber of Deputies. In each case the maximum space provided for such topics have not exceeded one, maximum two paragraphs in the whole text, whereas examples of only two sentences could also be found 52 . In terms of the EP programmes that the parties presented, such a general statement could not be made, but huge differences in length, detailedness and the nature of covered topics suggest that European integration has different levels of significance in these parties’ perception. With regard to the press releases and other alternative sources, this last remark is even more valid. Even though the overall number of analysed items in case of every party has been very similar 53 , the distribution of the self-expressions based on their sources has been very different. While ODS and Dawn provided ample data set in the form of press releases, the rest

51 “Basically when someone realizes that membership in a group is no longer an advantage, they have the right to leave it.” (Vaněk, 2014b) 52 ODS can be mentioned as an example, since the party dealt with EU-connected topics quite extensively. 53 From approx. 150-200 items altogether the number for each party is as follows: ČSSD (12), ANO (7), Dawn (12), TOP 09 (12), KSČM (14), KDU-ČSL (11), ODS (12)

78 of the test subjects did not devote much space for questions of European integration on their websites. Accordingly, the missing information had to be filled from personal blogs and other sources. Since the scope of the research has deliberately concentrated only on a very specific pool of potential data, I expected the sources to be limited in numbers, but not as much as the final results have brought. My conclusion for any further use of this typology in the future is that an even wider range of sources should be included, in order to overcome the scarcity of usable data. Continuing with the summary of the results, we can note that from the 7 analysed subjects, the typology has identified 1 Reformist party ( ČSSD), 4 Gradualist parties (ANO 2011, KDU-ČSL, TOP 09, KS ČM) and 2 Revisionist parties (ODS, Úsvit).

Figure 7 – Party positions on the modified scale of Flood-Ushwerood

I would like to make the following observations regarding the position of the parties. First of all, there are no subjects on any extreme poles of the scale, which indicates that European integration is not perceived by these parties as a process that should be either opposed completely or endorsed without questioning its direction and speed. Secondly, it is visible that 5 of the 7 subjects are relatively closer to the Maximalist end of the scale than to the Rejectionist one, which implies that our first specific research question has been answered the following way.

Q2.1: Are the occupied positions of the political parties on our scale closer to the Rejectionist end of the continuum than to the Maximalist one?

We can state that the majority of the analysed Czech parties have conclusively presented a very pro-integrationist approach, which means that presumptions about an inherently negative Czech political sphere do not seem to have validity. From the obtained results, another pattern can be noticed, which relates to our second specific research question:

Q2.2. Are right-wing parties in the Czech party system less inclined to support further and deeper integration than Leftist ones?

From the party positions on the scale we can see that there is no correlation between the obtained label and the ideological predisposition of the analysed subjects. On the contrary, parties associated with a Gradualist label cover a wide spectrum from the extreme left (KS ČM) through liberal-centrist (ANO 2011) to centre-right (TOP 09, KDU-ČSL). At the same time ODS, which identifies itself as a liberal conservative party, took the same position as the radical populist Dawn. Although general conclusions should not be made, it has been shown within the scope of our study that a party’s attitude vis-á-vis the EU cannot be traced back to its ideological background, as the fragmented scene of Czech centre-right suggests. As a final remark at the end of this chapter, I would like to highlight the empty position of Minimalists. As no subjects have gained this label, it seems reasonable to say that the topic of European integration has polarized political parties in the Czech Republic. The visible gap between Revisionists and the rest of the scale (see Figure 7) indicates that according to all 7 subjects, the current status quo of integration has to change – either to move gradually forward in certain areas or step backwards in favour of returning competences to the nation states.

Conclusion

With its extensiveness, complexity and historical significance, European integration is not a phenomenon that can be captured within the pure dichotomy of support and opposition. Throughout the pages of my work I have tried to highlight how various polemical definitions and theories attempted to separate these dimensions and explain the negative side of these attitudes by using the term of Euroscepticism. Despite the fact that the concept itself has become increasingly intangible and unspecific, its occurrence in political science literature has not decreased. On the contrary, measuring party attitudes towards the European Union is still primarily conducted with the help of typologies that work with distinct concepts of opposition and were created more than a decade ago. One of the main purposes of this thesis was first to reveal certain deficiencies that these classifications entailed and to shed light on an alternative approach that has been largely ignored in academic papers so-far. Although I have identified a number of theoretical advantages of using a single, gradual scale to measure party attitudes, lack of empirical data has made it impossible to support these arguments in reality. By modifying an existing, but so far untested single-scale typology, I set forth the second aim of my study, that is, to verify the applicability of this method on a chosen party system. The research question that I proposed here was the following:

Q1: Is the modified version of Flood and Usherwood’s typology suitable in empirical use to analyse a wide range of party positions vis-á-vis European integration in a given country?

In order to provide a proper answer, I will attend to two components that underline the question. • Q1.1: Is the typology able to show the precise position of all analysed parties on the modified scale? As it has been proven in the analysis of the Czech political parties, all 7 subjects could be placed on the scale to a specific position, although in case of one party, serious reservations have been made. KS ČM has presented both in its programmes and in the self-expressions of its members a high level of inconsistency. From the example of the Communist party we can presume that the scale would have the same difficulties with parties that consider the EU only as a conduit to reach specific policy goals or have a concept of integration 54 which is not measurable in the dimension that this typology is based on (the level of integration itself).

54 In case of KSČM, it was the concept of a „peaceful, social, ecologic and democratic Europe”.

• Q1.2: Are the six labels in the typology sufficiently defined to avoid overlapping party positions? Although we have encountered situations when it was not clear, whether a Gradualist or a Reformist label should be used, by acquiring more data the question has been settled in all cases. It must be admitted that the difference between these two categories is indeed more difficult to grasp than in case of the rest of the scale. Although I have tried to overcome this deficieny in Flood and Usherwood’s original typology by re-defining both categories, it seems that further empirical results will be needed to determine the question. Despite the described weaknesses, I believe that the typology has delivered the expectations that I attached to it and brought insights to the Czech party system that have not been visible in previous analyses, due to the recent emergence of new political parties and the different way of measurement of previous typologies. Naturally, one example from one specific country is not sufficient to ensure the general applicability of our scale. To confirm these results, more tests would be required in the future on multiple party systems, with the inclusion of a wider source of data. Indeed, the availability of relevant inputs proved to be the biggest obstacle in the case of this study as well. Even though the greatest advantage of measuring the core dimension of European integration 55 is that the data set can be substantially reduced, finding that information requires a highly meticulous approach and devoted time. Although the study I have carried out cannot be considered more than a prototype, it was an attempt to provide a new input for EU-related political research. Based on the results, I am convinced that departing from the traditional concepts that characterized both academic and public discourse in previous decades can gradually lead to a deeper and less biased understanding of reactions that European integration invokes in political parties. Further studies should also examine whether Flood and Usherwood’s modified scale in a longitudinal study is able to pinpoint party positions more accurately than multi-scale typologies have so far and how parties have changed their position when the process of integration took another step ahead through a new treaty. For such a research agenda, this study can be a good starting point in the future.

55 The distribution of competences between nation states and the organs of the EU, and the level/deepness of the integration itself.

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Czech Social Democratic Party - ČSSD

BOCIÁNOVÁ, Kate řina (2014): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/katerina-bocianova/

BROZBOHATÁ, Zuzana (2014): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/zuzana-brzobohata/

ČSSD (2013): Volební program ČSSD. Volby do Poslanecké sn ěmovny P ČR25. -- 26. 10. 2013. Available: https://www.cssd.cz/data/files/volebni_program.pdf

ČSSD (2014a): Chceme spravedlivou a sociální Evropu! Programový manifest ČSSD pro volby do Evropského parlamentu 23.–24. 5. 2014. Available: https://www.cssd.cz/data/files/manifest.pdf

ČSSD (2014b): Premiér B. Sobotka p řipomn ěl na konferenci k 10. výro čí členství v EU důležitost evropské integrace. Available: https://www.cssd.cz/media/tiskove-zpravy/1-8/

ČSSD (2015): Vláda ud ělala další proevropský krok, schválila Koncepci politiky ČR v EU. Available: https://www.cssd.cz/media/tiskove-zpravy/vlada-udelala-dalsi-proevropsky-krok- schvalila-koncepci-politiky-cr-v-eu/

KELLER, Jan (2014): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/jan-keller/

KOLMAN, Petr (2014): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/petr-kolman/

POC, Pavel (2014): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/pavel-poc/

POC, Pavel (2016a): Pro č udržovat korunu p ři život ě? Available: https://www.cssd.cz/aktualne/blogy/proc-udrzovat-korunu-pri-zivote/

POC, Pavel (2016b): Delegace k hlasování o usnesení EP ve v ěci holistického p řístupu k řešení migra ční krize. Available: https://www.cssd.cz/media/tiskove-zpravy/delegace-k- hlasovani-o-usneseni-ep-ve-veci-holistickeho-pristupu-k-reseni-migracni-krize/

PROS, Martin (2015): Euro - Čas op ět otev řít diskusi. Available: https://www.cssd.cz/aktualne/blogy/euro-cas-opet-otevrit-diskusi/

PROUZA, Tomáš (2014): Evropská unie na k řižovatce. Available: https://www.cssd.cz/aktualne/blogy/evropska-unie-na-krizovatce/

ŠÁDA, Petr (2014): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/petr-sada/

SE ĎA, Antonín (2014): K projevu pana prezidenta v Evropském parlamentu. Available: http://www.antoninseda.cz/k-projevu-pana-prezidenta-v-evropskem-parlamentu

SE ĎA, Antonín (2015): Bude mít Evropská unie své síly rychle reakce? Available: https://www.cssd.cz/aktualne/blogy/bude-mit-evropska-unie-sve-sily-rychle-reakce/

TECHNIK, Radim (2014): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/radim-technik/

VÁHALOVÁ, Dana (2014): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/dana-vahalova/

VÁHALOVÁ, Dana (2015): Zůstane „Evropská armáda“ stále jen nad časovým projektem? Available: https://www.cssd.cz/aktualne/blogy/zustane-evropska-armada-stale-jen- nadcasovym-projektem/

VÁHALOVÁ, Dana (2016): Pojem solidarita nesmí být zneužíván . Available: https://www.cssd.cz/aktualne/blogy/pojem-solidarita-nesmi-byt-zneuzivan/

VÁ ŇA, Roman (2016): Odmítáme návrh evropské sm ěrnice o zbraních. Available: https://www.cssd.cz/media/tiskove-zpravy/navrh-evropske-zbranove-smernice-odmitame/

ZAORÁLEK, Lubomír (2014): Probu ďme naši zahrani ční politiku . Available: https://www.cssd.cz/aktualne/blogy/probudme-nasi-zahranicni-politiku/

ANO 2011

ANO (2013): Resortní program. Available: http://www.anobudelip.cz/cs/o- nas/program/volby-2013/resortni-program/

ANO (2014): Náš program pro volby do Evropského parlamentu. Available: http://www.anobudelip.cz/cs/o-nas/program-do-eurovoleb/

ANO (2015): Opat ření k řešení imigra ční krize . Available: http://www.anobudelip.cz/cs/o- nas/aktuality/novinky/opatreni-k-reseni-imigracni-krize-23446.shtml

DOBEŠOVÁ, Ivana (2016): Každý stát má suverénní právo si sám rozhodnout, koho p říjme a komu pom ůže . Available: http://www.anobudelip.cz/cs/o-nas/blogy/25775/kazdy-stat-ma- suverenni-pravo-si-sam-rozhodnout-koho-prijme-a-komu-pomuze

INDRÁ ČEK, Ivan (2014): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/ivan-indracek/

JAN ČÁREK, Ivan (2014): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/ivan-jancarek/

JEŽEK, Petr (2014): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/petr-jezek/

TELI ČKA, Pavel (2015a): ALDE navrhuje Evropskou obrannou unii. Available: http://www.telicka.eu/novinka/cz/645/alde-navrhuje-evropskou-obrannou-unii/#novinky

TELI ČKA, Pavel (2015b): Andrej Babiš: Nejv ětším problémem Evropské unie je rozdíl mezi slovy a činy. Available: http://www.telicka.eu/novinka/cz/824/andrej-babis-nejvetsim- problemem-evropske-unie-je-rozdil-mezi-slovy-a-ciny/#novinky

TELI ČKA, Pavel (2016): Zeman se k unii nechová jinak než Klaus. Available: http://www.telicka.eu/novinka/cz/992/zeman-se-k-unii-nechova-jinak-nez-klaus/#novinky

VÁLKOVÁ, Helena (2014): Ministryn ě spravedlnosti Helena Válková jednala v Bruselu na rad ě ministr ů spravedlnosti o uspo řádání ú řadu evropského ve řejného žalobce či ochran ě osobních údaj ů. Available: http://www.anobudelip.cz/cs/o-nas/aktuality/tiskove- zpravy/ministryne-spravedlnosti-helena-valkova-jednala-v-bruselu-na-rade-ministru- spravedlnosti-o-usporadani-uradu-evropskeho-verejneho-zalobce-ci-ochrane-osobnich-udaju- 19379.shtml

VL ČKOVÁ, Alžbeta (2014): Pro č jít volit do Evropského parlamentu. Available: http://www.anobudelip.cz/cs/o-nas/blogy/16684/proc-jit-volit-do-evropskeho-parlamentu

Dawn (National Coalition) - Úsvit

ČERNOCH, Marek (2015a): Kvóty jsou diktát. Navrhneme referendum o EU . Available: http://www.usvitnarodnikoalice.cz/tiskove-zpravy/cernoch-usvit-kvoty-jsou-diktat- navrhneme-referendum-o-eu/

ČERNOCH, Marek (2015b): Sv ěř it ochranu hranic EU je šílenost. To radši z Schengenu odejd ěme. Available: http://www.usvitnarodnikoalice.cz/tiskove-zpravy/sverit-ochranu- hranic-eu-je-silenost-to-radsi-z-schengenu-odejdeme/

OKAMURA, Tomio (2014): Vyjád ření p ředsedy hnutí Úsvit Tomia Okamury ke kandidatu ře a kauze Kláry Samkové. Available: http://www.usvitnarodnikoalice.cz/tiskove- zpravy/vyjadreni-predsedy-hnuti-usvit-tomia-okamury-ke-kandidature-a-kauze-klary- samkove/

RADOSTOVÁ, Kate řina (2014): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/katerina-radostova/

SAMKOVÁ, Klára (2014): Jsme PRO posílení postavení ČR a zachování národní suverenity a identity. Available: http://www.usvitnarodnikoalice.cz/blog/klara-samkova-jsme-pro- posileni-postaveni-cr-a-zachovani-narodni-suverenity-a-identity/

ŠARAPATKA, Milan (2014): Prezident ve Štrasburku. Available: http://www.usvitnarodnikoalice.cz/tiskove-zpravy/milan-sarapatka-prezident-ve-strasburku/

ŠKRABÁNEK, Roman (2014a): Evropský parlament posv ětil další krok ke Spojeným stát ům evropským! Úsvit říká jasné NE. Available: http://www.usvitnarodnikoalice.cz/blog/roman- skrabanek-evropsky-parlament-posvetil-dalsi-krok-ke-spojenym-statum-evropskym-usvit- rika-jasne-ne/

ŠKRABÁNEK, Roman (2014b): Reakce na Karla Schwarzenberga. Available: http://www.usvitnarodnikoalice.cz/blog/roman-skrabanek-reakce-na-karla-schwanzerberga/

ŠKRABÁNEK, Roman (2014c): Vyjád ření lídra hnutí Úsvit ekonoma Ing. Romana Škrabánka ke kauze Kláry Samkové. Available: http://www.usvitnarodnikoalice.cz/tiskove- zpravy/vyjadreni-romana-skrabanka-ke-kauze-klary-samkove/

ŠKRABANEK, Roman (2014d): Teli čka a jeho „ řečnické um ění“ v televizní debat ě. Available: http://www.usvitnarodnikoalice.cz/blog/roman-skrabanek-telicka-a-jeho-recnicke- umeni-v-televizni-debate/

ŠKRABÁNEK, Roman (2014e): Nepot řebujeme eurovládu, ale efektivní EU. Available: http://www.usvitnarodnikoalice.cz/blog/roman-skrabanek-nepotrebujeme-eurovladu-ale- efektivni-eu/

ÚSVIT (2013): Program Hnutí Úsvit. Available: http://www.usvitnarodnikoalice.cz/download/documenty/program-hnuti-usvit-prime- demokracie.pdf

ÚSVIT (2014a): Program. Available: http://www.usvitnarodnikoalice.cz/euro-volby/

ÚSVIT (2014b): Stanovisko Hnutí Úsvit k dnešnímu rozhodnutí vlády o p řijetí fiskálního paktu. Available: http://www.usvitnarodnikoalice.cz/tiskove-zpravy/stanovisko-hnuti-usvit-k- dnesnimu-rozhodnuti-vlady-o-prijeti-fiskalniho-paktu/

ÚSVIT (2014c): Stanovisko k fiskálnímu paktu a exekutor ům. Available: http://www.usvitnarodnikoalice.cz/tiskove-zpravy/stanovisko-k-fiskalnimu-paktu-a- exekutorum/

ÚSVIT (2015): Předkládáme návrhy na referendum o vystoupení z EU a o odmítnutí kvótách. Available: http://www.usvitnarodnikoalice.cz/tiskove-zpravy/predkladame-navrhy-na- referendum-o-vystoupeni-z-eu-a-o-odmitnuti-kvotach/

TOP 09

CZERNIN, Tomáš (2014): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/tomas-czernin/

IFRAH, Reda (2014): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/reda-ifrah/

LIDOVKY.CZ (2015): Ne časova vláda je celá. Kalousek povede finance, John získal vnitro. Available: http://www.lidovky.cz/necasova-vlada-je-cela-kalousek-povede-finance-john- ziskal-vnitro-pye-/zpravy-domov.aspx?c=A100629_182103_ln_domov_mpr

NIEDERMAYER, Lud ěk (2014a): Evropa není na cest ě k budování superstátu. Available: http://www.top09.cz/co-delame/medialni-vystupy/niedermayer-evropa-neni-na-ceste-k- budovani-superstatu-15474.html

NIEDERMAYER, Lud ěk (2014b): Sociální politiku by m ěly členské státy dozorovat samy. Available: http://www.top09.cz/co-delame/medialni-vystupy/niedermayer-socialni-politiku- by-mely-clenske-staty-dozorovat-samy-15625.html

NIEDERMAYER, Lud ěk (2014c): Atraktivita p řijetí eura se do t ří let ješt ě zvýší. Available: http://www.top09.cz/co-delame/medialni-vystupy/niedermayer-atraktivita-prijeti-eura-se-do- tri-let-jeste-zvysi-15675.html

NIEDERMAYER, Lud ěk (2014d): Evropa se neustále m ění, protože se m ění naše okolí. Available: http://www.top09.cz/co-delame/medialni-vystupy/niedermayer-evropa-se- neustale-meni-protoze-se-meni-nase-okoli-15859.html

NIEDERMAYER, Lud ěk (2015): Nevymlouvejte se na Brusel. Available: http://www.top09.cz/co-delame/medialni-vystupy/niedermayer-nevymlouvejte-se-na-brusel- 17752.html

POL ČÁK, Stanislav (2014): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/stanislav-polcak/

POPOV, Simeon (2014): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/simeon-popov/

POSPÍŠIL, Ji ří (2014): Preferen ční vít ěz eurovoleb: V komisi bych si p řál Roithovou. Available: http://www.ceskatelevize.cz/ct24/domaci/1031330-preferencni-vitez-eurovoleb-v- komisi-bych-si-pral-roithovou

POSPÍŠIL, Ji ří (2015): Jsem proti návrhu o z řízení Ú řadu evropského ve řejného žalobce. Available: http://www.top09.cz/co-delame/tiskove-zpravy-europoslancu/Pospíšil-jsem-proti- navrhu-o-zrizeni-uradu-evropskeho-verejneho-zalobce-18260.html

SCHWARZENBERG, Karel (2014): Doufejme, že k další integraci EU nep řisp ěje Putin. Available: http://www.top09.cz/co-delame/medialni-vystupy/schwarzenberg-doufejme-ze-k- dalsi-integraci-eu-neprispeje-putin-17287.html

TOP 09 (2013): Víme, kam jdeme. Available: http://www.top09.cz/files/soubory/volebni- program-2013-do-poslanecke-snemovny_894.pdf

TOP 09 (2014a): Evropa jsme my, ne oni. Available: http://www.top09.cz/files/soubory/volebni-program-do-evropskeho-parlamentu- 2014_1043.pdf

TOP 09 (2014b): Nabídka TOP 09 vlád ě. Available: http://www.top09.cz/co-delame/tiskove- zpravy/nabidka-top-09-vlade-15692.html

TOP 09 (2015): Stanovy politické strany TOP 09. Verze schválená CS TOP 09 28. 11. 2015. Available: http://www.top09.cz/dokumenty/stanovy/

TOP 09 (2016): History of TOP 09. Available: http://en.top09.cz/about-us/history/

ŽENÍŠEK, Marek (2014): V zahrani ční politice je EU stále papírovým tygrem. Available: http://www.top09.cz/co-delame/medialni-vystupy/zenisek-v-zahranicni-politice-je-eu-stale- papirovym-tygrem-14982.html

ŽENÍŠEK, Marek (2016): Svoji bezpe čnost si musí Evropa zajistit sama. Available: http://www.top09.cz/co-delame/medialni-vystupy/zenisek-svoji-bezpecnost-si-musi-evropa- zajistit-sama-19555.html

Czech Communist Party - KS ČM

DOLEJŠ, Ji ří (2014a): Eurovolby jako brána k lepší Evrop ě. Available: http://denikreferendum.cz/clanek/17183-eurovolby-jako-brana-k-lepsi-evrope

DOLEJŠ, Ji ří (2014b): Evropa doleva. Available: http://denikreferendum.cz/clanek/22215- evropa-doleva

DOLEJŠ, Ji ří (2014c): Úskalí ratifikace fiskálního paktu. Available: http://denikreferendum.cz/clanek/17561-uskali-ratifikace-fiskalniho-paktu

DOLEJŠ, Ji ří (2014d): Evropský projekt bankovní unie, šance a rizika. Available: http://denikreferendum.cz/clanek/17784-evropsky-projekt-bankovni-unie-sance-a-rizika

DOLEJŠ, Ji ří (2014e): Speech of Mr. Dolejs in the Chamber of Deputies. Available: https://www.psp.cz/eknih/2013ps/tesnopis/tz008.pdf pp. 432-436

JANE ČEK, Pavel (2014): Fiskální pakt jako krok k dalšímu prohloubení chudoby. Available: http://www.parlamentnilisty.cz/politika/politici-volicum/Janecek-KSCM-Fiskalni-pakt-jako- krok-k-dalsimu-prohloubeni-chudoby-326802

KONE ČNÁ, Kate řina (2014a): Euractiv.cz Kate řina Kone čná: ČR by si m ěla um ět dupnout. Available: http://konecna.cz/euractiv-cz-katerina-konecna-cr-by-si-mela-umet-dupnout/

KONE ČNÁ, Kate řina (2014b): Chceme Evropu pro lidi. Available: http://konecna.cz/chceme-evropu-pro-lidi/

KONE ČNÁ, Kate řina (2014c): Kone čná pro Euroskop k volbám do EP. Available: http://konecna.cz/konecna-pro-euroskop-k-volbam-do-ep/

KONE ČNÁ, Kate řina (2014d): Unie je t řeba m ěnit zevnit ř. Available: http://konecna.cz/rozhovor-pro-denik-pravo/

KONE ČNÁ, Kate řina (2014e): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/katerina-konecna/

KS ČM (2013): Volební program. Available: https://www.kscm.cz/uvodni-stranka/nas- program/volebni-program

KS ČM (2014): Volební program KS ČM pro volby do Evropského parlamentu v roce 2014. Available: https://www.kscm.cz/volby-a-akce/evropsky-parlament2/program

MAŠTÁLKA, Ji ří (2014a): Volby do evropského parlamentu 2014: Evropa na k řižovatce. Available: http://www.mastalka.cz/cs/2014/volby-do-evropskeho-parlamentu-2014-evropa- na-krizovatce/#more-579

MAŠTÁLKA, Ji ří (2014b): Pro č jít k volbám aneb jakou Evropskou unii chce levice. Available: http://www.mastalka.cz/cs/2014/proc-jit-k-volbam-aneb-jakou-evropskou-unii- chce-levice/#more-635

MAŠTÁLKA, Ji ří (2014c): Stop militarizaci Evropské unie. Available: http://www.mastalka.cz/cs/2014/stop-militarizaci-evropske-unie/

MAŠTÁLKA, Ji ří (2014d): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/jiri-mastalka/

MAŠTÁLKA, Ji ří (2015a): Evropský ve řejný žalobce - první krok k »policejní eu«? Available: http://www.mastalka.cz/cs/2015/evropsky-verejny-zalobce-prvni-krok-k- %C2%BBpolicejni-eu%C2%AB/

MAŠTÁLKA, Ji ří (2015b): Armáda EU: proti komu? Available: http://www.mastalka.cz/cs/2015/armada-eu-proti-komu/

RANSDORF, Miloslav (2014): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/miloslav-ransdorf/

SKÁLA, Josef (2014): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/josef-skala/

VALENTA, Ji ří (2014): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/jiri-valenta/

Christian Democratic Union - KDU-ČSL

BĚLOBRADEK, Pavel (2015): Budoucnost Evropy v dob ě uprchlické krize. Available: http://www.kdu.cz/aktualne/archiv/2015/budoucnost-evropy-v-dobe-uprchlicke-krize

HELLER, Šimon (2014): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/simon-heller/

HLADKÝ, Jan (2014): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/jan-hladky/

HULICIUS, Eduard (2014): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/eduard-hulicius/

KDU (2013): Volební program KDU-CSL 2013-2017. Available: http://www.kdu.cz/getattachment/6089d21c-eba3-4e8e-b390-1b922500af73/Volebni- program-pro-volby-do-poslanecke-snemovny-2.aspx

KDU (2014): Program KDU-CSL pro volby do Evropského parlamentu 23. a 24. kv ětna, 2014. Available: http://www.kdu.cz/getattachment/fdabd0ef-47a6-4d12-b049- 3bbe77adca2d/Volebni-program-pro-volby-do-Evropskeho-parlamentu.aspx

MÁLEK, Jan (2014): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/jan-malek/

STEINER, Leo (2014): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/leo-steiner/

SVOBODA, Pavel (2014a): Na cest ě do europarlamentu. Available: http://www.ceskatelevize.cz/porady/10116287760-politicke-spektrum/214411058200016/

SVOBODA, Pavel (2014b): Rozhovor s Pavlem Svobodem v Rádiožurnálu. Available: http://prehravac.rozhlas.cz/audio/3118731

SVOBODA, Pavel (2014c): Eurovolby 2014: s Janem Kellerem ( ČSSD) a Pavlem Svobodou (KDU-ČSL). Available: http://www.euro.cz/byznys/eurovolby-2014-s-janem-kellerem-cssd-a- pavlem-svobodou-kdu-csl-1085144

SVOBODA, Pavel (2014d): Šedá myš, která klame t ělem. Available: http://www.kdu.cz/aktualne/archiv/2014/svoboda-seda-mys,-ktera-klame-telem

SVOBODA, Pavel (2014e): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/pavel-svoboda/

ŠOJDROVÁ, Michaela (2014a): Velké zne čiš ťovatele neovlivníme. Evropa už prý dostala do zub ů, tvrdí europoslanec. Available: http://www.parlamentnilisty.cz/arena/monitor/Velke- znecistovatele-neovlivnime-Evropa-uz-pry-dostala-do-zubu-tvrdi-europoslanec-305583

ŠOJDROVÁ, Michaela (2014b): Michaela Šojdrová p ředstavila své programové priority do Evropských voleb. Available: https://www.sojdrova.cz/zpravy/2014/04/michaela-sojdrova- predstavila-sve-programove-priority-do-evropskych-voleb

ŠOJDROVÁ, Michaela (2015a): Evropský parlament: o geneticky modifikovaných organismech budou rozhodovat členské státy. Available: https://www.sojdrova.cz/zpravy/2015/01/evropsky-parlament-o-geneticky-modifikovanych- organismech-budou-rozhodovat-clenske-staty

ŠOJDROVÁ, Michaela (2015b): Šojdrová požaduje nový p řístup EU k mate řské dovolené. Available: http://www.kdu.cz/aktualne/archiv/2015/sojdrova-pozaduje-novy-pristup-eu-k- materske-dovol

ŠUSTR, Pavel (2014): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/pavel-sustr/

ULRYCH, Vít (2014): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/vit-ulrych/

ZDECHOVSKÝ, Tomáš (2014a): Češi mají řešení úniku pen ěz do da ňových ráj ů. Jmenuje se taxparentnost. Available: http://www.kdu.cz/aktualne/archiv/2014/cesi-maji-reseni-uniku- penez-do-danovych-raju-jmen

ZDECHOVSKÝ, Tomáš (2014b): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/tomas-zdechovsky/

ZDECHOVSKÝ, Tomáš (2015): Česko spl ňuje všechna kritéria pro p řijetí eura. Available: http://www.kdu.cz/aktualne/archiv/2015/cesko-splnuje-vsechna-kriteria-pro-prijeti-eura

Civic Democratic Party - ODS

BENDA, Filip (2014): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/filip-benda/

FIALA, Petr (2014a): Rozhovor pro www.parlamentnilisty.cz. Available: http://www.ods.cz/clanek/6629-rozhovor-pro-www-parlamentnilisty-cz

FIALA, Petr (2014b): Nesmysl fobie a smysl Evropy. Available: http://www.ods.cz/clanek/7254-nesmysl-fobie-a-smysl-evropy

FIALA, Petr (2016): Odmítáme plán EU na p řevedení kompetencí ve v ěci žádostí o azyl z národních stát ů na EU. Vláda by m ěla podat žalobu. Available: http://www.ods.cz/clanek/11511-petr-fiala-odmitame-plan-eu-na-prevedeni-kompetenci-ve- veci-zadosti-o-azyl-z-narodnich-statu-na-eu-vlada-by-mela-podat-zalobu

GRULICH, Tomáš (2016): Pot řebuje EU hrani ční policii? Available: http://www.ods.cz/clanek/10966-potrebuje-eu-hranicni-policii

HYNEK, Josef (2014): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/josef-hynek/

KOLLMANN, Marcel (2014a): Zem ě Evropské unie by se m ěly vzájemn ě respektovat. Available: http://www.ods.cz/clanek/7206-zeme-evropske-unie-by-se-mely-vzajemne- respektovat

KOLLMANN, Marcel (2014b): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/marcel-kollman/

KROPÁ ČOVÁ, Marcela (2014): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/marcela-kropacova/

KU ČERA, Martin (2014): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/martin-kucera/

ODS (2013): #Volím_pravici. Volební program pro volby do Poslanecké sn ěmovny P ČR 2013. Available: http://www.ods.cz/docs/programy/volebni-program-2013.pdf

ODS (2014a): Otá číme EU správným sm ěrem. Volební program pro volby do Evropského parlamentu 2014 . Available: http://www.ods.cz/docs/programy/program-volbyEP2014- velky.pdf

ODS (2014b): EU chce národním letovým dispe čer ům p řevzít kompetence, které fungují. Available: http://www.ods.cz/clanek/6567-eu-chce-narodnim-letovym-dispecerum-prevzit- kompetence-ktere-funguji

ODS (2014c): Pro č ODS požaduje trvalou výjimku z eura. Available: http://www.ods.cz/clanek/6714-proc-ods-pozaduje-trvalou-vyjimku-z-eura

ODS (2016): Výsledky voleb. Available: http://www.ods.cz/volebni-vysledky

SKOPE ČEK, Jan (2014): Fanatické p řijímání Fiskálního paktu je nejlepším p říkladem eurohujerismu ČSSD. Available: http://www.ods.cz/clanek/6834-fanaticke-prijimani- fiskalniho-paktu-je-nejlepsim-prikladem-eurohujerismu-cssd

STÁREK, Jakub (2014): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/jakub-starek/

TOŠENOVSKÝ, Evžen (2014a): Prošla, ale mou podporu nezískala. Available: http://www.ods.cz/clanek/8574-prosla-ale-mou-podporu-neziskala

TOŠENOVSKÝ, Evžen (2014b): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/evzen-tosenovsky/

TRYL ČOVÁ, Radka (2014a): EU by se m ěla vrátit ke svým ko řen ům. Available: http://www.ods.cz/clanek/7272-eu-by-se-mela-vratit-ke-svym-korenum

TRYL ČOVÁ, Radka (2014b): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/radka-trylcova/

VAN ĚK, Tomáš (2014a): V jakém politickém systému vlastn ě žijeme? A kam sm ěř ujeme? Available: http://www.ods.cz/clanek/7047-v-jakem-politickem-systemu-vlastne-zijeme-a- kam-smerujeme

VAN ĚK, Tomáš (2014b): Rozhovor pro Parlamentní listy. Available: http://www.ods.cz/clanek/7099-rozhovor-pro-parlamentni-listy

VLASÁK, Old řich (2014): Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/oldrich-vlasak/

ZAHRADIL, Jan (2013a): Koalice si s Evropskou unií neví rady. Available: http://www.ods.cz/clanek/6306-koalice-si-s-evropskou-unii-nevi-rady

ZAHRADIL, Jan (2013b): Konec koruny musejí schválit ob čané v referendu. Available: http://www.ods.cz/clanek/6321-konec-koruny-museji-schvalit-obcane-v-referendu

ZAHRADIL, Jan (2014a): ODS nabízí 10 let zkušeností a konkrétních výsledk ů. Available: http://www.ods.cz/clanek/6713-ods-nabizi-10-let-zkusenosti-a-konkretnich-vysledku

ZAHRADIL, Jan (2014b): Rozhovor s Janem Zahradilem v Radiožurnalu. Available: http://prehravac.rozhlas.cz/audio/3118731

ZAHRADIL, Jan (2014c): . Responses to the survey of Volby do EU. Available: http://www.volbydoeu.cz/kandidati_eu_2014/jan-zahradil/

ZAHRADIL, Jan (2016): Od britských požadavk ů k flexibiln ější Unii. Available: http://www.ods.cz/clanek/11129-od-britskych-pozadavku-k-flexibilnejsi-unii

ZAMRAZILOVÁ, Eva (2014): Evropa na rozcestí mezi respektem k národním zájm ům a pastí centralizace. Available: http://www.ods.cz/clanek/7038-evropa-na-rozcesti-mezi- respektem-k-narodnim-zajmum-a-pasti-centralizace