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Contesting the European Union in Times of Crisis: an Analysis of Facebook Interactions

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Contesting the European Union in Times of Crisis: an Analysis of Facebook Interactions Contesting the European Union in times of crisis: an analysis of Facebook interactions Milica Pejovic School of International Studies University of Trento 07/01/2019 Supervisor: Prof. Carlo Ruzza Thesis submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in International Studies Table of Contents Chapter 1: Introduction ..................................................................................................................................... 4 1.1 Europe in the crisis mode ........................................................................................................................ 4 1.2 Ascending Euroscepticism ...................................................................................................................... 5 1.3 Social media and the European Union.................................................................................................... 7 1.4 The aim of the study and research questions ........................................................................................ 9 1.5 Dissertation outline ............................................................................................................................... 15 Chapter 2: Euroscepticism: definition, evolution, typologies and causes ...................................................... 18 2.1 Introduction............................................................................................................................................ 18 2.2 From a “permissive consensus” to a “constraining disensus” ............................................................ 21 2.3 Brief historical overview of the evolution of Euroscepticism ............................................................ 23 2.4 Party-based Euroscepticism ................................................................................................................. 25 2.5 Popular Euroscepticism: locating its causes ........................................................................................ 28 2.5.1 Utilitarian factors ............................................................................................................................ 31 2.5.2 Identity factors ................................................................................................................................ 34 2.5.3 Political factors ................................................................................................................................ 40 2.5.4 Other scholarly explanations of popular Euroscepticism ............................................................ 44 2.6 British Euroscepticism as an ultimate form of opposition to the EU ................................................. 45 2.7 Euroscepticism and EU politicization ................................................................................................... 47 2.8 Euroscepticism and populism ............................................................................................................... 50 2.9 Euroscepticism and the European public sphere ................................................................................ 52 2.10 New approach to Euroscepticism: studying social media debates .................................................. 56 Chapter 3: The EU in times of crises: (un)democratic and (in)effective? ........................................................ 61 3.1 Introduction............................................................................................................................................ 61 3.2 From the Maastricht Treaty to the Third Greek Bailout: What Has Gone Wrong? ........................... 63 3.2.1 The Economic and Monetary Union: too different to be united? ................................................ 64 3.2.2 Greece as the “weakest link” in the Eurozone .............................................................................. 67 3.3 The EU under the migratory pressure ................................................................................................. 73 3.3.1 The year 2015 as a peak of migration crisis ................................................................................. 73 3.3.2 EU response to the migration crisis ............................................................................................... 75 3.3.3 National responses to the migration crisis ................................................................................... 78 3.4 Democracy “under the siege” ................................................................................................................ 80 3.5 Crises and social media.......................................................................................................................... 85 3.6 Conclusion .............................................................................................................................................. 86 1 Chapter 4: Research design, methodology, and data sources ........................................................................ 89 4.1 Introduction............................................................................................................................................ 89 4.2 Studying Euroscepticism: the added value of qualitative research methods ................................... 90 4.3 Facebook focus ....................................................................................................................................... 93 4.4 Rhetorical analysis ................................................................................................................................. 96 4.5 Interviews ............................................................................................................................................... 99 4.6 Content analysis ................................................................................................................................... 101 4.6.1 Choice of content analysis ............................................................................................................ 101 4.6.2 Data collection and sampling ....................................................................................................... 103 4.6.3 Coding technique and coding scheme ......................................................................................... 107 4.7 Reporting of findings ........................................................................................................................... 114 4.8 Limitations ............................................................................................................................................ 115 Chapter 5: Top-down approach to the public contestation of European integration in social media ......... 117 5.1 Introduction.......................................................................................................................................... 117 5.2 Overview of EU communication policies............................................................................................ 118 5.3 Rhetorical analysis of EU institutions’ communication on Facebook .............................................. 122 5.3.1 Greek crisis .................................................................................................................................... 122 5.3.2 Migration crisis ............................................................................................................................. 126 5.4 Interviews with social media teams ................................................................................................... 132 5.4.1 Online interactions: a top-down perspective ............................................................................. 133 5.4.2 Online Euroscepticism and crises ................................................................................................ 135 5.4.3 Language and argumentation ...................................................................................................... 138 5.5 Conclusion ............................................................................................................................................ 140 Chapter 6: Debating the Union in crisis mode: an analysis of public attitudes towards European integration ....................................................................................................................................................................... 143 6.1 Introduction.......................................................................................................................................... 143 6.2 Third Greek bailout in public discourse ............................................................................................. 145 6.2.1 Principle of integration: better off together or on our own? ..................................................... 146 6.2.2 Current EU set up: the European Union lacks “the people” ....................................................... 148 6.2.3 Future of the Union: Grexit and/or disintegration ..................................................................... 152 6.2.4 EU polity evaluations .................................................................................................................... 154 6.2.5 Justifications for EU polity evaluations ....................................................................................... 155 6.2.6 Greek crisis “anatomized”:
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