Edited by L. De Sio, V. Emanuele, N. Maggini, | The European Parliament Elections of 2014 The European | Maggini, N. Emanuele, V. De Sio, L. Edited by The European Parliament Elections of 2014 Edited by Lorenzo De Sio Vincenzo Emanuele Nicola Maggini With contributions by Konstantinos Athanasiadis, Marcello Carammia, Luca Carrieri, Matteo Cataldi, Alessandro Chiaramonte, Mikołaj Cześnik, Roberto D’Alimonte, Lorenzo De Sio, Luigi Di Gregorio, Patrick Dumont, Vincenzo Emanuele, Marta Fraile, Vlastimil Havlík, Andrija Henjak, Enrique Hernández, Federica Izzo, David Johann, Raphaël Kies, Michał Kotnarowski, Sylvia Kritzinger, Nina Liljeqvist, Simona Kustec Lipicer, Marco Lisi, Nicola Maggini, Bruno Marino, Roderick Pace, Aldo Paparo, Carolina Plescia, Rocco Polin, Lukas Pukelis, Luana Russo, Michail Schwartz, Sorina Soare, Peter Spáč, Laura Sudulich, Liisa Talving, Federico Vegetti, Tom Verthé, Kristian Voss CISE – Centro Italiano Studi Elettorali Directed by Roberto D’Alimonte, the CISE – Centro Italiano Studi Elettorali (Italian Centre for Electoral Studies) is an inter-university research center established jointly by the LUISS Guido Carli University of Rome and the University of Florence. Its activity focuses on the study of elections and their institutional framework. The CISE carries out a range of research activities with different points of view on the electoral process: from the analysis of individual voting behavior (investigated through an independent, regular series of CATI surveys) to analyses of election results based on aggregate data (also including the study of vote shifts and of electoral geography), to research on electoral systems and their related legislation. The CISE research activity is also carried out through partnerships with other Italian and international scholars, as well as with national and international research centers and research programmes. The activities of the CISE, systematically documented on the website at http://cise.luiss.it/, are supported by Eni. The European Parliament Elections of 2014 Edited by Lorenzo De Sio Vincenzo Emanuele Nicola Maggini ISBN (print): 978-88-98012-15-2 ISBN (online): 978-88-98012-16-9 Cover image: © Claudio Monni | Dreamstime.com (cc) 2014 CISE - Centro Italiano Studi Elettorali, Roma. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/ or send a letter to Creative Commons, 444 Castro Street, Suite 900, Mountain View, California, 94041, USA. A copy of this book can be downloaded from the CISE website at http://cise.luiss.it Table of Contents » Introduction �������������������������������������������������������������������������������������11 Lorenzo De Sio, Vincenzo Emanuele and Nicola Maggini Part 1 – Before the elections . 17 » Towards the European elections: An introductory framework �����������19 Vincenzo Emanuele and Nicola Maggini » Life of EP: History of the empowerment of the European Parliament . 25 Rocco Polin » The evolution of turnout in European elections from 1979 to 2009 31 Nicola Maggini » Proportional representation with variable-geometry: Here is how to vote in the 28 member states . 37 Vincenzo Emanuele » Europarties’ choices—Who are the candidates for the presidency of the European Commission and how have they been selected? �������43 Bruno Marino » Expansion and electoral success: The winning strategy of the EPP ��� 51 Vincenzo Emanuele » United but loser? The PES between party cohesion and electoral decline. 59 Michail Schwartz De Sio L., Emanuele V. and Maggini N. (eds), The European Parliament Elections of 2014, CISE, Rome, 2014 ISBN (print) 978-88-98012-15-2 / ISBN (online) 978-88-98012-16-9 The European Parliament Elections of 2014 » The Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe Group: Towards an inevitable decline?. 67 Bruno Marino » From the Italian Communist Party to Tsipras: The path of Europe’s radical left . 73 Federica Izzo » The populist and Eurosceptic right: The evolution of its electoral success ���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������79 Nicola Maggini Part 2 – The results: Italy �������������������������������������������87 » Electoral results: The PD from the “majoritarian vocation” to its realisation �����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������89 Nicola Maggini » High fidelity and new votes for Renzi �����������������������������������������������99 Roberto D’Alimonte » Vote shifts in Rome and Milan confirm the frame of Renzi’s victory . 103 Aldo Paparo and Matteo Cataldi » The Italian party system between change and stabilisation on new basis . 111 Alessandro Chiaramonte and Vincenzo Emanuele » Where does Renzi’s victory come from? . 117 Lorenzo De Sio Part 3 – The results across Europe ������������������������� 125 » Austria: No one loses, all win? . 127 Carolina Plescia and Sylvia Kritzinger » The Baltic states: Mixed results for incumbents �������������������������������133 Liisa Talving and Lukas Pukelis 6 Table of Contents » Belgium: Far beyond second order. 141 Tom Verthé » Bulgaria: To support or not to support the government in power, this is the dilemma �������������������������������������������������������������������������147 Sorina Soare » Croatia: Negative results for the government coalition. 155 Andrija Henjak » Cyprus: Disapproval through abstention in the European Union’s remotest ‘outpost’ . 163 Konstantinos Athanasiadis » The Czech Republic: Where have all the voters gone? ���������������������167 Vlastimil Havlík » Denmark and Finland: (not always) a success for the far-right . 173 Nina Liljeqvist and Kristian Voss » France: The historic victory of the Front National ���������������������������181 Luana Russo » Germany: Merkel does not stand out but holds . 189 Carolina Plescia and David Johann » Greece: Historic change or alarm bell? . 195 Konstantinos Athanasiadis » Hungary: The stability of Fidesz’s domain ���������������������������������������203 Federico Vegetti » Luxembourg: The first European Parliament–only vote . 209 Patrick Dumont and Raphaël Kies » Malta: Hidden change? �������������������������������������������������������������������215 Marcello Carammia and Roderick Pace » Poland: Old turnout and new right . 223 Mikołaj Cześnik and Michał Kotnarowski 7 The European Parliament Elections of 2014 » Portugal: Between apathy and crisis of mainstream parties. 229 Marco Lisi » Romania: A preview of the 2014 presidential elections?. 235 Sorina Soare » Slovakia: Record holder in the lowest turnout ���������������������������������243 Peter Spáč » Slovenia: Internal political crisis and the success of the opposition. 249 Simona Kustec Lipicer » Spain: The beginning of the end of bipartisan rule? . 255 Enrique Hernández and Marta Fraile » Sweden: An escape from mainstream parties �����������������������������������263 Nina Liljeqvist » Netherlands, Ireland and UK: Euroscepticism does (not) triumph. 269 Laura Sudulich Part 4 – The results: an overview. 275 » A turnout like in 2009 but with many “Europes” within the EU. 277 Nicola Maggini » EPP loses votes and seats but remains the first party in the European Parliament . 283 Vincenzo Emanuele » The Party of European Socialists: Stability without success �������������289 Luca Carrieri » German and UK’s Liberals collapse and ALDE loses ground . 295 Bruno Marino » The radical left grows but only in the South of Europe �������������������301 Michail Schwartz » The electoral progress of the populist and Eurosceptic right. 307 Nicola Maggini 8 Table of Contents » A “revolutionary” election: The Italian party system is the most simplified in Europe �����������������������������������������������������������������������313 Luigi Di Gregorio Conclusions . 321 Lorenzo De Sio, Vincenzo Emanuele and Nicola Maggini » Notes on Editors . 327 » Notes on Authors ���������������������������������������������������������������������������329 9 Introduction1 Lorenzo De Sio, Vincenzo Emanuele and Nicola Maggini This book is dedicated to the European Parliament (EP) elections of 22–25 May 2014. Elections that were expected to be the first truly European elec- tions, rather than a collection of second-order elections, focused on national issues as had happened in all previous elections (Reif and Schmitt, 1980; Hix and Marsh, 2011). There were good reasons for such expectations. After 2008, the financial and sovereign debt crisis has impacted Europe, with important, and sometimes dramatic, consequences in economic, social, and political terms. Indeed, the crisis did not have an immediate impact, in terms of economic policies that would affect the everyday life of ordinary people. As a result, the 2009 EP elec- tions—held almost nine months after the Lehman Brothers default—did not show particularly clear effects of the crisis (De Sio and Legnante, 2010). But in subsequent years, the reaction to the crisis has seen the emergence of the European Union, its institutions, and other international institutions as key players in terms of economic policy of the Euro member states. Several of the states that were most impacted by the sovereign debt crisis had to negotiate bailout deals with the “Troika” committee (European Commission, European Central Bank, and International Monetary Fund) that strongly limited, if not temporarily cancelled, their economic policy sovereignty. Also, most other eurozone countries had to take economic