FROM SCEPTICISM TO ENGAGEMENT - EUROPEANIZATION OF THE GREEN PARTY AND SINN FÉIN IN IRELAND IN ELECTION CAMPAIGNS 2009-2020 - DIVA PORTAL
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FROM SCEPTICISM TO
ENGAGEMENT
Europeanization of the Green
Party and Sinn Féin in Ireland in
election campaigns 2009–2020
Mari-Helen Kula
Master thesis, 30 hp
Master’s program in political science, 120 hp
Spring term 2021Abstract This study examines the impact of the European Union and the programmatic and policy changes in two Irish political parties, the Green Party and Sinn Féin. The Europeanization concept is the theoretical basis of the study and it is operationalized by the use of EU salience. The study is carried out by content analysis of national and European election manifestos prepared by the parties during the 2009–2020 time period. The findings showed an increased salience on the European Union in national election campaigns by both parties, and in the European Parliament elections by Sinn Féin. A process of Europeanization has taken place in both parties regarding foreign policy and issues related to external relations. The Green Party showed an increased emphasis on the European Union regarding environmental issues. This study contributes to the research on the European impact on national political parties and the increased importance of European level politics in the national systems. Keywords: Europeanization, european integration, programmatic changes, political parties, EU salience, Irish party politics
List of abbreviations CAP Common Agricultural Policy CMP Comparative Manifestos Project CFSP Common Foreign and Security Policy CSDP Common Security and Defence Policy EC European Commission ECB European Central Bank EEC European Economic Community EMP Euromanifestos Project EMU European Monetary Union ESDP European Security and Defence Policy EU European Union IMF International Monetary Fund MARPOR Manifesto Research on Political Representation NATO North Atlantic Treaty Organization NEDG Non-Economic Demographic Groups UMG Underprivileged Minority Groups
Table of contents
1. INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................................................................ 3
1.1 BACKGROUND ................................................................................................................................................................3
1.2 PURPOSE AND AIM ........................................................................................................................................................4
1.2.1 Research problem ............................................................................................................................................ 4
1.2.2 Limitations ......................................................................................................................................................... 5
1.2.3 Outline ..................................................................................................................................................................6
1.3 POLITICAL PARTIES IN IRELAND ................................................................................................................................7
1.3.1 The Irish party system....................................................................................................................................7
1.3.2 Sinn Féin .............................................................................................................................................................. 8
1.3.3 The Green Party ............................................................................................................................................. 10
2. LITERATURE REVIEW .......................................................................................................................... 11
2.1 POLITICAL PARTIES AND THE EU ........................................................................................................................... 11
2.2 EUROPEANIZATION IN THE IRISH PARTY SYSTEM ............................................................................................... 14
3. THEORY .................................................................................................................................................... 15
3.1 EUROPEANIZATION ................................................................................................................................................... 16
3.2 THEORIES ON EUROPEAN INTEGRATION .............................................................................................................. 17
3.3 OPERATIONALIZATION AND RELEVANCE .............................................................................................................. 19
4. METHOD AND RESEARCH DESIGN .................................................................................................. 22
4.1 CASE STUDIES ............................................................................................................................................................. 22
4.1.1 Case selection ................................................................................................................................................. 22
4.1.2 Timeframe of the study............................................................................................................................... 23
4.2 EMPIRICAL MATERIAL .............................................................................................................................................. 24
4.2.1 Election manifestos ...................................................................................................................................... 24
4.3 METHOD ...................................................................................................................................................................... 26
4.3.1 Content analysis ............................................................................................................................................ 26
4.3.2 Coding procedure.......................................................................................................................................... 27
4.3.3 Reliability problems and validity ............................................................................................................ 29
15. FINDINGS .................................................................................................................................................. 30
5.1 BACKGROUND ............................................................................................................................................................. 30
5.1.1 Policy domains ............................................................................................................................................... 30
5.2 EUROPEAN ELECTIONS ............................................................................................................................................. 32
5.2.1 Programmatic changes in the Green Party ........................................................................................ 33
5.2.2 Programmatic changes in Sinn Féin ..................................................................................................... 38
5.2.3 Summary .......................................................................................................................................................... 42
5.3 GENERAL ELECTIONS 2011–2020 ....................................................................................................................... 44
5.3.1 Programmatic changes in the Green Party ........................................................................................ 45
5.3.2 Programmatic changes in Sinn Féin ..................................................................................................... 46
5.3.3 Summary .......................................................................................................................................................... 46
6. ANALYSIS .................................................................................................................................................. 47
6.1 IRELAND, FOREIGN POLICY AND THE EU............................................................................................................... 48
6.2 ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUES AND AGRICULTURE ...................................................................................................... 49
6.3 REFORMING THE SYSTEM ......................................................................................................................................... 50
6.4 GENERAL ATTITUDES TOWARDS THE EU ............................................................................................................. 50
6.5 THE EUROPEANIZATION PROCESS.......................................................................................................................... 51
7. CONCLUSION ........................................................................................................................................... 51
7.1 DISCUSSION OF RESEARCH QUESTIONS.................................................................................................................. 52
7.2 FINAL REFLECTIONS .................................................................................................................................................. 53
BIBLIOGRAPHY ................................................................................................................................................ 54
21. Introduction
1.1 Background
“Surely it is self-evident that if we were to remain outside the Community we
would be conferring on the Border the status of a frontier, both economic and
political, between ourselves and the rest of Europe.”– Jack Lynch, Taoiseach
(Dáil Éireann debates 1972)
At the time of entry (in 1973) into the European Economic Community (EEC), Ireland’s
economy was in dire straits. The unemployment rate was high, the productivity and incomes
were low, and economic growth through access to the inner market was much needed. The
consensus then among Irish state elites and society (Laffan 2018, 248) was that membership
would be a positive-sum game for the country, and an opportunity to catch up economically
with mainland Europe. The vitality of the Irish economy in the 2010s has likewise been largely
credited to the benefits of Europeanization and integration (Hayward 2010, 95). Although the
United Kingdom opted out of joining the European Monetary Union (EMU), Ireland was a
founding member (Donovan & Murphy 2013, 20–21).
Since the creation of the union and Ireland’s entry, the EU has faced a set of challenges
including a global recession in 2008 and the subsequent European debt crisis setting off in 2009,
the European migrant crisis hitting its peak in 2015, and the United Kingdom’s decision to exit
the union and the inner market. In 2021, the aftermath of Brexit continues to pose a challenge
for Ireland’s relationships with the United Kingdom as well as with the EU. The Irish parties’
relationships with the EU and its integration has despite the several crises been relatively stable
and slightly more positive over time, with Sinn Féin and the Green Party standing out as
previously opposed to European integration – if not outright Eurosceptical – but currently
holding significantly more positive views. In general, European parties have shown tendencies
of becoming more pro-integrationist over time (Hellström 2008a).
The European debt crisis in 2009, occurring a mere decade after the introduction of the Euro
currency and rooted in a balance-of-payments crisis, combined with a number of contributing
factors (Copelovitch, Frieden & Walter 2016, 10), was the EU’s most severe economic crisis
to-date and was a particularly devastating one for Ireland (and for the Eurozone members in
southern Europe as well). Despite the financial crisis of 2007–2008, that originated in the
3United States and sparked a global recession, it was a situation that the country did not foresee,
and the EU was fundamentally unequipped to deal with. During the years leading up to this
crisis that would soon lead to the country entering bailout negotiations, the Celtic Tiger
economy – dubbed so for the transformation from Ireland being one of the poorest countries in
the EU to a fast-growing economy within two decades (International Monetary Foundation
[IMF] 2018) – was prospering. Confidence was still high, and the previous fiscal years had
shown promising numbers (Donovan & Murphy 2013, 2). This shock that the EU was
essentially unprepared for revealed an asymmetry among members in the Eurozone when
Greece was on the brink of bankruptcy (Hooghe & Marks 2019) and Ireland, among others,
was in dire need of financial assistance. In 2010, the Irish government began negotiations with
the troika – consisting of the IMF, the European Central Bank (ECB) and the European
Commission (EC) – to enter a bailout program in order to stabilize the banking system and
restore the credit flow (IMF 2018). As of March 2021, the final repayment on the 3,7-billion-
euro loan has been completed (Curran 2021).
Ireland’s relationship with the EU is indisputably a special one and the benefits of membership,
especially in getting the economy back on its feet, cannot be overstated. However, as has been
indicated, the political parties have had very different stances on what the Irish relationship
with the EU should be. The aim of this thesis is to trace back the recent shifts in Sinn Féin and
the Green Party’s attitudes towards the EU to a Europeanization process. This is done by
examination of national and European election manifestos prepared by each party for a selected
time period, 2009–2020. A content analysis was carried out on the empirical material.
1.2 Purpose and aim
1.2.1 Research problem
The purpose of this thesis is to examine and explain the shifts in two Irish political parties’,
namely the Green Party and Sinn Féin, policy changes through a Europeanization process.
These parties have both historically been on the more Eurosceptical side, but the recent decade
has shown a shift in both party’s EU attitudes (Bakker et al. 2020), approaching the views of
the centre-right parties. As for the popular opinion in the country, support for remaining in the
EU is high (84%) in Ireland and there is a general view that membership has benefitted the
country in various way (European Movement Ireland 2020). While a discussion of
Europeanization of Irish parties and changes in party attitudes towards European integration
4certainly has taken place between scholars, recent literature on the subject is sparse and there is
a gap in the research, particularly in the past decade, on how Irish political parties motivate the
changes in their positions. Existing research has examined party positions on the EU up until
the early 2000s, however, the literature since then has been mostly focused on single policy
areas, or for example the impact of Brexit on Ireland’s relationship with the EU.
There is an argument to be made for continuing the research into Irish party attitudes towards
the EU and the importance of EU policymaking, in the post-Eurocrisis period, and certainly
now in the era of Brexit. Considering the grave crises that the Union has been exposed to in
recent years, it is reasonable to further explore the subject and seek to understand not only if
party positions have changed, which we from previous research by other authors can conclude
that they have, but in which policy areas changes are most prominent and how any
Europeanization effect on parties’ programmatic contents differs between national and
European elections. This thesis builds on Ladrech’s (2002) framework of analysis for the
Europeanization process in political parties and is specifically focused on policy and
programmatic changes. Furthermore, this thesis contributes to the research on effects of
Europeanization on national political parties’ policy and programmatic content.
Party positions on different EU policy issues are established in party manifestos and
programmatic and policy changes can thus be examined through them.
The study is guided by the following research questions:
– What programmatic changes can be identified in the Green Party and Sinn Féin?
– How are programmatic changes manifested in national and European elections?
1.2.2 Limitations
This study is concentrated on Sinn Féin and the Green Party and this research is limited to a
timeframe of 2009–2020. Research (presented further in the literature review) has indeed shown
a shift in attitudes and salience on EU issues in most Irish parties – and in general, as most
European parties have experienced an increase in pro-EU stances over the years (Hellström
2008a). However, the most radical changes have been identified in the Green Party and Sinn
Féin, which makes exploring the causes of those both more interesting and achievable, than for
parties that have gone through less drastic changes. For the same reasons, this study is also
limited to a certain time period that has been identified as when changes have occurred in the
parties.
5While Sinn Féin and the Green Party also operate in Northern Ireland, this analysis is focused
on the Republic alone, one reason being that the party system in Northern Ireland is structured
differently from the Republic – as a “dual ethnic party system” that is polarized around support
for a United Ireland versus the union with the UK (Murphy & Hayward 2009).
1.2.3 Outline
This remaining part of the thesis is structured as follows. First, I present a brief background to
the political parties and describe the context of the party system Ireland, with a focus on Sinn
Féin and the Green Party and how they distinguish themselves.
Then, an overview of the previous literature on the subject and ongoing discussions are
presented in the second chapter. Following the literature review, the theory chapter introduces
the concept of Europeanization and a discussion of different directions of Europeanization and
how it can be studied, along with other approaches to European integration. Within the same
chapter, the operationalization of the Europeanization concept and the chosen framework of
analysis are presented.
The fourth chapter presents the research design and method of analysis. This chapter includes
the case selection and timeframe of the study. The empirical material, election manifestos, is
presented and motivated, with regards to the operationalization and framework discussed in the
theory chapter. The content analysis method is presented and critically discussed and is
followed by a detailed description of the coding procedure. The possible limitations of the
analysis and issues with reliability are considered.
The fifth chapter presents the findings from the analysis of the empirical material. The first part
of the chapter is devoted to the findings of the European manifesto analysis, then, the findings
of the national manifesto analysis are presented. In the sixth chapter, the analysis of the results
in relation to the theory and research questions is presented. Lastly, the conclusions are
presented in the final seventh chapter, along with a discussion and reflections on the results and
their relation to previous research.
61.3 Political parties in Ireland
In all of Europe, mainstream parties are normally considered pro-integrationist while
Euroscepticism is reserved for the far left and right, which is often illustrated by an inverted U-
curve (Hix & Lord 1997; Hooghe, Marks & Wilson 2002). The explanation for this is according
to Marks (2004, 239) that for one, parties on the far left and right view the EU as an extension
of the domestic opposition parties, as centrist parties have dominated political institutions
around Europe and thus are responsible for creating the EU, making it easier for the parties
which had no hand in the European projects to be critical of them. Second, centrist parties have
strategic reasons for preferring convergence on EU support and avoiding competition with the
left/right parties on European integration, who in turn may stress the EU issue for strategic
purposes, further politicizing the issue.
Still, the relationship between ideology and integration has changed in the sense that social
issues, rather than economic, are the main drivers of parties’ attitudes and that the U-curve is
now two-dimensional (Prosser 2015). According to Hellström (2008a), it is within the
mainstream parties’ interest to maintain the status quo and not challenge European integration,
as membership in the EU is considered a fait accompli. The rise of the populist right-wing
parties in the past decades that are by design anti-EU has been prominent in all of Europe, and
although this trend has not bypassed Ireland entirely – The Irish Freedom Party has advocated
for an “Irexit” and “national independence and sovereignty” since 2018 (Irish Freedom Party
2021) – it has yet to gain any traction with the electorate. This absence of any successful right-
wing parties in the Irish political system is further discussed in the literature review chapter.
1.3.1 The Irish party system
The party system in Ireland can be categorized as “broadly centrist” (Puirséil 2017) and has
historically been less ideologically distinct than parties in the rest of Europe. Currently, the
largest parties are Fianna Fáil, Sinn Féin, and Fine Gael. Sinn Féin, the centre-left party,
received the most first-preference votes for the first time in the 2020 General Election, gaining
10,7 points since 2016. All of the mainstream parties except for Sinn Féin and the Green Party
lost some ground since 2016, although Fianna Fáil still won the most seats (Raidió Teilifís
Éireann 2020). Voter support has wavered, and election results fluctuated in the most recent
elections, still, Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael, both belonging to the ideological centre-right, remain
stable as the largest parties in the Republic of Ireland. The Irish political system has, up until
72020, fundamentally been centered around the competition between Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael
(Little 2020) and one of them forming a coalition government.
The 2020 election was a turning point in Irish politics, as it left the parliament unusually
fragmented when the seats were nearly evenly distributed and no combination had the majority
to form a government, in addition to Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael refusing to form a government
with Sinn Féin, essentially putting an end to the traditional “two-and-a-half party system” in
government (Field 2020) and leaving the Republic without a government for 20 weeks in the
midst of a public health crisis. Because of Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael’s refusal to enter a coalition
with Sinn Féin, a government was eventually formed with Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael, and the Green
Party, which marked the first time that Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael had formed a coalition
together, coincidentally ending “the so-called Civil War era of politics” (O’Halloran, Fiach &
Leahy 2020) and giving them a working majority in the Dáil, the lower house of the parliament.
As has been mentioned, the party system in Ireland is heavily focused on the centre. It should
be evident that both the far-left and -right of the Irish political spectrum are relatively
undeveloped. The two centre-right parties, Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael, are rather similar in their
relationship with the EU. These two parties were welcoming of the EU membership from the
onset (Laffan 2018, 249) and both remain supportive of further EU integration. Both are
Christian-democratic and conservative “catch-all” parties with similar ideologies, although
Fine Gael (“Family of the Irish”) leans towards more market liberalism. Fianna Fáil (“Soldiers
of Destiny”), was for long the dominating party – the period until 1989 was considered the
“Fianna Fáil vs the rest” era, followed by the “multi-party era” when coalition governments
became the norm in Ireland, which is a system that the party has also thrived in (Gilland Lutz
2003). Nevertheless, even members have had trouble differentiating between these two
dominating parties in terms of policy and left-right ideology (Gallagher & Marsh, 421).
1.3.2 Sinn Féin
The first party in focus in this thesis is Sinn Féin. Sinn Féin (“We Ourselves”) is a centre-left
party that is first and foremost characterized by its nationalism and Irish republicanism – the
movement for a united Ireland and independence from the United Kingdom. As “the political
manifestation of the Irish revolution” (Laffan 1999, 4), Sinn Féin has a controversial past
because of its association with the paramilitary organization the Irish Republican Army (IRA),
and consequently, its link to terrorism. Considered once as the political wing of the IRA, the
8party was vastly different at the time of founding in 1905 than it is today. It was not until the
Northern Ireland peace process in the 1990s that Sinn Féin became a mainstream party and
started to drift further from its original core beliefs (Hueckel 2007). Even so, the party was still
widely viewed as the political fringe until the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis that upended
the Celtic Tiger economy, when they started to pick up votes as a result of the changing socio-
economic dynamics and increasing unemployment rate (Utz 2019), although they have not been
in part of any cabinet since the time of the Irish Republic in 1922. While the party no longer
relies on the support and militarism of the IRA, a reunification with Northern Ireland is still in
their endgame. On social issues, Sinn Féin is a progressive party with explicit support of
LGBTQ rights (Sinn Féin 2018).
One reason for Sinn Féin’s status as a fringe party in the first decades of Ireland’s EEC
membership was that they simply did not have the resources to campaign in elections, and that
either way participation in elections would give legitimacy to the partition of Ireland, meaning
that elections were therefore not useful to the party’s agenda (Maillot 2009). This approach
dates back to the early abstentionist days of Sinn Féin, which is still practiced by the party in
Northern Ireland, meaning that while they do participate in elections, they decline to take up
seats in the UK parliament (Kelly 2019) when successfully elected – even in the context of
Brexit, where it would appear logical, because, according to an abstentionist MP in Northern
Ireland, “these institutions have often acted against the interests of the Irish people – not just in
the past, but as we are seeing now” (Maskey 2018).
In the 1970s, the party also rejected membership in the EEC on the basis that it would jeopardize
Ireland’s sovereignty, and continues to be critical of the EU, but still “critically engaged”. Sinn
Féin opposes Brexit because of the threats it constitutes to Northern Ireland, where the people
voted to remain in the EU, in terms of the peace process and the Good Friday Agreement of
1998, the access to the single market, trade, and the border with the Republic (Sinn Féin 2021).
The early electoral efforts of Sinn Féin in the EEC and later in the EU were not, according to
Maillot (2009), grounded in their willingness to engage with the Union, but rather in an electoral
strategy to keep the momentum and established local activism that had been building in the
1980s. The party’s opposition to European integration has, however, been evident through the
years, seen manifested in for example the “no” campaigns for the Nice and Lisbon Treaty
referendums. The party at the time of the Lisbon Treaty referendum criticized both the Irish
government for its failure to protect national interests, and accused the Green Party of only
9siding with the “yes” side so that they could remain in government with Fianna Fáil and the
Progressive Democrats (O’Halloran 2008). This opposition towards the treaties distinguishes
Sinn Féin from the other Irish parties, but their later “critical engagement” with the EU has also
given the party increased legitimacy (Maillot 2009). Sinn Féin currently holds one seat in the
EP and belongs to the European United Left/Nordic Green Left (GUE/NGL) group.
Additionally, two other Irish MEPs from the left-wing Independents 4 Change party, and one
independent MEP, are also part of this group. (GUE/NGL 2021)
1.3.3 The Green Party
The Green Party (“Comhaontas Glas”) in Ireland, located on the centre-left of the political
spectrum, was formed in the 1980s around the same time as green parties were forming in the
rest of the world. As such, the party’s focus is on environmental protection and a sustainable
society (The Green Party 2021). The party is socially progressive, with support for example for
reproductive rights, including abortion rights, and recognition and protection of transgender
people (The Green Party 2021b). The Green Party has been in government twice; entering for
the first time in 2007, and the second in 2020. As previously mentioned, the party is currently
in a coalition government with Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael since the 2020 election, a formation
made possible by the fact that the two other parties both refused a coalition with Sinn Féin. In
2007, the Green Party enter government with Fianna Fáil and the centre-right Progressive
Democrats, which formally dissolved in 2008 while in government (Hansen 2009). During the
first government negotiations, one MEP wrote that a coalition with Fianna Fáil would be like
“a deal with the devil” (Cuffe 2007). There was a certain disagreement between the party
members who entirely opposed entering government, and those who saw it as an opportunity
to implement green policies (Leonard 2011, 90).
The Green Party was, undoubtedly, very much an opposition party. The party has, however,
shown a certain degree of professionalization – in campaigns, decision-making, and
organization – and a transformation from protest party to one of more mainstream and
conventional politics, since its government participation (Bolleyer 2010). Ireland’s entry into
the EU was also met with suspicion (Bolleyer & Panke 2009), although the party now holds
significantly more positive views on the union. The electoral success that allowed the Green
Party to participate in government twice has undoubtedly made its mark, and also shifted the
power from ordinary party members to the officeholders (Bolleyer 2010).
10The Green Party currently holds two seats in the EP and is part of the Greens/European Free
Alliance (The Greens/EFA 2021).
2. Literature review
In this section, previous discussions on Irish parties and European integration are presented,
along with research on policy stances and general EU support from parties and the Irish
electorate.
The mainstream Irish parties have historically had somewhat differing views on EU and
European integration, and somewhat contradictory stances with the passing of time. This is
exemplified in the rejection and later acceptance of the Nice and Lisbon Treaties, as Ireland
requires referendums for authorisation to ratify treaties. Both treaties were initially rejected by
the public but overwhelmingly accepted after second referendums and “a significant charm-
offensive by the Irish pro-EU political parties” (Karv 2019, 36), which also involved guarantees
by the Irish government that implementation of the Treaty would not impose on the
constitutional right to life or Irish neutrality (Church & Phinnemore 2016, 43).
The then-smaller parties Sinn Féin, the Green Party, and the Socialist Workers’ party
campaigned against the Nice Treaty during the first referendum in 2001 and the second in 2002,
dissenting from the consensus of the political establishment. During the campaign leading up
to the first referendum on the Lisbon Treaty in 2008, the Green Party took a neutral position.
Still, after securing a narrow majority with the Members of Parliament, the party campaigned
for the “yes” vote in the second referendum in 2009 – making it the first time the Green Party
had officially came out in favour of a European treaty (Brennan 2009).
2.1 Political parties and the EU
Green parties across Europe have a tendency to be pro-EU but unsupportive of centralizing
power to the union, although, even the Green parties that have been somewhat Eurosceptical
until recent years (such as those in Ireland and Sweden) were still not to be considered outright
anti-EU (Spoon 2012; Dolezal 2010). Bomberg (2002) has previously discussed green parties’
ambivalent relationship with the EU and the discrepancy between green political values and the
EU’s structures and processes. For green parties, the nation state is “too large” in that it imposes
on individual rights, but “too small” in that it fails to solve environmental problems, where
11transnational cooperation is therefore much needed. Bomberg also claims that green parties
around Europe have used the EU as a platform to increase exposure and exploited the voters’
dissatisfaction and low confidence in the EU in the 1990s and early 2000s. This has turned out
to be a beneficial vote-maximizing strategy, but also a result of Europeanization in terms of
programmatic changes and ideological adaption. After all, the European platform provides
green parties with the opportunity to amplify their core beliefs, but also to shape the integration
and direction of policies, which Bomberg (2002, 35) calls the “interactive character of
Europeanization”– meaning that the parties are not passive to the process, but are actively
engaged in the process for their own gain. However Eurosceptical the Greens were at the onset,
the involvement in EU institutions and processes has led to a “mellowing” of ideologies and a
positive shift in their EU attitudes and former opposition to certain EU policies. Bomberg also
claims organizational changes and changing patterns of party competition in green parties due
to Europeanization, which is associated with the increasing politicization of the EU
domestically, and rivalry with other Eurosceptical parties. This is perhaps expected of a
relatively new party family, which should be more prone to change and less bound by party
traditions. The European electoral arena has always been important for green parties, as they
were not initially strong in their domestic party systems and today tend to do better in European
than national elections (Rüdig 2019, 4). All in all, green parties have certainly taken advantage
of the benefits that EU integration has brought; resources that they would not have access to at
a national level.
Research by Hellström (2008a) has concluded that the majority of European parties tend to
position themselves as slightly more positive towards the EU over time and that the significance
of left-right ideology has weakened. Party ideology is still important in party positions on the
EU, and especially so because of the influence of European party families, but it is one
significant factor among several others.
The subject of Irish parties’ shifting relations with the EU has not been extensively researched
during the past decade, with exceptions such as Costello (2017; 2020) and Murphy (2019). A
lot of attention has, however, been given to public support and opinion on the EU and European
integration (see for example Eichenberg & Dalton 2007; Guinaudeau & Schnatterer 2019;
Simpson 2019). The results of the first rounds of referendums, with the Nice Treaty being
rejected by the public in 2001 and the Lisbon Treaty rejected in 2008, are cited by Simpson
(2019, 511) as a potential for “emergence of a new popular scepticism” towards the EU,
12although we have yet to see any evidence of such scepticism in Ireland. In the founding member
states, there is a gap between public support for the principle of European integration and the
utilitarian support – i.e. the perceived national and personal benefits of European integration –
however, this gap does not exist e.g. in Ireland, where high public support is observed in both
dimensions and where the public opinion has been, compared to other member states, relatively
stable over time (Guinaudeau & Schnatterer 2019, 1189–1191). High support by the Irish public
is also given to specific EU policy areas, such as the single European currency and the Common
Security and Defence Policy (CSDP) – in fact, the only area where the public is divided seems
to be in the possibility of future EU enlargement (Karv 2019, 320–322).
It should be mentioned that the Irish voter is considered as somewhat of an anomaly within
political science. Party loyalties are shallow (Marsh 2019), with the PR-STV (proportional
representation by single transferable vote) electoral system allowing voters to express their
preferences within but also across parties in the same election and being beneficial for
independent candidates. This was illustrated exceptionally well in the 2019 local and European
elections, where the differences in support were striking, contradicting the notion that parties
perform at the same level when local and European elections take place during the same time.
Furthermore, the Irish party system as a whole requires some attention, as it has several unique
characteristics. For one, the strong centrist “catch-all” parties distinguish the Irish party system
from other countries in Europe (Murphy & Hayward 2009), along with the absence of
successful right-wing populist parties. This absence is notable considering the fact that Ireland
meets many of the conditions that favour prosperity of those parties (O’Malley 2008), such as
high levels of immigration, convergence on the left and right with parties with parties moving
more towards the center, and an electoral system that allows the emergence of new parties and
is suitable for independent candidates. O’Malley further argues that such ideological space is
already taken up by Sinn Féin, whose voters are more likely have negative attitudes towards
immigrants which is rather noteworthy. Costello (2017) hypothesizes that if the immigration
issue and the future of the EU become more politicized in Europe, we should expect that Sinn
Féin will adjust their positions to reflect their voters’ opinions, particularly if new parties that
further emphasize these issues should arise. Still, the hypothesis that parties adapt to reflect the
voters’ opinions of the EU as a rational vote-maximizing strategy was previously rejected by
Hellström (2008b). The opposite, however, that voter opinion is to some extent influenced by
the parties, has turned out to be true.
132.2 Europeanization in the Irish party system
As stated before, the public opinion on the CSDP is highly favourable (Karv 2019). This is an
upward trend that seems to mirror the stances of the parties. A 2009 study of Irish parties’
attitudes towards military and security policies – from positions on Irish neutrality to the
European Union Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) and its integral part the
European Security and Defence Policy (ESDP, renamed the CSDP after the Lisbon Treaty) –
spanning four decades showed that Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael and Labour all moved steadily from
neutrality towards a more maximalist ESDP (Devine 2009), while the Green Party were more
inclined to maintain its position up until the 2000s, when the only party left supporting Irish
neutrality was Sinn Féin. This suggests a certain level of Europeanization of party positions, at
least concerning military and security policy up until the 2000s. The upward trend of support
for more maximalist ESDP in all parties but Sinn Féin is noteworthy, as this is a policy area
that relates to the de facto sovereignty and neutrality of a country. As Frampton (2005, 236) has
noted, “sovereignty, nationalism and independence” is at the core of Sinn Féin, and it should
perhaps not be surprising that this is mirrored in their stance on Europe.
Nevertheless does Maillot (2009) argue that Sinn Féin’s relationship with the EU has changed
since the 1990s, from “outright opposition to European integration to critical engagement” and
that the programmatic changes in the party meets Ladrech’s (2002) expectations for
Europeanization, although these changes were more likely motivated by nationalist priorities
than by loyalty to the supranational institution. It is argued that the party’s strategy to include
European integration, while maintaining a critical position, has been fruitful in European
elections. Similarly, in the 1997–2002 period, while the major parties shifted somewhat from
pro-European integration to more moderate positions (Benoit 2009), Sinn Féin remained
unchanged and the Green Party turned from Eurosceptic towards a more moderate position.
Likewise, Bolleyer & Panke (2009) have found evidence of Europeanization in the Green Party
during the early 2000s.
Party attitudes regarding the EU also seem to lean more positive in times of crisis. Research by
Costello (2020) on parliamentary debates has shown a certain “rally around the flag” effect
among Irish political elites, after and because of the Brexit crisis, that is most prominent in the
mainstream parties. This phenomenon is defined by the development of consensus among the
political elite, including the opposition parties, to refrain from criticism of the national
government during an international crisis. It is argued by Costello that a similar effect would
14occur not only towards the national government, but also regional institutions such as the EU
during a crisis that involves them and the nation state. Also, this elite consensus is said to
increase public support for the government (Groeling & Baum 2008, 1066). Costello (2020, 2)
claims that when the EU appeared to champion the interests of Ireland during the Brexit crisis,
and in particular in regard to the problems with the Northern Ireland border, politicians became
more wary of appearing to criticize the EU and, by extension, to undermine the national
interests of Ireland. It should be highlighted that according to this research, the support or lack
of criticism was by definition due to the fact that the EU was furthering Irish national interests,
and not necessarily because of politicians’ shifting loyalties from the national government to
the EU. For example, the support from Sinn Féin politicians, where the change from before
Brexit to after Brexit was most apparent, was the most significant during the timing of the
backstop agreement – the effect should thus be explainable in this case by rational arguments
(Costello 2020, 12). In contrast, it is shown by Rauh, Bes, and Schoonvelde (2020) in a study
of political elite communication during the Eurocrisis that national leaders faced with growing
Euroscepticism at home tend to undermine and attach more negative sentiments to European
integration in their communication, while the European Commissioners in a similar situation
tend to further defend it. Murphy (2019) has claimed it is evident that Brexit has caused a degree
of Europeanization of Irish parties in the short term, but that these forces may not be resilient,
depending on what long term impacts Brexit has on Ireland and on the future of the EU. In the
short term, however, it appears that the Irish “uploading” and “downloading”, of national
interests to EU level and vice versa, has become more prominent and the commitment to the
Union has intensified.
To conclude, there is a variety of literature on Irish policy positions towards the EU up until the
2010s, and the consensus seems to be that there has been a positive shift in most parties, even
in the previously Eurosceptical Green Party and Sinn Féin. The literature on this type of party
attitudes is, however, sparse in the post-Eurocrisis period, and the Europeanization of political
parties has not been excessively studied.
3. Theory
What follows is discussions of different approaches to European integration and the concept of
Europeanization, its connection to the research questions and how this is operationalized for
the purpose of this study.
153.1 Europeanization
The research problems of this thesis are approached by applying the Europeanization theory
and concept. The concept of Europeanization is similar to that of globalization, but with a
geographical delimitation and the addition of a “pre-existing national framework which
mediates … adjustment” (Ladrech 1994, 71). Europeanization is a process which explains the
impacts that the European political arena has on national polities, and it has through the years
been defined in various ways by different scholars. Some scholars imply that Europeanization
is a top-down process, where the EU makes the rules and the domestic systems implement them,
with indicators such as national parliamentary activity around EU matters and the EU in
national legislature (Raunio 2009), thus reorienting (Ladrech 1994, 70) the workings of the
national political system. A somewhat more nuanced definition by Radaelli (2000, 4–6) refers
to the concept as a “construction, diffusion, and institutionalization” of formal and informal
rules and norms, shared beliefs, and procedures, which are decided at the EU level and
incorporated by domestic systems. Nevertheless, the top-down Europeanization concept
explains how the EU produces domestic change – but only if the domestic system is not
previously aligned with the European one, i.e. if there is a misfit between the domestic policies
and processes and the EU (Börzel & Panke 2016, 116). Conversely, the bottom-up approach
describes how member states can influence the politics and institutions of the EU by
successfully “uploading” their domestic preferences to the EU level and thereby influencing
policies, again, if there is a misfit between the domestic and European preferences (Börzel &
Panke 2015, 117–119). Ultimately, Europeanization is, as Saurugger and Radaelli (2008) call
it; “a process of power generation” among EU institutions, member states and civil society.
It is important to emphasize that Europeanization should, however, not be considered
equivalent to convergence (although this can be an effect of Europeanization, the effect can
also be divergence) or harmonization between member states. Also, Europeanization is not
equivalent to European integration, but Europeanization is rather an effect of European
integration. Furthermore, any traces of Europeanization will be expected to look different
across different domestic political systems, and within those systems. Ladrech also calls the
benefits of participating in the EP for national parties “indirect at best” as the EP does not have
any authority over the national space and EU resources cannot be directly transferred to national
parties (Ladrech 2002, 395–396).
16Börzel and Panke (2016, 113) have argued that Europeanization matters for two main reasons:
one, the ever-broadening integration affects every policy area of every member state, and
likewise, it affects citizens, institutions and processes in the domestic system. This is, of course,
also a matter of sovereignty for the member states, as they outsource power to the European
level of politics. Second, the effects of Europeanization are not always limited to the member
states, but also influencing governance in third countries – neighbouring countries, and also in
the so-called candidate countries. For example, Norway is not a member of the EU, and yet,
they are a part of the Schengen area. Nonetheless, the effects of Europeanization differ
depending on the member state and policy area – Börzel and Panke claim that Ireland, among
others, are more Europeanized in environmental policy because of their “environmental
latecomer” status (Börzel & Panke 2016, 115), compared to for example the Nordic countries.
How can the possible effects of Europeanization be observed at the national level? Peter Mair,
in his (2000) widely cited research on Europeanization, concluded that there are little direct
effects of Europeanization on the member states’ national party systems. The format and
mechanics of the national party systems appear to be unaffected, even when it comes to party
competition with new, Eurosceptic parties because it is argued by Mair that these parties
generally have little impact on the domestic system. Indirect effects, such as Green parties’
strengthened credibility in the national arena due to their engagement in European elections
(Mair 2000, 36), can emerge, but the party systems as a whole appear to be resilient to effects
of Europeanization. Mair (2000, 48) further holds the belief that Europe matters mostly to
politicians and the bureaucracies of government, and that it does not necessitate involving the
electorate to any larger extent.
3.2 Theories on European integration
Besides the Europeanization concept, there are a few theoretical approaches to understanding
European integration and the effects that the European political arena has on the member states.
Intergovernmentalism refers to a more rationalist view where European states participate in
bargaining for mutually advantageous purposes (Hooghe & Marks 2019), and where European
integration is a direct effect of the cooperation or competition between them. The
intergovernmental bargaining is thus directed by the needs and interests of the national
governments, who are the central actors in shaping European integration – suggesting a more
bottom-up approach where the processes of the political institutions of Europe are considered
17less influential (Karv 2019, 41–42). Intergovernmentalism thus assumes rationality by
governments who participate in bargaining at the European (or regional) level in accordance
with their national interests, and also, that inter-state bargaining and further European
integration takes place when the participating member states see enough concrete national
benefits for it.
Neo-functionalist theories of European integration involve the concept of spillover effects
(Haas 1958, referenced in Strøby Jensen 2016, 54–57) – functional, political, and cultivated –
into the domestic area, due to repeated interactions and engagement of national actors in
supranational decision-making, in the European political arena. For example, political spillover
is the process that supposedly happens because political elites shift their focus to the European
level, due to their involvement in supranational cooperation. In a similar way, the elite
socialization hypothesis predicts that over time, actors tend to develop supranational loyalties,
to the European level of governance, and preferences, oriented towards more European norms
(Strøby Jensen 2016, 59). This integration process is assumed to be path-dependent and self-
reinforcing (Hooghe & Marks 2019), shifting political elites’ and citizen’s views in a more pro-
European direction, which in turn leads to further integration that was perhaps not planned for.
This particular theory does however not fit into our case, where the Green Party and Sinn Féin
have not been consistently involved in EU decision-making in the EP over the years, and still
adapted to more pro-EU and pro-integration stances, and it would also be difficult to prove.
The neo-functionalist point of view is also criticized by Mair (2000, 38), as the national parties
tend to be effective in keeping their representatives in the EP bound to their domestic
organizations despite new cross-national alliances that should emerge in the European arena.
Mair’s analysis does not, however, account for impacts of Europeanization on individual
political parties in these national party systems. Political parties are very much central to
Europeanization processes, as they represent the links between voters and EU institutions and
work to legitimize them and EU governance (Poguntke et al. 2007). Somewhat contradictory
to the above discussion on the flaws of the elite socialization hypothesis and political spillover
effects, Poguntke et al. (2007) propose the possibility of the so-called “EU specialists” within
parties (most of all MEPs, but also other actors well-briefed on EU affairs) triggering a
Europeanization effect on the national parties that are shifting towards European integration,
when their increased influence within the national party is combined with the socializing effect
of the EP on members. This socializing effect is said to be “rapid, though gentle” on new
18members of the EP (Franklin & Scarrow 1999, 45). Mair’s (2000) remark that national parties
are well inclined to hold their respective MEPs accountable to the domestic polity has also been
contested. Poguntke et al. (2007) highlight the risk that these mechanisms do not necessarily
work as intended, and that the “EU specialists” thus have gained a greater influence on the
direction of the party activities. Raunio (2000) shows evidence of MEPs independence from
national parties, that MEPs have gained influence in general (and in small parties in particular),
and that scrutiny from the national polity comes in the form of consultations rather than outright
instructions (voting). MEPs are also in the unique position where they answer not only to their
domestic counterparts, but also to their European Parliamentary group that they are affiliated
with, according to political ideology rather than nationality of the members. Thus, there is an
argument for not only political parties being central actors in Europeanization processes, but
actors within those parties as well.
3.3 Operationalization and relevance
Going back to the purpose and aim of this study, we are interested in examining how both Sinn
Féin and the Green Party have adapted to the impact of the EU during the past decade. The
programmatic changes in the parties through 2009–2020 and how this is manifested in national
versus European elections are of interest. The assumption is thus that there has been a process
of Europeanization in both parties and that recognizable changes have been taking place due to
that process. Therefore, a top-down approach to Europeanization is employed, as the interest is
in what impact Europe has on domestic actors – political parties.
Making the link between Europeanization theory and observable patterns and behavior in
political parties requires a framework for empirical analysis. In this thesis, we rely on the
pioneering framework developed by Ladrech (2002), who explains Europeanization as broadly
referring to the integration of Europe on the “politics and policies of its member states as well
as the process of enhancing European-level political institutions” (Ladrech 2002, 389). In other
words, it is the process of actors responding to European integration. Ladrech’s work on
Europeanization puts political parties in focus, as actors being impacted by European
integration and responding to it in their primary environment, the national political system. This
view on Europeanization assumes that it is a top-down process, where the EU (and politics at
the European level) influences institutions in its member states (and in third countries),
triggering domestic change (Börzel & Panke 2016).
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