The book provides an in-depth analysis of Eurosceptics’ strategies in the European Parliament. It explores the paradoxical situation of Eurosceptic MEPs: particularly successful during EP elections, how then, once elected, do they operate in a political system they oppose? This book analyses how Eurosceptic MEPs conceive and carry out their mandate within the institution. On the basis of more than 100 interviews, it proposes a typology of four strategies developed by these actors. It also explains the diversity of Eurosceptics’ strategies, showing the relevance of the interaction between the institutional context and the individuals’ preferences. With the growing success of Eurosceptic parties and the challenges they pose to the future of integration, this study also reflects on the consequences of their presence for the EP and for the legitimacy of the EU. This book will be of interest to students and scholars of European politics, European integration, comparative politics, legislative studies and political parties.

This set provides a comprehensive review of Euroscepticism in contemporary European politics. Leading scholars address the strength and breadth of Euroscepticism across a range of EU member and candidate states, and draw out comparative lessons on the nature of political parties and party systems.

Is Euroscepticism still suited to analyze the variegated nature of opposition to the EU? Starting from this question, this book critically reviews Euroscepticism, reconceptualizes it in terms of political opposition and discovers, disentangles and explains patterns of EU-opposition within the European Parliament (EP). Distinguishing between “what the EU does” and “what the EU is”, the research elaborates an index of parties’ positioning “measuring” it through the speeches that parties’ deliver in the EP. The EP is the “perfect laboratory” where decisions concerning EU-policies are taken and the future EU-trajectories are shaped. Besides delineating a set of guidelines categorizing parties, the book concludes that their positioning varies along two main axes: the pro-anti-EU-system and the pro-anti-EU-establishment. From a normative perspective, the research argues for the growing importance of the “cumulation hypothesis”: if criticism remains unheard within the European elitist construct, such criticism will transform itself into rejection.

After decades of steady progress in terms of gender and sexual rights, several parts of Europe are facing new waves of resistance to a so-called ‘gender ideology’ or ‘gender theory’. Opposition to progressive gender equality is manifested in challenges to marriage equality, abortion, reproductive technologies, gender mainstreaming, sex education, sexual liberalism, transgender rights, antidiscrimination policies and even to the notion of gender itself. This book examines how an academic concept of gender, when translated by religious organizations such as the Roman Catholic Church, can become a mobilizing tool for, and the target of, social movements. How can we explain religious discourses about sex difference turning intro massive street demonstrations? How do forms of organization and protest travel across borders? Who are the actors behind these movements? This collection is a transnational and comparative attempt to better understand anti-gender mobilizations in Europe. It focuses on national manifestations in eleven European countries, including Russia, from massive street protests to forms of resistance such as email bombarding and street vigils. It examines the intersection of religious politics with rising populism and nationalistic anxieties in contemporary Europe.

In contrast to the wealth of studies on progress towards gender equality, opposition to gender equality is rarely studied, which makes it difficult to understand the positive and negative dynamics of gender equality as a political project. The first of its kind, this timely collection examines the potential and challenges of our current scholarship on understanding opposition to gender+ equality in Europe. Divided into three parts, Mieke Verloo and her team of international experts begin Varieties of Opposition to Gender Equality in Europe by theorizing the dynamics of opposition to gender equality policies in Europe. Part Two highlights oppositional actors (politicians, governments, citizens, policy makers, churches) and political arenas (parliament, courts, Internet), as well as different and opposing visions of gender+ equality. Part Three concludes with a framework for understanding oppositional dynamics on gender equality change. Setting the agenda for future research, this book will be useful for students of gender and politics, social movements, European integration, and policy studies, as well as for high-level policymakers, students, and feminist activists alike. It will be an inspiration to thinkers and doers and to scholars and political actors.

The project of European integration now spans Europe, but in becoming bigger and broader the European Union has brought on itself significant criticism. As the EU becomes deeper, wider, and more ambitious, so opposition and scepticism become more prominent for citizens and more problematic for elites. Concerns about a 'democratic deficit' and the distance between European elites and publics have come to be a common feature of European politics. As a consequence Euroscepticism has become a part of the terrain of conflict between political parties across Europe. Opposing Europe? provides the first comprehensive review of party-based Euroscepticism across the breadth of contemporary Europe, and the first in-depth comparative academic study of Euroscepticism. This, the first of two volumes, is made up of chapters that map, describe, and analyse Euroscepticism in the party systems of a range of countries and the European Parliament. Each is written to a common frame of reference that differentiates 'hard' and 'soft' Euroscepticism. The volume looks across Europe and includes EU member states and candidate and non-member states in order to draw out comparative lessons that relate to the nature of political parties, party systems, and the domestic politics of European integration. Opposing Europe? is a groundbreaking, 'state of the art' book that provides a definitive review of a key issue in European politics. It is also one of the few attempts to integrate the fields of EU studies with both West European and East European studies in order to draw lessons about the way in which the EU interacts with domestic politics in both member and non-member states. Examining the way that parties position themselves and compete on the European issue provides powerful lessons for the trajectory of the European integration project more generally and on the prospects for the emergence of a European political system and polity.

Abandoning the usual Cold War–oriented narrative of postwar European protest and opposition movements, this volume offers an innovative, interdisciplinary, and comprehensive perspective on two decades of protest and social upheaval in postwar Europe. It examines the mutual influences and interactions among dissenters in Western Europe, the Warsaw Pact countries, and the nonaligned European countries, and shows how ideological and political developments in the East and West were interconnected through official state or party channels as well as a variety of private and clandestine contacts. Focusing on issues arising from the cross-cultural transfer of ideas, the adjustments to institutional and political frameworks, and the role of the media in staging protest, the volume examines the romanticized attitude of Western activists to violent liberation movements in the Third World and the idolization of imprisoned RAF members as martyrs among left-wing circles across Western Europe.