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For Whom the EU Tolls? A Comparative Analysis of European Publics and Policy Agenda Representation

Comparative Politics
Democracy
Public Policy
Public Opinion
Francesco Visconti
Università degli Studi di Milano
Francesco Visconti
Università degli Studi di Milano

Abstract

Understanding the relationship between public opinion and public policy is fundamental to evaluate the quality of democratic political representation. Scholars have underlined that a common European mood for integration exists, with EU citizens sharing variation over time – as well as a covariation with real EU integration. This article investigates two related and complementary aspects of policy representation. First, it addresses whether citizens have homogeneous or heterogeneous policy priorities in fifteen EU countries across a number of segmentations (gender, age, education, and ideology) using Eurobarometer data. Secondly, whether some sub-group policy priorities have a stronger covariation with the agenda set out by the EU Council. If political equality is a desirable feature of a democracy, decision-making processes at the national and supra-national level should equally weight the policy priorities of each European citizen, so that no structural inequality exists and everyone has the same chance of influencing the EU. The presence (or absence) of different publics (in terms of average level of issue salience and its updating) allows testing for this consistency. The article tries to shed new light on how public opinion priorities affect the policy agenda of the EU, an institution whose decisions have been often accused of democratic deficit.