"Group switching", "Europarty switching" and the (re)structuration of transnational cleavages: The example of the competition between two TAN-Europarties (ECR and ID)

This paper is interested in two interrelated phenomena of "Europarty politics": "group switching" in the European parliament (whereby individual MEPs change their political group affiliation in the EP during the same mandate, or in successive mandates); and "Europarty switching" (whereby national parties change their affiliation from one Europarty and/or one political group to another). It investigates the linkage between those apparently localized and limited phenomena, with the larger process of institutionalization of transnational party organizations - the "Europarties" and the restructuration of transnational cleavages. I hypothesize that the progressive institutional (and financial) consolidation of Europarties has given important strategic incentives to party realignments within and outside the EP, which in turn have led to the restructuring, the clarification and the consolidation of transnational cleavages. This work is based on the recent completion of a database, listing all Members of the European Parliament (EP) since 1979 (N=4195). It provides, among other data, the national and European party affiliations of all MEPs throughout their successive mandates in the EP. This database makes it possible to analyse the "partisan trajectory" of MEPs in the EP over a long period. The paper exemplifies this strain of research by looking into the competition and differentiation between two apparently similar groups and Europarties (from an ideological point of view) such as the ECR (the "European Conservative and Reformists") and ID ("Identity and Democracy"), which are competing for the representation of the "Eurosceptic" political segment, and more broadly for the transnational representation of TAN parties. To this end, the paper will combine methods in an attempt to distinguish between electoral-parliamentary strategies, and the socio-political and socio-cultural dynamics underlying these evolutions. The paper is intended as a contribution to the study of cleavage politics and the transformations of European democracy.