Indirect Effects of Eurosceptic Messages on Citizen Attitudes toward Domestic Politics

Abstract

Does criticism of the European Union (EU) by elites cultivate support for democratic values among ordinary citizens? All Eurosceptic messages are critical of European integration; they do not all vilify similar aspects of the European Union. This article proposes a framing model of the effects of Euroscepticism on citizens' domestic political attitudes. EU critiques that are framed in terms of ‘democratic deficit’ lead citizens to consider which political values are desirable in democratic society and may promote support for liberal democratic norms among citizens exposed to these messages. Eurosceptic rhetoric is built into framing experiments that vary the content of EU‐critical messages. Subjects in the United Kingdom and Bulgaria are randomly exposed to a ‘cultural threat’ or ‘democratic deficit’ criticism of the EU. Both Eurosceptic frames reduce support for integration, but subjects exposed to the ‘deficit frame’ more strongly embrace liberal democratic values. Under certain conditions, Euroscepticism may carry benefits for representative democracy.

Personality and Euroscepticism: The Impact of Personality on Attitudes Towards the EU

“…Knowing that anti-EU media discourse contributes to euroscepticism (e.g. Abbarno & Zapryanova, 2013;Lecheler & Vreese, 2010), we can now add that framing effects differ according to personal predispositions, providing us with a better understanding of how framing effects affect EU opinion formation in real-life politics.…”

“…For example, frames stressing the risks associated with EU integration make individuals less likely to support EU integration (Schuck & Vreese, 2006). An experiment framing the EU as a 'cultural threat' or emphasizing its 'democratic deficit' showed that both frames led to less EU support (Abbarno & Zapryanova, 2013). Furthermore, exposure to different news frames affects the understanding of EU enlargement (Lecheler & Vreese, 2010).…”

Recategorizing political frames: a systematic review of metaphorical framing in experiments on political communication

“…While a large majority of metaphorical generic frames emphasize the competitive nature of politics, only very few metaphorical issue-specific frames conceptualize politics as a battle like the 'image attack frame' (Sung, 2000). For example, the conceptual metaphor of THE EUROPEAN UNION IS MONEY was inferred from the 'democracy deficit frame' (Abbarno & Zapryanova, 2013), because according to the MacMillan dictionary, the word deficit is an economical term referring to insufficient money. Likewise, the conceptual metaphor of HOUSING POLICY IS A BIO-LOGICAL PROCESS was deduced from the 'lifecycle housing frame' (Goetz, 2008), since the dictionary defines the word lifecycle as a biological process of changes that happen to an organism during its lifetime.…”

Europhiles or Eurosceptics? Comparing the European policies of the Labour Party and the Liberal Democrats

“…This situation In very few other member states has EU membership been as controversial amongst mainstream parties as in the UK. What is more, the recent successes of the UK Independence Party (UKIP), which calls for EU withdrawal and has won a considerable number of seats in local and European elections, as well as one seat in the general election of 2015, has contributed to a EU-hostile environment (Abbarno and Zapryanova, 2013). By contrast, the Labour Party and the Liberal Democrats are often portrayed as BritainÕs ÔEurophilesÕ.…”