The resistible rise of populism in Europe - Martens Centre [PDF]

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European View Chairman

Advisory Board

Mikuláš Dzurinda

Antonio López-Istúriz Christian Kremer Luc Vandeputte Galina Fomenchenko Roland Freudenstein José Luis Fontalba

President of the Wilfried Martens Centre for European Studies

Editorial Board Carl Bildt former Prime Minister, Sweden

Elmar Brok Member of the European Parliament, Germany

John Bruton former Prime Minister, Ireland

Mário David former Vice-President of the European People’s Party, Portugal

Ingo Friedrich Chairman of the Forum for European Studies, Germany

Editor-in-Chief Tomi Huhtanen Assistant Editor-in-Chief Ingrid Habets Assistant Editors Marvin DuBois Communicative English Team Sofia Karttunen Loredana Teodorescu

Vicente Martínez-Pujalte López former Member of Parliament, Spain

Chris Patten former Member of the European Commission, United Kingdom

Jan Petersen former Minister of Foreign Affairs, Norway

For editorial and article submission inquiries please contact: European View Editor-in-Chief 20, Rue du Commerce – 1000 Brussels, Belgium e-mail: [email protected] Tel.: +32 2 300 8004, Fax: +32 300 8011 www.martenscentre.eu

Hans-Gert Pöttering Chairman of Konrad Adenauer Foundation, Germany

Alexander Stubb former Prime Minister, Finland

József Szájer Vice-Chairman of the EPP Group in the European Parliament, Hungary

Andrej Umek former Minister for Science and Technology, Slovenia

Yannis Valinakis former Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, Greece

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This publication receives funding from the European Parliament. The European Parliament and the Wilfried Martens Centre for European Studies assume no responsibility for facts or opinions expressed in this publication or their subsequent use. Sole responsibility lies on the author of the article.

The Wilfried Martens Centre for European Studies (previously the Centre for European Studies) was established in 2007 as the political foundation and official think tank of the European People’s Party (EPP). It embodies a pan-European mind-set based on centre-right, Christian Democrat, conservative and like-minded political values. It serves as a framework for national political foundations linked to member parties of the EPP, with currently 30 foundations members. The Martens Centre takes part in the preparation of EPP programmes and policy documents. It organises seminars and training on EU policies and on the process of European integration. The Martens Centre also contributes to formulating EU and national public policies. It produces research studies and books, policy briefs, and the twice-yearly European View journal. Its research activities are divided into six clusters:

party structures and EU institutions, economic and social policies, EU foreign policy, environment and energy, values and religion, and new societal challenges. Through its papers, publication launches, conferences and online activities, the Martens Centre offers a platform for discussion among experts, politicians, policymakers and the European public. At the beginning of 2014, the Martens Centre was renamed in honour of its late President and founder, Wilfried Martens, the EPP’s long-standing President and former Prime Minister of Belgium. The Martens Centre has four main goals: advancing centre-right thought, contributing to the formulation of EU and national policies, serving as a framework for national political foundations and academics, and stimulating public debate about the EU.

http://www.martenscentre.eu

European View The Resistible Rise of Populism in Europe Volume 15 • Number 2 • December 2016 EDITORIAL The resistible rise of populism in Europe Mikuláš Dzurinda 171 POPULISM AND EUROPE PEGIDA and the Alternative für Deutschland: two sides of the same coin? Karsten Grabow 173 Populism in Spain: an analysis of Podemos Javier Zarzalejos 183 The political power of evoking fear: the shining example of Germany’s anti-TTIP campaign movement Matthias Bauer 193 From dreams to reality: the challenges of Italy’s Five Star Movement Margherita Movarelli 213 The crisis of European identity and awakening of civil society Martin Mycielski 223 The Norwegian Progress Party: an established populist party Johan Bjerkem 233 CURRENT AFFAIRS Political communication in the (iconic) Trump epoch Giovanni Maddalena 245 Do not trust people: lessons from political economy on how to counter misinformation and lies Juha-Pekka Nurvala 253

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Media discourse on the refugee crisis: on what have the Greek, German and British press focused? Stergios Fotopoulos and Margarita Kaimaklioti 265 The Visegrád Group in the EU: 2016 as a turning-point? Milan Nič 281 The impact of demographic developments in Africa on Europe Ruth Gursch-Adam and Lívia Benková 291 Consolidating pluralism under the terrorist threat: the Tunisian case and the Algerian experience Dario Cristiani 305 ‘Nobody told me we could do this’: why fiscal union is not the answer to eurozone woes Eoin Drea 315 Complementing traditional diplomacy: regional and local authorities going international Filippo Terruso 325 Are there formulas for successful diplomatic agreements? Jorge Mestre-Jorda 335 SATIRICAL REVIEW Joke theory Roland Freudenstein 347 FROM MARTENS CENTRE RESEARCH Germany and the Juncker Plan IN FOCUS: three steps to reconcile fiscal consolidation and investment Eoin Drea and Simon Conry 351 No illusions, no regrets: the current struggle to reform Ukraine Maksym Popovych 353 From disapproval to change? Russia’s population may surprise Putin at the next elections Vladimir Milov 355 The bear in sheep’s clothing: Russia’s government-funded organisations in the EU Vladislava Vojtíšková, Vít Novotný, Hubertus Schmid-Schmidsfelden and Kristina Potapova 357 What the EU can, may and should do to support Georgia Teona Lavrelashvili 359 The Tsar and his business serfs: Russian oligarchs and SMEs did not surprise Putin at the elections Ilya Zaslavskiy 361

European View DOI 10.1007/s12290-016-0423-5

EDITORIAL

The resistible rise of populism in Europe Mikuláš Dzurinda 

© The Author(s) 2016. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com

Parliamentary elections across Europe have seen an increasing number of votes being cast in support of populist parties. These parties come from diverse ideological backgrounds but they are linked by their characterisation of politics as a fight between the good and the bad: the defenders of the oppressed citizens versus the supposedly corrupt elite. Making vast promises to their electorate, these parties challenge the central elements of democratic thinking and practice. In Poland, Norway and Finland, right-wing populist parties are now members of the governing coalitions. This trend is disconcerting as it threatens the opportunities for established democratic parties to deliver solid policy outcomes. The history of Europe shows us that populist movements have traditionally fed on economic, social and political crises. The current refugee and eurozone crises, among others, are providing ample opportunity for populists to increase their influence. Populists are skilled in appealing to people’s emotions through sensational narratives, myths and fears that plant the seeds of distrust in a constructed enemy. The simple solutions to complex problems offered by their charismatic leaders have attracted many voters.

M. Dzurinda (*)  Wilfried Martens Centre for European Studies, Rue du Commerce 20, 1000 Brussels, Belgium e-mail: [email protected]

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However, it remains to be seen whether the current populist movements will succeed in meeting the electorates’ expectations. As I was prime minister of Slovakia at a pivotal time for my country, I have experienced the value of open and in-depth communication and of finding solutions within the framework of liberal and representative democracy. Delivering sound and balanced policies is of utmost importance to ensuring that problems are properly addressed and growth continues in the future. What Europe needs is action. We need a structurally reformed Europe with real implementation. To remain strong and viable societies in the long term, we need to reform our social, educational and health care systems. There is no sense in pretending we are solving the problems that exist: we have to solve them. Populists are winning through their strong words. We, especially the Christian Democrats, can only win through strong actions. This issue of the European View addresses the problem of populism in today’s Europe. The interaction between populist parties and conventional parties is discussed, along with proposals for potential ways forward. Furthermore, the role and influence of political communication are in our focus, as are the refugee and economic crises, which can be identified as potential breeding grounds for populism. From this issue on, the European View has been reformed to include topics unrelated to the main theme, so as to enable discussion on more than one subject. Therefore, the reader will also find insightful contributions on the collaboration among the Visegrád Four, the relationship between political economy and misinformation, the use of words in the media regarding the refugee crisis and the tactics of diplomacy. I hope that the work of our authors will provoke constructive ideas among our readers on how to work towards a party landscape free from populism. Achieving this is vital to Europe’s future. Open Access This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits any use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author(s) and the source are credited.

Mikuláš Dzurinda is president of the Wilfried Martens Centre for European Studies.

European View DOI 10.1007/s12290-016-0419-1

ARTICLE

PEGIDA and the Alternative für Deutschland: two sides of the same coin? Karsten Grabow 

© The Author(s) 2016. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com

Abstract Over the last two years Germany has experienced a significant growth of nationalist, anti-Islamic and xenophobic forces. While the movement Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the West (Patriotische Europäer gegen die Islamisierung des Abendlandes, PEGIDA) has been mobilising protest on the ground in the Saxon capital, the Alternative for Germany (Alternative für Deutschland, AfD) has continually increased its number of seats in state parliaments, with a fundamental rejection of the refugee policy of the federal government. Since the election of a new leadership of the AfD in the summer of 2015, one can observe signs of rapprochement between these two organisations. In this paper I argue that the AfD and PEGIDA are two sides of the same coin. Further approximation and collaboration will depend on the outcome of lasting internal power struggles inside the AfD. Keywords  Germany | Anti-Islamic protest | Radicalisation | Right-wing and national populism

K. Grabow (*)  Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung, Klingelhöferstraße 23, 10785 Berlin, Germany e-mail: [email protected]

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Introduction Compared to its neighbours, Germany is a latecomer when it comes to having a relevant and nationwide right-wing populist party. Attempts to establish such parties previously were either locally or temporarily restricted, or failed because of resistance from the established democratic forces, including the media. Moreover, far-right parties suffered from internal disputes over leadership and strategy, and problems demarcating themselves from the right-wing extremist camp. Their major problem was, however, that they could not build up alliances with like-minded social movements. Things changed with the foundation of the Alternative for Germany (Alternative für Deutschland, AfD) in April 2013 and the Patriotic Europeans against the Islamisation of the West (Patriotische Europäer gegen die Islamisierung des Abendlandes, PEGIDA) movement, which entered the scene for the first time in October 2014 in Dresden, the capital of Saxony. Although these two events were separated by a gap of more than a year, and although in the beginning the AfD was primarily an anti-euro protest party with some nationalist and anti-immigration influences that it tried very hard to repress, some representatives of the party’s nationalist wing, such as the leaders of the AfD group in the state parliaments of Brandenburg and Thuringia, Alexander Gauland and Björn Höcke, respectively, immediately recognised PEGIDA as a natural ally (Vorländer et al. 2016, 40; Korsch 2016a, 120). At the top level, however, the leaders of both organisations at this time were reluctant to move closer together. Bernd Lucke and other AfD officials of the misleadingly labelled ‘economic-liberal’ wing1 were sceptical about the true character of PEGIDA, considering it too xenophobic, too nationalist and too radical, and therefore repellent to potential voters. For their part, the hardcore PEGIDA activists accused the Lucke-led AfD of being too accommodating. PEGIDA’s front man, Lutz Bachmann, insulted the AfD, even calling it a toothless mainstream party (Korsch 2016a, 114). The indifferent relationship between the AfD and PEGIDA cooled even further when Frauke Petry, then chair of the AfD in Saxony and leader of the AfD parliamentary group in the Saxon parliament, called for Bachmann’s immediate resignation, after the PEGIDA founder labelled refugees ‘scum and brutes’ and posted Hitlerposed selfies on social media (Korsch 2016a, 121–2). His reaction was instant: Bachmann declared the AfD a mainstream party of careerists that was no longer an ally. The relationship between the two organisations was close to a complete breakdown when PEGIDA decided to compete against the AfD with a candidate of its own in the

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Bernd Lucke and his party fellows Hans-Olaf Henkel and Joachim Starbatty—all Members of the European Parliament now in the AfD splinter group Alliance for Progress and Departure—justified their rejection of the euro with their obtrusively claimed economic expertise, even though, while the members of that wing of the party certainly advocated a liberal market economy, Lucke, at least, was the opposite of a ‘liberal’. His leadership of the party closely resembled a dictatorship, and documents show that he sat on a radicalisation strategy in order to heat up protest potential for street mobilisation and to mobilise right-wing and xenophobic voters (Spiegel Online 2015a, b). Under his leadership the AfD campaigned with right-wing populist slogans (‘no immigration to the German welfare state’, ‘guarded and safe borders instead of border crime’, and so forth), and Lucke carefully considered cooperation with PEGIDA for a while to exploit this potential (Korsch 2016a, 118).

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elections for the mayor of Dresden, the home base of the movement, in June 2015, with the result that the PEGIDA candidate gathered twice as many votes as the candidate of the AfD (although both failed to reach the run-off). Nonetheless, after an inner-party revolt against Lucke and his wing, and the election of a new leadership in July 2015, the AfD changed its position regarding PEGIDA and approached the movement openly. After the election of Petry as one of the party’s two speakers, right-wing representative Marcus Pretzell celebrated the AfD as ‘the PEGIDA party’ (Vorländer et al. 2016, 41). In this paper I argue that, at least since the election of the new AfD leadership, the party and PEGIDA have come to be two sides of the same coin, although the PEGIDA speakers have been more radical in their behaviour since the beginning. The two organisations benefit from the same overall political trends, primarily concerning the refugee crisis. They address the same issues, they have the same demands, they share the same bogeyman and they use the same style of propaganda. AfD officials and PEGIDA speakers have repeatedly attacked representatives of the state personally and in highly offensive ways. Finally, a large proportion of PEGIDA’s followers prefer the AfD above all other German parties (Patzelt 2016b, 183–6). At present, closer cooperation between PEGIDA and the AfD is not guaranteed, although mutual contacts have intensified over recent months (Spiegel Online 2016; Weiland 2016b; Zeit Online 2016). However, deeper cooperation depends on developments inside the AfD, which is—again—being shaken by an intense dispute about leadership. If the wing around the challenged party co-speaker Frauke Petry should win the inner-party power struggle, the hesitant back-and-forth relationship with PEGIDA could last. But if the nationalist wing of her challengers were to gain more influence, an outcome that seems to be likely at present, I argue, PEGIDA and the AfD will probably converge further, assuming that PEGIDA does not disintegrate. In that scenario the AfD would become the parliamentary arm of the movement, with PEGIDA serving as the societal bridgehead of the party. In this case, Germany will have an aggressive rightwing and anti-system party—within several state parliaments, at least—and an obscure movement outside that gathers and mobilises dissatisfied, grumbling, politically homeless, nationalist and xenophobic-minded people who are afraid of the future. For the remaining part of this paper I will briefly describe the characteristics of the two organisations under study. Then I will summarise the recent signs of approximation. The last section will consider how the democratic parties could deal with growing unrest from the right.

PEGIDA: the mobilisation of detached people by political entrepreneurs In this movement it is necessary to distinguish between the organisers and the spokespersons, on the one hand, and the followers, on the other. One half of the organisers and speakers are predominantly parvenus with either a difficult or a simple past, and

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with links to the security business and the red-light milieu (Zeit Magazin 2015). Prior to joining PEGIDA, Bachmann made his way in various small jobs and gained notice for some petty crimes (assault, theft). He was supported by René Jahn, a caretaker; Kathrin Oertel, a freelance property consultant; and Achim Exner, a security businessman, who have all since left PEGIDA after disputes with Bachmann in the interim. The inner circle consisted additionally of Frank Ingo Friedemann, a failed businessman; Siegfried Däbritz, the operator of a small pension in Meißen, a city close to Dresden; and Edwin Wagensveld, the owner of a mail-order business for pneumatic guns, self-defence products and outdoor equipment (Vorländer et al. 2016, 31–3). Other PEGIDA spokespersons were notorious far-right activists, such as Götz Kubitschek, the owner of a small publishing business through which he distributes the right-wing magazine Sezession. The former first lieutenant of the Bundeswehr (unified armed forces) is known to have links to numerous networks of the radical right in Germany and as the co-founder of the Institute for State Policy (Institut für Staatspolitik), which is considered to be the think tank of the right-wing milieu in Germany (Backes 2012). At the very beginning it was unclear what PEGIDA stood for. The only hint about its goals was the name—some people against the Islamisation of the West. The first call for a demonstration under this slogan via Facebook mobilised some hundred followers, but their numbers grew weekly to a peak of roughly 25,000 in January 2015. By that time PEGIDA had published some position papers. Together with the contents of the speeches, it was possible to identify PEGIDA’s messages. The movement fights a kind of Kulturkampf (cultural war) to protect Germans against an ‘ethnic redeployment’ (‘Umvolkung’). It warns against foreign infiltration, primarily by (Muslim) immigrants and refugees; the loss of German identity because of the steady Islamisation of public life (‘turbo Islamisation’); parallel societies; and the threat of the introduction of Sharia, and it links crime with immigration (Vorländer et al. 2016, 36; Korsch 2016b, 143; Patzelt 2016a, 72–100). All these positions have been connected with severe attacks against the federal government, especially the chancellor and the minister of justice, Heiko Maas,2 who have been accused of selling out Germany to Muslims and forgetting the needs and worries of the concerned citizens, while the media have not dared to report these needs or have done so in a biased way (‘lying press’). PEGIDA has demanded limits on immigration, immediate restrictions to asylum regulations, border controls, zero tolerance in cases of abuse of the right to asylum, stringent deportation of criminal foreigners, and significantly more staff and equipment for police forces to increase public safety. Demands of the second order, appearing less frequently in documents and speeches, have called for referenda, the rejection of the

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Heiko Maas was among the first prominent politicians to condemn the PEGIDA marches and messages, having denounced them as a ‘shame for Germany’ early in 2015. Since that time he has been bogeyman number one at PEGIDA marches. This reveals the PEGIDA speakers’ kind of thinking, including how they link their attacks against the minister with Nazi comparisons. In a speech on 4 July 2016 in Dresden, Siegfried Däbritz, one of the hardcore radical PEGIDA speakers, referred to Heiko Maas as ‘Josef’, by which he meant the former Reichsminister of propaganda, Josef Goebbels.

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Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (presumably as representative of a loss of national sovereignty), and declarations of understanding and sympathy for the Russian president, in tandem with a call for the ‘normalisation’ of German–Russian relations (Vorländer et al. 2016, 36; Korsch 2016b, 143; Patzelt 2016a, 72–100). As we know, these claims have mobilised up to 25,000 followers, who each Monday cheer on their spokespersons. Research has shown that this crowd does not consist entirely of xenophobes, racists or people with far-right attitudes, but followers who are highly receptive to the messages sent out by Bachmann and his fellows. The majority of PEGIDA followers are men from Dresden, mainly between 30 and 60 years of age, employed, with a medium or even higher formal education and with a regular income; this group is followed by male pensioners. They feel disappointed and completely misrepresented by the established political parties. They have lost all trust in the government and the media, support claims for direct democracy, are afraid of the future in general and Islam in particular, and they show—if any political inclination—considerable sympathies for the AfD (Daphi et al. 2015; Vorländer et al. 2016, 57–68). It appears that it was only in the Saxon capital and its surrounding areas that there was a critical mass of detached and angry people who could be mobilised, goaded and used by political entrepreneurs such as Lutz Bachmann and his fellows, who have discovered a new calling in running a business as brokers of uncertainty, worry and indignation.

The AfD: a torn party moving further to the right The short history of the AfD has been marked by internal struggles of competing wings and splinter groups, and ongoing disputes over leadership. From the very beginning the party was torn between two competing wings. The first was made up of those loyal to the founder, Bernd Lucke; it was primarily in favour of Germany’s exit from the eurozone. Then there was a nationalist wing that formed around Frauke Petry, Marcus Pretzell, Alexander Gauland, Björn Höcke and others, who wore down Lucke with their nationalist and xenophobic statements and lack of loyalty. At the party convention in July 2015, Petry and Jörg Meuthen, an economist, were elected as the new leaders. The Lucke camp founded a new party, the Alliance for Progress and Departure (Allianz für Fortschritt und Aufbruch), and have paled into insignificance, except for the fact that Lucke, together with three others, represents this minor party in the European Parliament. The election of Petry was seen as a move further to the right. First, her home branch, the AfD in Saxony, is considered to be one of the anti-Islamic forerunners of the present-day AfD. From the start, the Saxony party linked immigration with crime and emphasised—among other things—strict border controls and the deportation of criminals (Korsch 2016b, 144). Second, in early 2016 Petry revealed herself to be a taboobreaking radical when she demanded that the German border police use firearms to prevent ‘illegal crossings’ of the German borders by refugees. This same idea was set forth—with a slight variation—by speaker Tatjana Festerling at a PEGIDA demonstration on 22 February 2016, and was celebrated by the demonstrators (Meisner 2016).

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Third, the new leaders did not suspend the nationalists for their right-wing–inspired statements and in some cases actively participated in their meetings. When in May of 2016 the still-acting co-speaker Jörg Meuthen returned from a visit to the Patriotic Platform (Patriotische Plattform, PP), the podium of the nationalist right wing of the party, he declared that he felt very comfortable with the platform (Weiland 2016a). At the same time the party celebrated remarkable success in the state elections in Baden-Wurttemberg, Rhineland-Palatinate and Saxony-Anhalt, where the party’s right-wing representative André Poggenburg was elected as a member of parliament. Together with Hans-Thomas Tillschneider, another member of parliament from SaxonyAnhalt and a member of the PP, Poggenburg, Gauland and Höcke are working on a strategy aimed at bringing about a xenophobic and nationalist radicalisation of the AfD. Höcke is fighting a kind of a crusade against the hypothetical Islamisation of Germany (Grabow 2016), while Gauland is using racist prejudices as a provocation. For example, he openly racially attacked German soccer player Jérôme Boateng (‘People like to see him playing but they won’t have such guys in their neighbourhood’. See Wehner and Lohse 2016). Yet even Petry, once the figurehead of the national right-wingers of the party, is under pressure. On the one hand, she has broken with her co-chair, Meuthen, primarily because of a power-struggle for party leadership. Meuthen himself gave an additional reason for that conflict when he founded a new parliamentary group in the state parliament of Baden-Wurttemberg after the AfD group had split over a dispute about the antiSemitic, inflammatory writings of one of its members. On the other hand, Petry is under observation by the nationalist hardliners, who are lurking and waiting for the proper moment to take control of the party.

Recent signs of rapprochement At present the AfD is paralysed by internal power games. Nevertheless, the nationalist hardliners are gaining in influence. They share a number of common positions with the organisers of PEGIDA, including their hatred of the federal government. Then there are the repeated pronouncements that Germany is going to be overwhelmed by an aggressive and brutalised Islam; that German women are endangered by sexually uninhibited male Muslims; that crime caused by refugees and asylum seekers is going up; and that a cartel of silencers comprised of the established democratic parties and the media are suppressing ‘people’s voices, will and worries’; and so forth. Meanwhile, the movement does the ‘dirty’ fieldwork, and the AfD squad works—apart from some public remarks— rather silently, in order not to make any strategic mistakes. However, one can state that there are some clear signs of approximation between the AfD and PEGIDA, even while it seems that the actual leader of the AfD, like her predecessor, is losing control over crucial parts of her party. The first to recognise PEGIDA as part of a common movement was Björn Höcke. For him, PEGIDA ‘is the bridgehead of the AfD in Dresden’ (Zeit Online 2016). Without

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PEGIDA the AfD was not that strong, said Höcke in April 2016, and he thanked the movement for their important fieldwork. This was the initial spark for mutual visits by AfD officials to PEGIDA demonstrations and vice versa. AfD representative and PP member Tillschneider spoke at a PEGIDA demonstration in May 2016, where he repeated the thanks and mentioned that PEGIDA’s messages are now part of the AfD’s position on Islam, that is, ‘No to Islam!’ (Spiegel Online 2016). Under Lucke and then under Petry in the early days of her leadership, if AfD members participated at PEGIDA events they did so privately, whereas the PP faction of the AfD now seeks to close ranks. Shortly after Tillschneider’s speech at the PEGIDA demonstration, PEGIDA speaker Siegfried Däbritz accepted an invitation by Höcke to speak at a public AfD event in Erfurt, the capital of Thuringia. Later, Höcke said that the two organisations share many common goals, which must be made visible by at least symbolic acts (Weiland 2016a). According to Patzelt (2016b, 186), the AfD and PEGIDA are ‘flesh of the same flesh’. This conclusion should be modified insofar as it holds true for the radical hardcore organisers of PEGIDA and the PP group within the AfD and its mentors such as Höcke. For them, PEGIDA is a beneficial bridgehead into parts of the Saxon lower middle class (and, by the way, an instrument able to weaken Petry’s authority inside the party), while PEGIDA, for its part, is looking for a parliamentary arm for its messages. Whether the approximation continues depends a great deal on the result of the ongoing conflicts inside the AfD.

Counter strategies As is well known, there is no fast-acting medicine against populist movements and parties, because the reasons for their foundation and growth cannot be changed overnight. Concerning right-wing populist parties, it seems plausible for established democratic parties, especially those that are in government, to deliver good policy outcomes—that means solving given problems in a manner that is good for the country and the majority of the people. Moreover, democratic forces should confront the right-wing and national populists, with their weak ideas. They are more or less complete naysayers and problem-seekers, not problem-solvers. The majority of their positions are either artificially constructed or do not fit the degree of complexity of the given challenges. There is no guarantee that the combination of these two approaches will work, but there is no reason for any democratic party to be afraid of an open confrontation with the political fortune seekers and demagogues of the right, provided that the established parties deliver. The situation of PEGIDA is even more complicated because a large proportion of the followers do not seem to be amenable to reason. Whether problem-solving and good government can ease their frustration and alienation cannot be predicted with certainty. We can safely assume, however, that the mindset and the motivation of the PEGIDA organisers can never be changed. Alarming, defaming, and exaggerating problems and worries linked to xenophobic, Islamophobic or racist prejudices constitutes their personal business plan, which works as long as it finds a receptive audience. As long as the organisers do not fail on account of their own weakness, it seems that Germany

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must put up with these protest marches and the messages that are sent out from the Saxon capital, because this is a legal, though unpleasant, part of democracy. Open Access  This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits any use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author(s) and the source are credited.

References Backes, U. (2012). Intellektueller Rechtsextremismus in Deutschland. Bonn: Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung. http://www.bpb.de/politik/extremismus/rechtsextremismus/ 151617/intellektueller-rechtsextremismus-in-deutschland. Accessed 20 July 2016. Daphi, P., Kocyba, P., Neuber, M., Roose, J., Rucht, D., Scholl, F., et al. (2015). Protestforschung am Limit. Eine soziologische Annäherung an Pegida. Berlin: Wissenschaftszentrum für Sozialforschung. Grabow, K. (2016). Das Volk, des Volkes, dem Volk. Die Politische Meinung, 61(539), 23–7. Korsch, F. (2016a). ‘Natürliche Verbündete’? Die Pegida-Debatte in der AfD zwischen Anziehung und Ablehnung. In A. Häusler (Ed.), Die Alternative für Deutschland: Programmatik, Entwicklung und politische Verortung (pp. 111–34). Wiesbaden: Springer. Korsch, F. (2016b). Stichwortgeber in Nadelstreifen: Personelle und inhaltliche Konvergenzen zwischen AfD und Pegida. In A. Häusler (ed.), Die Alternative für Deutschland: Programmatik, Entwicklung und politische Verortung (pp. 135–47). Wiesbaden: Springer. Meisner, M. (2016). Pegida billigt Schusswaffeneinsatz gegen Flüchtlinge. Tagesspiegel, 18 February. http://www.tagesspiegel.de/politik/daily-mail-interview-mittatjana-festerling-pegida-billigt-schusswaffeneinsatz-gegen-fluechtlinge/12981704.html. Accessed 20 July 2016. Patzelt, W. J. (2016a). PEGIDAS programmatik. In W. J. Patzelt & J. Klose (eds.), PEGIDA: Warnsignale aus Dresden (pp. 57–100). Dresden: Thelem. Patzelt, W. J. (2016b). Wer sind und wie denken Pegidianer? In W. J. Patzelt & J. Klose (eds.), PEGIDA: Warnsignale aus Dresden (pp. 149–294). Dresden: Thelem. Spiegel Online. (2015a). Bernd Luckes E-Mails: Er schielt auf den rechten Rand. 18 January. http://www.spiegel.de/video/bernd-luckes-e-mails-video-erklaert-strategie-vonafd-video-1548807.html. Accessed 20 July 2016.

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Spiegel Online. (2015b). Lucke fischte nach Wählerstimmen am rechten Rand. 16 January. http://www.spiegel.de/spiegel/vorab/lucke-fischte-nach-waehlerstimmen-amrechten-rand-a-1013359.html. Accessed 20 July 2016. Spiegel Online. (2016). Kundgebung in Dresden: AfD-Abgeordneter Tillschneider dankt Pegida. 10 May. http://www.spiegel.de/politik/deutschland/pegida-in-dresden-afd-abgeordneter-hans-thomas-tillschneider-bedankt-sich-a-1091522.html. Accessed 20 July 2016. Vorländer, H., Herold, M., & Schäller, S. (2016). PEGIDA. Entwicklung, Zusammensetzung und Deutung einer Empörungsbewegung. Wiesbaden: Springer. Wehner, M., & Lohse, E. (2016). Gauland beleidigt Boateng. http://www.faz.net/aktuell/ politik/inland/afd-vize-gauland-beleidigt-jerome-boateng-14257743.html. Accessed 25 August 2016. Weiland, S. (2016a). AfD-Flügel: Versöhnung am Kyffhäuser. Spiegel Online, 31 May. http://www.spiegel.de/politik/deutschland/afd-meuthen-nimmt-an-veranstaltung-von-afdrechten-teil-a-1095115.html. Accessed 20 July 2016. Weiland, S. (2016b). AfD und Pegida: Da haben sich zwei gefunden. Spiegel Online, 20 May. http://www.spiegel.de/politik/deutschland/afd-und-pegida-da-haben-sich-zweigefunden-a-1093081.html. Accessed 20 July 2016. Zeit Magazin. (2015). Pegida: Busen, Bier und Islamismus. 23 April. http://www.zeit.de/ zeit-magazin/2015/15/pegida-kathrin-oertel-lutz-bachmann. Accessed 20 July 2016. Zeit Online. (2016). AfD: Höcke bedankt sich bei Pegida. 9 April. http://www.zeit. de/politik/deutschland/2016-04/afd-bjoern-hoecke-pegida-wegbereiter-wahlerfolg. Accessed 20 July 2016. Karsten Grabow is a party researcher at the Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung in Berlin. He is author and editor of numerous publications on European rightwing and national populist parties, including (with Florian Hartleb) Exposing the Demagogues: Right-Wing and National Populist Parties in Europe (Brussels: Centre for European Studies, 2013) and (with Torsten Oppelland) ‘I Want to Destroy the EU’: EU Opponents in the 8th European Parliament – Taking Stock of the Past Year (Berlin: Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung, 2015).

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European View DOI 10.1007/s12290-016-0408-4

ARTICLE

Populism in Spain: an analysis of Podemos Javier Zarzalejos 

© The Author(s) 2016. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com

Abstract  This article analyses the causes of the loss of support suffered by Podemos in the elections held on 26 June 2016. In these elections, the party, led by Pablo Iglesias, ran for office in coalition with the United Left. The article describes the way the election developed for Podemos, analyses the shaping of its populist rhetoric in line with a radical left-wing view, discusses the social and political conditions that favoured its rise, and finally, notes that the disappearance of these conditions jeopardises its chances of success in the future. Keywords  Populism | Political parties | Spain | Left | Nationalism

J. Zarzalejos (*)  Foundation for Social Analysis and Studies, Calle María de Molina 40, 6°, 28006 Madrid, Spain e-mail: [email protected]

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Introduction The most recent general elections in Spain, which were held on 26 June, showed two clear trends. The first was a significant increase in votes for the People’s Party (Partido Popular, PP) as compared to the results of the December 2015 elections, when the party was severely punished by the electorate. The second was the serious failure of the populist radical left, represented by Unidos Podemos (United We Can). This organisation emerged from the convergence of Podemos (We Can), led by Pablo Iglesias, and United Left (Izquierda Unida), the political branch of the Communist Party (Partido Comunista de España), led by Alberto Garzón.1 The failure of Podemos has been electoral and political, quantitative and qualitative. In the weeks prior to the June elections, all polls, without exception, predicted spectacular results for this party. According to these forecasts, Iglesias’s party would greatly profit from his coalition with the Communists, which would grant him access to a pool of over 900,000 votes. This contribution of new votes, coupled with the crisis in the Socialist Party (Partido Socialista Obrero Español, PSOE), with its electoral support at historic lows, pointed to an unprecedented success at the polls that would make Podemos the second largest political force in Spain. That is, it was thought that Podemos would not only win a substantial number of votes and seats but also become the dominant force of the left, overtaking the PSOE, the historical reference point and hegemonic party of the left since the beginning of the transition to democracy in the second half of the 1970s. In short, what was anticipated in the polls and expectations of the elections was that Spain was undergoing a process that would replace the PSOE with left-wing populists, as had happened in Greece with Passok and Syriza—with the end result being the achievement of the Spanish populists’ strategic goal. In fact, because of the expectations generated by Podemos, the media in Spain acquired two new political terms. One was ‘sorpasso’, an Italianism that referred to Podemos overtaking the PSOE in the elections. The other was ‘passokisation’, which was used to describe the grim future forecast under the Spanish socialists, like that suffered by the Greeks under Passok. However, neither sorpasso nor passokisation came to be. In June, Podemos suffered a resounding political failure and a deep disappointment from which it has still not recovered. As one of the populist forces that has attracted more attention than others in this Europe of populisms, Podemos has proved that the assumption that these movements can only grow as if they were an unstoppable tide is wrong. The results speak for themselves. In the elections of 20 December 2015, Podemos obtained 5,189,333 votes (20.66 %) and the United Left 923,105 (3.67 %). On 26 June, the coalition of both parties obtained just 5,049,734 votes (21.1 %), in other words, 140,000 votes fewer than Podemos achieved when it stood alone (Government of Spain, Ministry of Home Affairs 2013).

1 

For an overview of the origin and development of Podemos, please see Alvarez Tardío (2015).

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Does this mean that the time has come to write the story of the rise and fall of leftwing populism in Spain? Certainly not. At least not yet. But the recent Spanish lesson is that populism can be stopped and reversed.

Podemos, a populist party ‘Podemos’ is a political expression that articulates the thinking and strategic approaches developed by the radical left after its failure as embodied by the demolition of the Berlin Wall and the dissolution of Soviet Communism.2 At the core of the party Podemos is a group of political science, sociology and economics professors. Their scholarship is not particularly prestigious, but they have built on the theories of left-wing thinkers such as Zizek, Badiou and Laclau.3 They are also fascinated by the experiences of ‘Socialism of the twenty-first Century’, the ideological driver of Chavism in Venezuela and of the regimes of Correa in Ecuador and Evo Morales in Bolivia, and have been influenced in their political practice by Gramscian theories regarding the achievement of hegemony. Podemos offers a practical example of what is meant by understanding populism not as having a particular ideological content but as a discursive logic. It is a logic of political construction that can be filled with different ideologies; in short, by understanding populism as a ‘political narrative’. Populism, from either the right or the left, rests on two pillars. On the one hand, it requires the construction of an enemy. On the other, it disparages representative democracy. Populism is basically illiberal. Building an enemy is necessary in order to drag society into antagonism and establish an unbridgeable divide between good and bad, virtuous and wicked, and the wicked elites and the oppressed, by exploiting caste and the exploited ‘people’. The disparaging of representative democracy enables populism to counterpose an ‘authentic’ model of ‘direct’ or ‘participatory’ democracy, in which ‘the people’ make their own decisions at all times without delegating to anyone or to the representative system in which the interests of citizens are forgotten by the power circuits populated by the elites. The rejection of representative democracy and what it means as a consensus, as a transaction and as a vehicle for political integration is actually a rejection of democracy tout court, of democracy as it has been carried out historically in the societies that enjoy it. As an alternative, populism proposes a political entity called ‘the people without institutions’, deliberately ignoring the fact that the people is a plural reality and its political

2 

This is acknowledged by Iglesias, following Perry Anderson, when he states: ‘The only conceivable starting point today for a realistic left is to become aware of the historic defeat’ (Anderson 2015, 10). 3

 An excellent study of left-wing thinking can be found in Scruton (2015). For the theoretical bases of leftwing populism, see Laclau (2005).

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expression requires channels of representation, guarantees of the separation of powers, and protection of individual freedoms and of minorities. Populism contradicts the central elements of democratic thinking and practice. Instead of the inclusive and integrating concept of the ‘people’ as a group of citizens free and equal before the law, populism imposes a divisive idea of people that fractures society into antagonistic factions doomed to clash: there are ‘the people’ (the oppressed, victims of the crisis) and the ‘non people’, represented by the elites, the caste and the oligarchy. As Laclau (2005) states, populism turns the ‘plebs’ into the ‘populus’. For that same reason, populism refuses to be attached to the right or to the left. All populists claim to lie beyond that division. In this sense, they seek to be post-ideological. Populism can be ‘progressive,’ ‘patriotic,’ ‘national’ or ‘social’, but all varieties insist on not belonging—only in terms of appearance—to the peaceful confrontation of ideological choices typical of democracies. Populists seek to be recognised as representatives of the whole. Therefore, it is also typical of populists to refuse to be regarded as political parties in the traditional way. Populists despise parties; they consider them to be mere instruments of domination by the elites. Not them; they are ‘popular movements’ generated from the bottom up, rooted in deeper social aspirations, without the bureaucratic and oligarchic distortions of traditional parties, which are top-down organisations. Their denominations often reflect this, circumventing any conventional ideological reference (Christian–Democrat, conservative, socialist, radical or popular) and seeking broader terms, as in the case of the name ‘Podemos’ (‘We can’). When you renounce institutions, charismatic leaders emerge; this is also typical of populism. All theorists who have studied this phenomenon highlight the importance of this type of leadership to ensure the cohesion of the followers and a common identity for any particular form of populism. It could not be otherwise. This can be illustrated by the well-known categories of leadership proposed by Max Weber. If rational leadership—that which stems from the electoral procedures of representative democracy—is ignored, then charismatic leaders arise. This kind of leadership claims to have a special connection with the people, reflecting their real voice. As a referendum offers a binary choice—yes or no—it is the perfect tool to promote the division of society and it also serves as the plebiscite through which the leader establishes a direct relationship with the people. Populism considers political action to be a zero-sum game between the ‘elites’ and the ‘people’. It is the recovery of conflict as the central concept of politics and, in this sense, the populist discourse owes much to the thesis of Schmitt (1982) on the friend– enemy relationship as the essential political relationship. Hence democracy, understood as mediation, as a process of deliberation and integration, and as a form of peaceful organisation of dissension, is radically rejected by the populism of Podemos. This rejection is not just a theoretical element. In the case of Podemos, it is the line of action that identifies it as a party.

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Podemos, populism and the radical left Unlike Syriza in Greece, Podemos follows up left-wing radicalism in economic and social matters with a political proposal for the constitutional break-up of Spain. It is worth noting that Syriza has not proposed amendments to the Greek constitution, the electoral system or the basic territorial organisation of the Greek state. On the contrary, Tsipras’s left-wing radicals have left the roles of the Orthodox Church and the armed forces unchanged, when it could be expected that part of its radicalism would be directed against these two institutions, which seem far removed from what is understood by ‘progressivism’. In Spain, in contrast, Podemos has made a point of rejecting the 1978 constitution and the national reconciliation agreements that allowed the peaceful transition to democracy. Its stated goal is to end the democratic regime implemented by Spain in 1978. This is based on the bizarre argument that the constitution—approved by a consensus of the vast majority of political forces, from the Communist Party to the Catalan nationalists, and with the endorsement of an overwhelming majority of the electorate—was the result of a reform and not a rupture, and that, consequently, Spanish democracy is a disguised continuation of Franco’s dictatorship. The idea is delusional but nevertheless occupies a central place in the narrative of Podemos. To reinforce its argument against the Spanish constitutional system, Podemos has allied itself with nationalist forces in Catalonia, the Basque Country, Navarre and Valencia which openly raise the matter of the independence of these territories or the claim to exercise an alleged right to unilateral secession. Podemos, therefore, is anti-system on both counts, and with this political acquis it has grown on the national political scene from a modest—but significant—result in the June 2014 European Parliament elections, in which it achieved 1,245,948 votes or 7.97 % of the vote. A year later, the results of the regional and local elections of 24 May 2015 granted considerable institutional power to Podemos. Indeed, after these elections, the PSOE decided that wherever a majority could be reached to govern city and town halls by adding its votes to those of the populists, it would reach agreements with Podemos to prevent the PP from ruling. As a result of these widespread agreements between the socialists, Podemos and, where necessary, the nationalists, Podemos and its partners have gained significant positions, such as the city halls of Madrid and Barcelona, and hold important roles in regional governments and administrations. The fact that the PSOE has been the party most affected by the rise of Podemos and, at the same time has granted it so much power through these agreements is no small paradox. This is hard to understand when most European countries threatened by populism have developed a broad consensus among the established parties to prevent the former from reaching power. Such has been the case in France, in the similar logic of the ‘grand coalition’ in place in Germany and in Berlusconi’s support of the Democratic Party before the rise of the Five Star Movement in Italy. In Spain, the PSOE has not only failed to contain the populist radical left but has in fact boosted it. Clearly a confrontation with the PP was more desirable than making a common commitment to face the damage inflicted on democratic institutions by populism.

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The financial crisis and the rise of populism It is undeniable that we must link the development of new populist movements in Europe to an environment of generalised crisis: a crisis of prosperity, a crisis in the sense of security, a crisis of identity and governance, and a crisis of the European project. Not all European countries have been affected by these different crises with the same intensity, but all are suffering from some manifestation of them. In some countries a perception of insecurity prevails, or there is the feeling that national identity is being threatened, either by the effects of globalisation or by the massive influx of migrants and refugees. In Spain, the dominant crisis is indeed one of prosperity and governance as a result of the long recession. The recession has led to high unemployment, which has affected a very large segment of the middle class and forced an internal devaluation, resulting in a significant loss of income for many Spaniards. In this climate, there is deep indignation among the population about the political and financial corruption that has emerged, aggravating the perceptions of citizens to the point that they consider corruption to be the result of a systemic deficiency in the political and economic model. Populism has sailed on the winds of crisis and indignation, successfully spreading its simple solutions to complex problems without having to worry about demonstrating that these solutions are indeed effective or even possible. Here, then, we must again insist that populism is a political narrative, not a programme for government. Therefore its proposals’ disconnection with reality, practical unfeasibility, and departure from politics and real economics are not obstacles to its success but together form a utopian component typical of wishful thinking which only makes populism more attractive to certain sectors of the electorate and public opinion. For populists, reality is dispensable. However, considering the crisis to be the only key to explaining the rise of populism would be oversimplifying the matter, and the rise of Podemos too. It is obvious that established or traditional parties have lost credibility and the ability to politically articulate the voices of European societies. Nor have they been able to reduce the generation gap that is dividing European politics to a greater extent even than ideological differences. Social media help populism to communicate its simplistic messages, in preference to the complex reasoning demanded by many of today’s problems. Political loyalties, both on the right and on the left, have become weaker, and commitment to traditional parties is all but unknown among younger generations. ‘Podemos’ means ‘we can’, clearly echoing Obama’s ‘Yes we can’, which is a brilliant slogan, and has been used throughout the political spectrum and adopted as a universal spell to solve any problem. Faced with this motto, which is full of emotion, it is hard to argue that it is not always true. Unfortunately, in addition to the crisis, in other discussions populism has occupied dominant positions that have not been challenged. Many of these have been debates on uncomfortable issues, in which populists on both the right and the left have claimed to be the voice of the street, of the ordinary citizen and of the normal individual who suffers from the incompetence and selfishness of politicians, which are aggravated by the callous power of bureaucrats, usually from Brussels. Thus populists propose solutions that are unrealistic—what is left of Syriza’s claims?—but that does not mean that they

European View

are out of touch with reality. Rather, they offer an explanation to citizens who believe one cannot be found elsewhere for the reality in which they are living. And this is where we can agree that the success of populism is the correlative failure of the elites in the best sense of the word, that is, of those who, due to their positions in society, politics, the economy, finance, culture, media, academia and so on, should promote collective conversations about common problems and challenges to avoid populism filling the void with its demagogic monologue. This ability to build a narrative for the crisis gave populism an air of invincibility that is largely to blame for Podemos’s original successes. However, behind the recent poor performance of Podemos there are a number of issues. They were already there, yet it was unknown when they would have an effect. In the run-up to the June general election, Iglesias seemed to be having a ‘Trump moment’, even saying in a campaign rally that if he were to stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot a bystander, he would still not lose a single vote.

Podemos and the crisis of Spanish socialism An analysis of Podemos’s progress up to the last general election needs to take into account that this party emerged in a window of opportunity between two key moments. The first was the end of the socialist government (2004–11), whose authority had been deeply eroded due to its poor management of the economic downturn and the adjustment measures it was forced to adopt. The second was the arrival in government in 2011 of the PP, which focused on a thorough fiscal adjustment and structural reforms of the economy that boosted the populist discourse. It was against this backdrop that the 15 M movement emerged, occupying the Puerta del Sol in Madrid for weeks, and which Podemos usurped, profiting from the protest. The development of Podemos cannot be understood without noting the political and electoral collapse suffered by the PSOE in the final period of its term in office, which caused it to clash with very large segments of the left. But if the social and economic situation of Spain and the socialist crisis offered unique chances for a new populist leftwing force, the leaders of Podemos did not hesitate to seize them. They managed to activate young people, regular abstainers and a large part of the left who were eager to punish the PSOE at the polls. Their radical and apparently motivational rhetoric reached segments of the middle class impoverished by the crisis and disappointed in their expectations of social promotion. Podemos was able to rightly boast that it had become a cross-cutting political force, capable of attracting voters from the centre–right and the left, as well as uncommitted voters. In order to do this, its commitment to the massive and skilful use of social networks and the new digital media, and a continuous presence on innovative television discussion programmes that reported remarkable audience ratings, was essential.4

4 

‘People do not militate in parties but in media’, Iglesias in Anderson (2015, 21).

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European View

It is not likely that this set of conditions in which Podemos has thrived will continue. The latest election results seem to point to this. As their structures, their leaders and their history have become known to the people, Podemos has experienced the effects of contact with real politics and public scrutiny. Research has revealed its financial and political links with Chavez’s Venezuela and the fact that Iranian capital finances the television channel through which Podemos’s leaders have been spreading their propaganda. The wrongdoings of some of the latter regarding university contracts or alleged consulting work for Latin American ‘Socialism of the twenty-first Century’ governments have damaged their reputations, further impacting the authenticity of their public-life regeneration messages, which were already under suspicion from the public. Moreover, in their goal to overtake the PSOE, Podemos adopted a strategy of ideological versatility that would one day cause Iglesias to express himself in the most extreme terms while on the next to adopt a more moderate stance as the heir of social democracy. This strategy has generated confusion among potential voters, including among those of the United Left, whom Iglesias has clearly failed to attract. Hence his coalition with the Communists was an agreement between leaders but failed to work for the voters. Furthermore, Iglesias’s refusal to enable a government headed by the PSOE’s Pedro Sánchez with the support of the new party Citizens (Ciudadanos) has retrospectively been seen as a mistake and left Podemos responsible for thwarting the formation of a government not led by the PP. In addition to this, Syriza’s management of the Greek government has not set an encouraging precedent for populists as to the viability of their radical proposals. Therefore, Podemos had to face dual pressures in the recent election campaign. On the one hand, from the PP, which focused its efforts on warning about the damage that Podemos’s growth, as well as its possible access to government, could cause; and on the other, from the PSOE, which blamed Iglesias for blocking an alternative to the PP by not supporting the former’s agreement with Citizens. Both strategies worked, especially that of the PP, which managed to mobilise some of the voters who had previously abandoned it to vote against Podemos. Thus, the PP won the election, increasing their lead over the PSOE, while the socialists avoided the sorpasso. The unprecedented crisis in the PSOE might provide fresh opportunities for electoral gains for Podemos at the expense of the socialists. The internal strife and the inability of the PSOE to cooperate with the PP on a bipartisan basis to produce a government are likely to take a heavy toll if a third general election in less than a year has to be called.

Conclusions Even though Podemos maintained a very significant number of votes in the recent elections, it is now a party seriously affected by the failure to meet expectations. Its agreements with the nationalist left in Catalonia and Galicia have become very difficult to manage because Iglesias’s authority as leader is no longer unquestioned by the new left. The discovery that radical left-wing populism is stagnant has triggered an internal debate that calls into question the core elements of its political project. Íñigo Errejón, Podemos’s ‘number two’ and ideological driver, acknowledged this shortly after the last election: ‘In order to govern, Podemos has to change, it has to mutate’ (Manetto

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2016). He added that the model of a populist party that Podemos had developed ‘is a model that no longer is the exception, the surprise . . . It is one capable of delivering certainties to a large part of the Spaniards who, even though they see us with sympathy, need more security and need us to demonstrate, in the meantime, our usefulness.’ ‘The street,’ Errejón stated, ‘not only demands epic narratives and demonstrations, the street asks for guarantees, public policies’ (Manetto 2016). That an intellectual disciple of Ernesto Laclau should express himself in these terms reveals the depth of the sense of crisis among the populists. Podemos is facing a very difficult task: nothing less than surviving itself. Open Access  This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits any use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author(s) and the source are credited.

References Alvarez Tardío, M. (2015). Podemos y la izquierda antiliberal. Cuadernos de Pensamiento Político, 46, 9–34. Anderson, P. (2015). Entender Podemos. New Left Review, 93, 9–28. Government of Spain, Ministry of Home Affairs. (2013). Consulta de resultados electorales. Last updated 3 September 2014. http://www.infoelectoral.interior.es/min/. Accessed 19 September 2016. Laclau, E. (2005). La razón populista. Madrid: Fondo de Cultura Económica. Manetto, F. (2016). Para poder gobernar, Podemos tiene que cambiar, tiene que mutar. El Pais, 24 July. Schmitt, C. (1982). Teoría de la constitución. Madrid: Alianza Editorial. Scruton, R. (2015). Fouls, frauds and firebrands. Thinkers of the new left. London: Bloomsbury Continuum. Javier Zarzalejos has been secretary general of the Foundation for Social Analysis and Studies in Spain since 2012, where he previously held the positions of director of the Constitution and Institutions Unit, and editor of the in-house publication Cuadernos de Pensamiento Político. From 1996 to 2004 he was secretary general of the Office of Prime Minister José María Aznar.

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European View DOI 10.1007/s12290-016-0424-4

ARTICLE

The political power of evoking fear: the shining example of Germany’s anti‑TTIP campaign movement Matthias Bauer  © The Author(s) 2016. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com

Abstract In Germany and Austria, an unprecedented political communication campaign orchestrated by a small group of well-connected politicians, green and left-wing political parties, and associated civil society organisations has evoked strong aversion among the population to the negotiations for the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership Agreement (TTIP) between the EU and the US. Germany’s anti-TTIP groups want nothing less than to take their protests to other European countries. The network’s campaigns are largely driven by myths and fears evoked by emotive narratives and powerful metaphors. Their reasoning has strong persuasive power though. This article sheds light on who the campaign movement’s major protagonists are, the messages they spread, their objectives, and how their deceptive argumentation threatens social interaction, pluralist societies and individual economic freedom.

This article is partly based on a comprehensive study conducted by the European Centre for International Economy (ECIPE), Brussels, titled The Political Power of Going Negative: German Riders and European Horses in Anti-TTIP Protests, published in October 2016. M. Bauer (*)  European Centre for International Political Economy (ECIPE), Rue Belliard 4 – 6, 1040 Brussels, Belgium e-mail: [email protected]

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European View

Keywords  TTIP | CETA | Free trade | NGO | Political campaign | Social media

Introduction ‘TTIP is an attack on democracy’, ‘TTIP kills’, ‘Kill TTIP’, ‘TTIP protest picnic’, and ‘Tango against the TTIP’—in Germany, the protest activities of the anti-Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership Agreement (TTIP) lobbying groups are presented in colourful, but unambiguous ways. The campaign network’s core institutions are not only inventive: they are also resourceful. Based on generous public funding and private donations, political parties, political foundations and environmental groups, as well as clerical and long-established anti-globalisation organisations are able to maintain influential networks. The protest groups’ activities are coordinated and utilised by green and left-wing political parties that are searching for anti-establishment political profiles by spreading highly emotive messages about TTIP. In the recent past, their political catchphrases have had strong persuasive power.

The persuasive power of being negative about TTIP A recent survey commissioned by the Bertelsmann Foundation reported that the European majority welcomes TTIP, but that Germany and Austria are particularly sceptical. A major matter of concern is that, since 2014, Germany has seen a dramatic erosion of what had been a fundamentally positive opinion of trade (Bertelsmann Foundation 2016). Recent survey data from Infratest dimap suggests that some 70% of German citizens oppose TTIP, almost twice the average in other EU countries (Infratest dimap 2016; Eurobarometer 2015). What is worrying for supporters of open and well-regulated markets and pluralist societies is that the negative sentiment towards TTIP that the protest campaigns have evoked has already spilled over into other European countries. These include not only France (Fabry 2015), but countries that are known for their citizens’ general support of open markets and pluralist societies, such as Sweden, the Netherlands and the UK (van Ham 2016). Many observers on both sides of the Atlantic can attest to German citizens’ pronounced levels of risk aversion, frequently described as ‘German angst’. Others argue that many Germans show distinct levels of anti-Americanism, especially after the revelation of the US National Security Agency’s spying affairs (see, e.g. Sparding 2014). In addition, as is argued by Kolev (2016), the less trust German citizens place in the EU’s institutions, the greater their aversion to TTIP. The data discussed by Kolev explains why the majority of TTIP critics are generally in favour of free trade. However, with many people being of the opinion that TTIP is being shaped behind closed doors, the negotiations fuel the perception that German interests are being sold out in Brussels. In addition, in an article titled ‘Germany’s Strange Turn Against Trade’, Fratzscher (2016), a well-known leftist German economist, argues that Germany’s position as

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‘Europe’s economic superstar’ has caused a general aversion to changing the status quo. Furthermore, Fratzscher argues, TTIP aversion in Germany is rooted in the general surge in populist and nationalist politics in the Western world, as well as in the widely perceived inequality in society, and perceptions related to wealth and income distribution. Financial Times trade correspondent Donnan (2016) summarises that, in ‘Europe, protesters are taking to the streets against the agreement, while populists on both the right and the left have it in their sights as an easy proxy for both suspicion of Brussels and a thinly-veiled anti-Americanism’. Similarly, while the economist Freytag (2016) draws parallels between right-wing populist reasoning and anti-TTIP campaigning in Germany, Politico reporter von der Burchard (2016b) comments that ‘protectionist winds are blowing stronger than in a long time on both sides of the Atlantic—the product, in part, of a coordinated campaign by a panoply of organisations sceptical of globalization’. The reflections outlined above draw a realistic picture of the causes and symptoms of TTIP opposition in Germany. What they fail to elucidate, however, is the mind-penetrating force of those groups and individuals, including the influential figureheads of well-established political parties, that created the anti-TTIP scene in Germany in the first place, and who have since attempted to expand it to other European countries. Their simplistic narratives on TTIP aim to take advantage of German citizens’ negative attitudes towards the US National Security Agency’s spying, anti-Americanism, aversion to Brussels-made EU policymaking, and widespread anti-capitalist and anti-inequality sentiments.

Obstinate and deliberately unteachable Irrespective of the innumerable clarifications made by leading German and European politicians and the European Commission, it is particularly worrying that Germany’s major anti-TTIP groups have not distanced themselves from their original reasoning with respect to their major campaigns. Their original, alarmist and sensational narratives are still spread via online social media and Google-advertised calls for online petitions. Accordingly, Germany’s (and Austria’s) leading anti-TTIP groups have continued to spread messages that evoke widespread fears about TTIP and the EU–Canada Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA). Their key narratives are: ‘TTIP encourages the proliferation of genetically modified organisms in the EU’, ‘TTIP and CETA are an attack on democracy’, ‘TTIP allows the United States to veto and eventually block EU law-making’, and ‘TTIP allows multinational corporations to sue EU governments for enforcing laws on consumer, health and environmental safety’. It is crucial to understand, however, that all of these claims fail to pass the validity check. Von der Burchard (2016a) notes that by using such arguments, TTIP has ‘elevated [German non-governmental organisations] to positions of unprecedented influence. Their coffers have swollen with funds, enabling them to boost their staff and their political profile.’

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Figure 1  Google search interest by country. Austria Germany Belgium Spain Netherlands Finland Ireland United Kingdom Italy Czech Republic Switzerland Sweden Norway Denmark Hungary Greece Poland Portugal France Australia United States Canada

2 2 2

5

10 9 9 9

15 14 14

21 21 20 20 18

31 30 28

42

80

100

Source: Google Trends (n. d.) and Bauer (2016a). Note: Query conducted on 30 August 2016. Numbers do not convey absolute search volumes. Numbers represent search interest relative to the highest point on the chart. If, for example, at most 10% of searches for the given region and time frame were for ‘TTIP’, it is taken as 100. Covers the period from January 2013 to June 2016.

Online campaigning: setting the stage for what German citizens think about TTIP Until recently German citizens had not been particularly interested in the negotiation of (free) trade agreements. However, the metaphorical messages spread by Germany’s major anti-TTIP groups have triggered widespread, far-higher-than-average interest in Germany. At the same time, anti-TTIP campaigns have had strong persuasive powers. For the period January 2013 to June 2016, Google Trends data shows that citizens’ interest in searching for TTIP is by far the strongest in Austria and Germany (Figure 1). It is striking that interest in TTIP is three times higher in Germany than in Spain, 20 times higher than in France and 40 times higher than in Canada and the US. Since TTIP negotiations started in 2013, a colourful alliance of Germany’s anti-globalisation, Marxist, Christian and, particularly, environmental non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and political parties have run forceful campaigns against a trade agreement whose chapters have yet to be written.1 The precise motivations of each individual protest group are difficult to disentangle. Most NGOs and political parties

1 

For an overview of the declared members of Germany’s anti-TTIP alliance, TTIPunfairhandelbar (‘TTIP non-negotiable’), see the list of member organisations: TTIPunfairhandelbar (n. d.).

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argue that TTIP poses a threat to European consumer and environmental protection standards. Some call TTIP a substantial threat to democracy due to its opaque negotiations and the inclusion of investor–state dispute settlement procedures (see Table 1). Highly professional campaigning organisations have managed to exploit the citizens’ (largely uninformed) reservations about the US, Brussels-centred policymaking and multinational enterprises (see Kolev 2016; Sparding 2014). The remarkable interest of German and Austrian citizens in TTIP is also reflected by the content and relative number of Google Search queries related to TTIP (Figure 2). Eight of the 20 top Google queries related to TTIP were exclusively searched for in German. Another eight queries included generic terms that generally apply both in German and other languages. Six of the top 20 queries were biased towards a negative view of TTIP. ‘TTIP demo’, where ‘demo’ is short for protest demonstration, ranked first among the TTIP-related queries, while ‘Stop TTIP’, an initiative against TTIP that has its origins in Germany and is coordinated by German campaign groups, ranked fourth (Table 2). By comparison, only 1 in the top 20 queries was in Spanish. The query ranked rather low down the list and, importantly, conveys a rather more neutral sentiment (TTIP que es [What is TTIP?]). The same applies for searches in English. The interest in TTIP and the negative sentiment conveyed by the Google searches is the consequence of a highly professional campaign. Online (social) media has played a critical role in spreading a negative image of TTIP. Declared anti-TTIP groups’ messages are primarily spread through social media. Almost 80% of anti-TTIP groups’ messages are spread via Twitter, while 20% of their posts are spread through Facebook. As my analysis (Bauer 2015c) shows for the period June to December 2014, negative online media reporting about TTIP in Germany was more than 20 times higher than positive reporting. Declared anti-TTIP groups easily dominated the online media debate. In the period July to December 2014, anti-TTIP groups’ announcements in Germany amounted to 83% of the total online media coverage of the subject on average, rising to 93% at peak times. Peak-time media reporting took place around the time of the TTIP negotiation rounds. Eighty-five per cent of the total number of TTIP-related posts were originally authored and spread by anti-TTIP groups. Even more significantly, from the very beginning of the negotiations, negative reporting about TTIP on social media was reinforced by sponsored search results from antiTTIP groups on search engines such as Google. As a consequence, even those citizens (e.g. interested pupils and students) who searched for a balanced perspective about the agreement were rarely able to find one in German on the Internet. In September 2016, for example, Google adverts sponsored by Germany’s green political party The Alliance ’90/the Greens (hereafter the Green Party) and civil society organisations Foodwatch, Publik Forum (an organisation rooted in Christian religious beliefs), BUND and Greenpeace Germany ranked first in simple searches for TTIP. Such adverts had titles including ‘The green position on TTIP’, ‘Stop TTIP now’, ‘The war on TTIP’, and ‘Stop CETA

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Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

TTIP is an attack on democracy and the right to regulate

TTIP allows the US and/or multinational corporations to block EU laws

TTIP allows multinational corporations to sue EU governments for enforcing laws on consumer safety, health and environmental safety

Campact (funded by Attac members)b

Yes

Attac Germanya

Spread by

Yes TTIP allows for the proliferation of GMOs in the EU

Claim

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

Foodwatch Germanyc

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

Greenpeace Germanyd German Federation for the Environment and Nature Conservation (BUND)e

Table 1  Narratives and phrases used about TTIP by Germany’s most active anti-TTIP organisations.

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Campact (funded by Attac members)b

‘TTIP und CETA Stoppen’ [Stop TTIP and CETA]; ‘Böse Saat’ [Evil seeds]; ‘CETA ist brandgefährlich’ [CETA is extremely dangerous]

‘TTIP Stoppen’ [Stop TTIP]; ‘Stop CETA und TTIP’ [Stop CETA and TTIP]; ‘TTIP, nicht mit uns’ [TTIP—We will never agree]; ‘Kommunale Daseinsvorsorge unter Liberalisierungsdruck’ [Public services under pressure to privatise]; ‘Wir werden CETA stoppen’ [We will stop CETA]

Greenpeace Germanyd German Federation for the Environment and Nature Conservation (BUND)e

  See information provided by BUND Germany (Bund für Umwelt und Naturschutz, Friends of the Earth Germany) (n.d., 2015).

  See information provided by Greenpeace Germany (n. d., 2016).

e

d

  See information provided by Foodwatch Germany (2015a, b, 2016).

c

  See information provided by Campact (n. d.) and Strasser (2015).

  See information provided by Attac Germany (n. d. a, n. d. b, n. d. c).

b

a

Foodwatch Germanyc

‘Ein Angriff auf ‘Freihandelsfalle TTIP’ ‘Stoppt TTIP’ [Stop Demokratie und VerTTIP]; ‘Konzernen [TTIP is a free trade braucherrechte’ [An noch mehr Macht trap]; ‘Konzerne attack on democracy geben’ [Additional machen Staaten den and consumer rights] power to multinational Prozess’ [Multinacorporations]; ‘TTIP tional enterprises rule beschneidet die Menover governments]; schenrechte’ [TTIP ‘Technokraten entcuts human rights] machten Parlamente’ [Technocrats deprive governments of power]

Attac Germanya

Spread by

For details of the major anti-TTIP groups in Germany, see Bauer (2015b, c).

Source: Bauer (2016a).

Political catchphrases

Claim

Table 1  continued

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Figure 2  Most popular Google Search queries related to TTIP. TTIP demo

100

EU TTIP

95

TTIP trade

75

Stop TTIP

70

Was ist TTIP

65

CETA

65

TTIP CETA

65

TTIP wiki

55

TTIP Berlin

55

TTIP Freihandelsabkommen

50

Freihandelsabkommen

50

Gegen TTIP

50

Peon TTIP

45

TPP TTIP

45

What is TTIP

40

Pro TTIP

35

TTIP que es

35

Nachteile TTIP

30

TTIP news

30

TTIP Abkommen

30

Source: Google Trends (n. d.) and Bauer (2016a). Note: Query conducted on 30 August 2016. Numbers do not convey absolute search volumes. Numbers represent search interest relative to the highest point on the chart. If, for example, at most 10% of searches for the given region and time frame were for ‘TTIP’, it is taken as 100. Solid coloured bars indicate queries conveying a negative sentiment regarding TTIP. Covers period January 2013 to June 2016.

and TTIP’. Likewise, several heavily promoted online petitions, such as the anti-TTIP groups’ call on email newsletter subscribers to contribute to the European Commission’s online consultation on investment protection in 2015 (by completing forms made available to potential signatories), contributed to spreading dubious claims rather than factbased, balanced information (see, e.g. Bauer 2015a; European Commission 2015).

All politics is local: an analysis of TTIP‑related information events in Germany For TTIP-related information that is spread via social media, my previous analyses (Bauer 2015b, c) illustrate that there is a severe asymmetry in the content and sentiment of information about TTIP. This asymmetry is also reflected by the patterns in ‘offline’

No. (1) On investment protection and investor– state dispute settlement: TTIP does not stop governments from passing laws. But where new laws discriminate against foreign firms, it allows them to bring a claim for compensation. (2) On regulatory cooperation: TTIP will not overrule, repeal or amend EU legislation. The EU’s 28 member countries and the European Parliament would have to approve any changes to EU laws or regulations in order to liberalise trade

No. Under CETA, the EU and Canada have No. TTIP aims to encourage discussion about agreed to set up a Regulatory Cooperation regulations. Although EU and US regulations Forum. The Forum will function as a voluntary are often very similar they sometimes achieve cooperation mechanism to exchange experitheir aims in different ways. TTIP aims to ences and relevant information among regulaencourage EU and US regulators to work more tors, and to help identify areas where regulators closely when setting new regulations, and to could cooperate. It will not be able to change recognise each other’s regulations where they existing regulations or develop new legislation provide equivalent protection

TTIP/CETA is an attack on democracy and the right to regulate

TTIP/CETA allows the US and/or multinational corporations to block EU laws

No. See CETA text. The right to regulate is explicitly guaranteed in the investment protection chapter, trade and labour chapter, and trade and environment chapter

No. CETA does not affect EU restrictions on beef containing growth hormones or GMOs. See CETA text and European Commission summary clarification

No. The EU has a strict system for deciding whether to allow companies to sell any given GMO in the EU. This is entirely separate from trade negotiations. The EU basic law on GMOs—including the European Food Safety Authority’s safety assessment and risk management procedure—is not up for negotiation. It will not change as a result of TTIP

TTIP/CETA would allow the proliferation of GMOs in the EU

Clarification by EU Commission on CETAb,c

Clarification by EU Commissiona on TTIP

Claim

Table 2  Validity check of claims spread by Germany’s anti-TTIP groups.

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13

  See summary information provided by the European Commission (2016a).

c

  See text provided by European Commission (2014).

  See information provided by the European Commission (2016b).

b

a

Source: Bauer (2016a).

No. See CETA text. The right to regulate is No. EU laws set high standards that protect, explicitly guaranteed in the investment protecamong others, human life and health, animal tion chapter, trade and labour chapter, and trade health and welfare, the environment and and environment chapter consumers. In the EU, independent regulators advise governments on how strict these standards should be, based on the latest scientific research. TTIP will safeguard these standards and governments’ right in the future to set them as high as they wish

TTIP/CETA allows multinational corporations to sue EU governments for enforcing laws on consumer safety, health and environmental safety

Clarification by EU Commission on CETAb,c

Clarification by EU Commissiona on TTIP

Claim

Table 2  continued

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information events in Germany (Bauer 2016a). For the period February 2015 to February 2016, I analysed a unique and comprehensive dataset of 1,508 public information events on TTIP in order to shed light on those groups and individuals that played a dominant role in setting up the German and pan-European anti-TTIP grass-roots protest movement. The analysis is supplemented by additional information about the most prominent individuals and organisations in order to allow conclusions to be drawn about the underlying motivations and ideologies. A detailed description of the dataset and (coding) methodology is provided in Bauer (2016a). The major results are outlined below.

1. A majority of 66% of TTIP information event titles conveyed a neutral sentiment regarding TTIP. Thirty-one per cent of the TTIP event titles conveyed a negative message about TTIP. Only 3% of the TTIP event titles conveyed positive sentiments. 2. The majority of TTIP event organisers (58% of all registered events) are associations, organisations and political parties that were initially set up as or have declared membership of formal anti-TTIP campaigns in Germany (i.e. TTIPunfairhandelbar (‘TTIP non-negotiable’) and ‘Stop TTIP’). Amongst others, these networks include Attac Germany, BUND, More Democracy (Mehr Demokratie), Campact and four well-established political parties in Germany: The Green Party, The Left, The Pirates Germany and the Ecological Democratic Party. 3. German businesses and business associations as well as Germany’s Christian Democrats (Christlich Demokratische Union Deutschlands/Christlich-Soziale Union in Bayern, CDU–CSU) have shown relatively weak motivation to engage publicly in the debate. Only 11 and 1% of TTIP event organisers in Germany are business associations and individual businesses respectively. Those political parties that have not declared membership of a formal anti-TTIP campaign network account for 30% of TTIP events organised in Germany. 4. Germany’s Social Democratic Party (Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands, SPD) politicians across the whole spectrum of political conviction (ranging from the conservative group Seeheimer Kreis (‘Seeheim Circle’) to the Parliamentarian Left group) have frequently expressed ambiguous views on TTIP and sympathy for the protest groups’ activities.2 Accordingly, if all of the 208 events organised by the SPD, which is more than twice the number of events organised by Germany’s CDU–CSU, are ascribed to the TTIP protest organisations, the anti-TTIP scene controlled more than 75% of the local debate in Germany in the period under study. 5. Event numbers adjusted by voter support demonstrate that the SPD and the Green Party are more than three times as active in hosting and organising TTIP-related events than Germany’s leading conservative political parties (the CDU–CSU). Moreover, Germany’s The Left is more than twice as active as Germany’s CDU– CSU.

2 

In addition to the Federal Ministry of Economic Affairs and Energy, which is led by the SPD’s Sigmar Gabriel, there are three more SPD-led ministries at the German federal government level that have a stake in TTIP: the Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation, Building and Nuclear Safety (which has directly provided generous public funding for the coordination office of the anti-TTIP campaign network TTIPunfairhandelbar; DNR 2013, 20), the Federal Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs, and the Federal Ministry of Justice and Consumer Protection.

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6. TTIP events’ agenda setters predominantly chose subjects related to ‘state and democracy’ (126 mentions), ‘communal or regional impact’ (97 mentions) and ‘consumer and health protection’ (95 mentions). These issues strongly prevailed over other issues. In addition, issues related to the ‘private sector’ (businesses, industries and markets, 60 events) and ‘environmental protection’ (53 events) were among those subjects most frequently addressed by TTIP event organisers. Issues related to ‘trade and economic growth’ (24 events), ‘jobs and employment’ (13 events), ‘competition’ (3 events), ‘innovation’ (1 event) and ‘investment’ (2 events) have evidently not played such an important role in the discussions set up about TTIP. 7. The number of speakers affiliated with declared member organisations of antiTTIP protest networks significantly outweighs the number of speakers affiliated with businesses and business associations. The great majority of speakers, who were largely presented as distinguished experts on TTIP, are affiliated with official members of declared anti-TTIP campaign groups in Germany (46%). 8. Speakers affiliated with the Green Party (225 speakers) and The Left (124 speakers) dominated in local TTIP debates. In addition, salient experts in the debates were affiliated with the Confederation of German Trade Unions (88 speakers), Attac Germany (an anti-globalisation, anti-corporate activist group, 83 speakers), More Democracy (an NGO promoting democracy and stronger citizen participation, 61 speakers) and BUND (57 speakers), or with local anti-TTIP groups (46 speakers). In addition to speakers representing labour unions (193 speakers, including the Confederation of German Trade Unions), speakers affiliated with clerical organisations (103 speakers) such as the Catholic Labour Movement (35 speakers) and Bread for the World (an aid organisation of the German Evangelical/Protestant church, 13 speakers) were also frequently found as experts on TTIP panels. On the other hand, while speakers affiliated with environmental organisations (129 speakers) frequently appeared on TTIP panels, speakers affiliated with consumer protection organisations (30 speakers) were relatively under-represented. The data shows that the number of speakers representing the top 2 most active antiTTIP groups exceeded the number of speakers representing the top 20 most active business organisations. Moreover, the number of speakers representing the top 20 most active anti-TTIP groups exceeded the number of active TTIP experts from the top 20 business associations by more than 300%, and the total number of speakers affiliated with individual businesses (109 speakers) by more than 700%.

Germany’s most influential anti‑TTIP figureheads My analysis (Bauer 2016a) shows that 37 of Germany’s 50 most active speakers on TTIP either represent declared member organisations of Germany’s formal anti-TTIP protest network (33 individuals) or have voiced strong aversion to TTIP (4 individuals; for a more detailed overview, see Bauer 2016b).

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It is particularly striking that a great majority of the top 50 anti-TTIP speakers, including politicians from Germany’s Green Party, The Left and the SPD, are affiliated with more than one declared anti-TTIP organisation, for example with environmental organisations, clerical organisations and labour unions (for a more detailed overview, see Bauer 2016a). For example, Sven Giegold, who is a member of the European Parliament’s Group of the Greens/European Free Alliance, is an influential figurehead on Germany’s anti-TTIP protest scene and one of its key backers. Giegold is affiliated with five of the campaign network’s most influential groups. He is a co-founder of Attac Germany and an adviser to Campact, Germany’s leading professional anti-TTIP campaign organisation (which was founded by Attac members in 2004, see DRadio 2015).3 He is also officially affiliated with More Democracy and Friends of Nature (Naturfreunde), and a member of the steering board of Germany’s Evangelical Church Conference. In addition, many of Germany’s top anti-TTIP influencers are well-connected through membership of multiple political parties, labour unions, Christian organisations and think tanks, such as the Institut Solidarische Moderne, which provides a networking platform for opinion leaders in green and left-wing politics, the media, and cultural and academic institutions.

German NGOs’ attempts to take protests to other (European) countries German anti-TTIP NGOs explicitly aim to take the protests to other European countries. The Berlin-based Forum for the Environment and Development (Forum Umwelt und Entwicklung) and Campact, a professional civil society campaign platform, are Germany’s most influential anti-TTIP campaign organisations.4 Together these organisations initiated Germany’s first anti-TTIP campaign, ‘TTIP non-negotiable’. The coordination centre for ‘TTIP non-negotiable’ is hosted by the Forum for the Environment and Development and is, to the surprise of many political observers, directly funded by Germany’s Federal Ministry of the Environment (DNR 2013). Currently the Forum for the Environment and Development also hosts the coordination centre for the European anti-TTIP movement ‘Stop TTIP’ (Stop TTIP 2016). It initiated and still coordinates the ‘self-organised’ European citizens’ initiative against TTIP. Germany’s Campact attempts to take German anti-TTIP protests to other EU countries too. The organisation has financed several civil society organisations in Europe, providing grants for anti-TTIP campaigns or infrastructure for political education for the anti-TTIP organisations PROGRESSI (Italy, €50,000), Skiftet (Sweden, €70,000), Uplift (Ireland, €50,000), Aufstehn (Austria, €25,000), and Fundacja Akcja Demokracja (Poland, €25,000). Campact has also provided funding to ActionStation (New Zealand,

3 

See also information provided by Campact (2016a).

4

 See DRadio (2015). For detailed information about the organisational background, missions and campaign activities of these organisations, see their webpages: https://campact.org, www.forumue.de, www. stop-ttip.org and http://www.ttip-unfairhandelbar.de.

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€50,000) and GetUp (Australia, €41,069), two organisations that have set up political campaigns against the Transpacific Partnership Agreement (see Campact 2016b). Germany’s Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung, the government-funded political foundation of Germany’s The Left, has organised anti-TTIP campaign trainings in Belgium (to ‘build strategies to face the threats of TTIP’), Spain (to train 70 TTIP activists), Italy and several other countries in Europe (Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung 2016a, b; Stop TTIP Italia 2016). In addition, the Seattle to Brussels Network, which actively supports anti-TTIP campaigning in Europe, is coordinated by a group of four individuals, of which three are experienced and well-connected German activists.5 In Germany (and Austria) influential civil society groups have managed to professionally exploit citizens’ (largely uninformed) reservations about the US (latent antiAmericanism), Brussels-centred policymaking, multinational enterprises and economic globalisation. At the same time, high-level politicians as well as individual businesses and business associations have failed to provide easy-to-understand clarity about what TTIP is and what its aims are. Moreover, the European Commission’s clarifications about why negotiations have to be behind closed doors have appeared deceptive and barely credible to citizens, politicians and the media alike. Investor protection, hormone-fed beef and chlorine-washed chicken have become popular symbols of the widespread anxiety among European citizens, who fear a reduction in democratic participation, growing corporate influence and a loss of control over EU politics in general. Taken together, these developments have had an impact on the zeitgeist of globalisation in and beyond Germany. Powerful online media campaigns against TTIP have already cemented anti-globalisation views, not only among the broader public, but also among Europe’s political elites. The ideas of globalisation are becoming less and less associated with personal liberties, economic freedom, a balance of power between the public and the private sector, accountable governments and, ultimately, peace.

What is to be done by those in favour of open markets and pluralist societies? In Germany, even the friends of open markets and competition have started to voice scepticism about TTIP. Some have even called for the trade agreement with the US to

5 

The Seattle to Brussels Network is a network of development, environmental, human rights, women’s and farmers’ organisations, trade unions and social movements, as well as research institutes.

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be dropped.6 For many politicians and businesses, it has become politically or economically expedient not to engage in the debate due to fear of losing one’s individual or organisational reputation in the toxic debate. For those who still aim to make TTIP a success, however, three major themes must be taken into consideration: transparency, education and engagement. As concerns transparency, TTIP proponents should point out that the negotiations should be based on three core principles: secrecy, stakeholder and civil society participation, and democratic ratification. Therefore, confidentiality during negotiations is the only way to avoid opportunistic interference and to protect ‘common good’ policymaking against excessively critical, sensation-seeking speculation expressed by vested business and/or NGO interests. The anti-TTIP debate offers a shining example of how guesswork-triggered myths spread by civil society organisations can become high-traffic viral stories on the Internet. In the area of education, efforts need to be intensified to address fears and prejudices through the continuous provision of facts by the European Commission. This requires that (leading) politicians deal with the nitty-gritty of all of the texts that have been made publicly available in order to credibly make the case for TTIP. Making reference to the creation of jobs and additional economic growth, which is seen by many as speculation, if not deception, should not be the principle argument for TTIP. As concerns engagement, individual politicians and (bourgeois) political parties, as well as individual businesses and business associations, must strengthen their efforts to promote TTIP as an instrument capable of changing societies from the bottom up, and not from the top down. Opinion leaders should promote TTIP as an agreement that encourages the exchange of ideas, which is a fundamental precondition for free, open and pluralist societies (see, e.g. Hirschman 2013). The effect of free cross-border trade between the EU and the US has not been given the attention it deserves. For political parties, businesses and citizens that are interested in a transatlantic dialogue about high standards, good rules for fair competition and, not least, good rules for good society, it is time to begin to challenge the anti-TTIP propaganda in Germany, Austria and other European countries. Friends of open and pluralist societies, as well as supporters of the TTIP negotiations, should not blame the ill-informed and often anxious protesters on the streets, but confront the protest campaigns’ ‘puppet masters’. It is high time to hold them to account for provoking emotional responses among citizens by spreading lies, myths and anti-TTIP hate speech on the Internet and beyond.

6 

This view is especially strong in Germany where liberal intellectuals such as Hans Kundani and newspapers such as Die Zeit have argued in favour of declaring TTIP a failure. Moreover, informal associations such as Germany’s Alliance of Small and Medium-sized Enterprises against TTIP portray themselves as the majority opinion leaders among businesses and citizens. As the SPD has moved closer to taking a formal position against TTIP, several pro-trade commentators have argued that it is best to put TTIP to rest. In the Financial Times, a similar view has been taken by, among others, Wolfgang Münchau. Ana Palacio, the former Spanish foreign minister, and many others have also joined the chorus.

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Open Access  This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits any use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author(s) and the source are credited.

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Nature Conservation in Municipalities. Consequences of TTIP, TiSA and CETA for Municiplities]. 9 July. http://www.bund.net/fileadmin/bundnet/pdfs/umweltschutz_international/150710_bund_umweltschutz_international_ttip_kommunen.pdf. Accessed 14 September 2016. Campact. (2016a). Das Campact Team [The Campact team]. https://www.campact.de/ campact/ueber-campact/das-team/. Accessed 30 September 2016. Campact. (2016b). Der Campact Report 2016 [The Campact report 2016]. https://blog. campact.de/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/160726_Campact_Transparenzbericht2015. pdf. Accessed 15 September 2016. Campact. (n. d.). 5-Minuten-Info: Handels- und Investitionsabkommen TTIP [TTIP in five minutes]. https://www.campact.de/ttip/appell/5-minuten-info/. Accessed 15 September 2016. DNR. (2013). Leistungsbericht des Deutschen Naturschutzrings 2013 [Report of the German Naturschutzring 2013]. http://www.dnr.de/downloads/leistungsbericht-2013. pdf. Accessed 15 September 2016. Donnan, S. (2016). The TTIP has missed its political moment. Financial Times, 16 May. https://www.ft.com/content/466ebdd4-fb3f-11e5-8f41-df5bda8beb40. Accessed 20 July 2016. DRadio. (2015). Die schlagkräftigste NGO Deutschlands [The most powerful German NGO]. 21 May. http://www.deutschlandradiokultur.de/protestorganisation-campact-dieschlagkraeftigste-ngo.2165.de.html?dram:article_id=320427. Accessed 30 September 2016. Eurobarometer. (2015). Eurobarometer 84 wave, December 2015. December. http:// ec.europa.eu/COMMFrontOffice/PublicOpinion/index.cfm/Survey/getSurveyDetail/ instruments/STANDARD/surveyKy/2098. Accessed 15 September 2016. European Commission. (2014). Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) between Canada, of the one part, and the European Union. September. http:// trade.ec.europa.eu/doclib/docs/2014/september/tradoc_152806.pdf. Accessed 15 September 2016. European Commission. (2015). Online public consultation on investment protection and investor-to-state dispute settlement (ISDS) in the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership agreement (TTIP). Report, SWD (2015) 3 final, 13 January. European Commission. (2016a). Fragen und Antworten [Questions and answers]. Last updated 18 April. http://ec.europa.eu/trade/policy/in-focus/ceta/questions-and-answers/ index_de.htm. Accessed 15 September 2016.

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European Commission. (2016b). Questions and answers: About TTIP—basics, benefits and concerns. Last updated 6 September. http://ec.europa.eu/trade/policy/in-focus/ttip/ about-ttip/questions-and-answers/index_en.htm. Accessed 15 September 2016. Fabry, E. (2015). France: A hotbed of opposition to the TTIP? Notre Europe Policy Paper no. 136. Berlin, 10 June. Foodwatch Germany. (2015a). Paralleljustiz im Interesse der Unternehmen? [Courts only acting in the interests of enterprises?]. 2 October. https://www.foodwatch.org/de/ informieren/freihandelsabkommen/mehr-zum-thema/private-schiedsgerichte/. Accessed 15 September 2016. Foodwatch Germany. (2015b). TTIP, CETA und TiSA – was verbirgt sich dahinter? [What hides behind TTIP, CETA and TiSA?]. 21 January. https://www.foodwatch.org/ de/informieren/freihandelsabkommen/mehr-zum-thema/ttip-ceta-tisa/. Accessed 15 September 2016. Foodwatch Germany. (2016). Ein Angriff auf Demokratie und Verbraucherrechte [An attack on democracy and consumer rights]. 27 January. https://www.foodwatch.org/de/ informieren/freihandelsabkommen/2-minuten-info/. Accessed 15 September 2016. Fratzscher, M. (2016). Germany’s strange turn against trade. Project Syndicate. 6 June. https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/germany-opposition-transatlantictrade-partnership-by-marcel-fratzscher-2016-06. Accessed 19 October 2016. Freytag, A. (2016). Machen die TTIP-Gegner Wahlkampf für die AfD? Freytags-Frage [Do TTIP opponents engage in electoral campaigning for the AfD?]. Wirtschaftswoche. http://www.wiwo.de/politik/deutschland/freytags-frage-machen-die-ttip-gegner-wahlkampf-fuer-die-afd/14550112.html. Accessed 17 September 2016. Google Trends. (n. d.). https://www.google.de/trends/. Greenpeace Germany. (n. d.). TTIP und CETA stoppen [Stop TTIP and CETA]. https:// www.greenpeace.de/ttip-stoppen. Accessed 15 September 2016. Greenpeace Germany. (2016). Böse Saat. [Evil seeds]. 28 April. https://www.greenpeace.de/themen/landwirtschaft/gentechnik/boese-saat. Accessed 15 September 2016. Hirschman, A. (2013). The passions and the interests: Political arguments for capitalism before its triumph. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Infratest dimap. (2016). ARD-DeutschlandTREND, Mai 2016 [ARD Consortium of public broadcasters in Germany, poll of Germany, May 2016]. May http://www.infratestdimap.de/umfragen-analysen/bundesweit/ard-deutschlandtrend/2016/mai/. Accessed 20 July 2016.

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Kolev, G. (2016). Ja zum Freihandel, nein zu TTIP? Die TTIP-Skepsis und ihre Ursachen [Yes to free trade, no to TTIP? The causes of TTIP criticism]. Institut der deutschen Wirtschaft Köln Report no. 25/2016. Cologne. Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung. (2016a). Search results for ‘TTIP’. http://www.rosalux.eu/ search/?q=ttip&tx_solr%5bpage%5d=1. Accessed 14 September 2016. Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung. (2016b). Spanish activists are gearing up to continue the fight against TTIP and CETA. 27 July. http://www.rosalux.eu/topics/global-power-andresistance/spanish-activists-are-gearing-up-to-continue-the-fight-against-ttip-and-ceta/. Accessed 14 September 2016. Sparding, P. (2014). Germany’s pivotal role on the way to TTIP. The German Marshall Fund of the United States Europe Policy Paper 5/2014. Berlin. Stop TTIP. (2016). Legal note. https://stop-ttip.org/legalnote/. Accessed 14 September 2016. Strasser, M. (2015). Diese 150 Sekunden haben es in sich: Video enthüllt neuen TTIP-Skandal [Striking 150 seconds: Video reveals TTIP new scandal]. Campact.de, 2 February. https://blog.campact.de/2015/02/diese-150-sekunden-haben-es-in-sichvideo-enthuellt-neuen-ttip-skandal/. Accessed 15 September 2016. Stop TTIP Italia. (2016). Roma, 13–13 Aprile: Seminario internazionale sull’Impatto del TTIP in Italia [Rome, 13–13 April: International seminar on the impact of TTIP]. 10 April. https://stop-ttip-italia.net/2014/04/10/roma-13-13-aprile-seminario-internazionalesullimpatto-del-ttip-in-italia/. Accessed 14 September 2016. TTIPUnfairhandelbar (TTIP non-negotiable). (n. d.). Mitgliederliste [List of members]. http://www.ttip-unfairhandelbar.de/start/wer-wir-sind/mitgliederliste/. Accessed 30 September 2016. van Ham, P. (2016). Communicating TTIP—Challenges for the European Union. Netherlands Institute of International Relations. Clingendael Policy Brief. March 2016. von der Burchard, H. (2016a). Anti-trade campaigners slaughter their golden goose: TTIP—Controversial accord has given NGOs more funds, staff and power than ever. Politico, 20 September. http://www.politico.eu/article/anti-trade-campaigners-slaughtertheir-golden-goose-ttip-why-ngos-germany/. Accessed 19 September 2016. von der Burchard, H. (2016b). The man who killed TTIP. Politico, 14 July. http://www. politico.eu/article/the-man-who-killed-ttip-thilo-bode-foodwatch-germany-free-trade/. Accessed 21 July 2016.

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Matthias Bauer is a senior economist at the European Centre for International Political Economy in Brussels.

European View DOI 10.1007/s12290-016-0412-8

ARTICLE

From dreams to reality: the challenges of Italy’s Five Star Movement Margherita Movarelli 

© The Author(s) 2016. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com

Abstract  Since its birth in 2009, the Five Star Movement has achieved incredible growth, accompanied by important electoral successes. This has resulted in concrete responsibilities and influential positions in the system. Grillo’s movement was born as an anti-system and populist force with interesting peculiarities, and the main challenge it is now facing is to prove itself able to govern and to transform problems into solutions. So far the promised revolution has not taken place: a mixture of inexperience, internal divisions, scandals and contradictions has already damaged the image of the movement, which is facing many challenges and a difficult transition. The evolution of the Five Star Movement shows all the weaknesses of populist movements facing reality. The best strategy to confront them is to ensure that all their contradictions emerge and, at the same time, to regain the citizens’ trust by providing credible solutions to their problems.

M. Movarelli (*)  Wilfried Martens Centre for European Studies, Rue du Commerce 20, 1000 Brussels, Belgium e-mail: [email protected]

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Keywords  M5S | Five Star Movement | Grillo | Casaleggio | Italy | Populism | Protest

Introduction ‘We will open up Parliament like a can of tuna fish.’ This was the vow made by Beppe Grillo, the leader of the Five Star Movement (Movimento 5 Stelle, M5S), before the general elections in 2013 (Adnkronos.com 2013). These elections took M5S representatives into the Italian Parliament for the first time. Less than four years had passed since 4 October 2009, the day when Grillo, a histrionic comedian, together with a visionary digital and marketing strategist, Gianroberto Casaleggio, founded M5S on the web from a collection of Meetup groups. Incredibly, in 2013, M5S was the primary political actor in the Chamber of Deputies, winning more than 25% of the votes in the elections (Ministero dell’Interno 2013). In 2014, with a lower but still significant percentage of the vote (21.1%), M5S won 17 seats in the European Parliament (Ministero dell’Interno 2014). Finally, in the last round of local elections in 2016, the movement won 19 out of the 20 ballots it participated in across the country. In particular, Rome and Turin— the capital and the third-largest Italian economic centre respectively—both elected M5S mayors with overwhelming majorities. Ever since its birth, M5S has achieved incredibly fast and significant growth (Passarelli and Tuorto 2016), enhanced by its innovative use of the Internet as the vehicle for its disruptive political message. This constitutes an unprecedented phenomenon in Italian (and European) politics. By using anti-system populist rhetoric, M5S has managed to collect a large share of the protest vote, which has its origins in widespread anger and discontent with both the current situation in society and the political and economic situation. By taking advantage of the connective power of new technologies, it has mobilised different communities—not just protest voters—all over the country on a wide variety of subjects (i.e. the environment, a universal basic income, fair taxation, transparency in public administration and the fight against corruption). It has represented some of the most urgent demands of Italian citizens, in a context of poor representation of such demands by the mainstream parties (Conti and Memoli 2015, 529). As a consequence of these successes, over the past few years M5S has gained powerful positions at all levels of the political system and an opportunity to influence the policymaking process. This means, at the same time, that the movement is now accountable for its actions and under the voters’ scrutiny. After many years spent criticising and blaming the establishment for the problems of the country, now M5S has the opportunity to prove that it is different and to make the promised changes by delivering effective policies. As the title of an article published by The Guardian in June, immediately after Virginia Raggi’s victory in the Rome elections, noted: ‘Italy’s Five Star Movement now has to translate problems into problem-solving’ (Grillo 2016). This is a big challenge for a movement which is composed of people with little or no experience in politics and which is not willing to compromise with other political parties. Moreover, contradictions and conflicts present within the movement are coming to the surface. And since Casaleggio—the brains behind the movement—passed away last

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April, M5S has been trying to find a new internal balance. Scandals and allegations are also putting M5S under pressure and they are expected to have an impact on the perceptions and future orientations of the movement’s voters. All of these elements show that M5S is facing many challenges and a delicate transition. This article intends to shed light on the identity of M5S and its accomplishments. Its aim is to ensure a better understanding of the Five Star phenomenon and offer some recommendations on how to confront populist rhetoric.

A hybrid actor with many contradictions M5S is a hybrid actor that goes beyond traditional classifications and is composed of a strange mixture of elements and contradictions (Diamanti 2014; Becchi 2015a, 71; Bordignon and Ceccarini 2015; Ceccarini and Bordignon 2016). According to Article 4 of its ‘Non Statute’—both in the first version of 2009 and in the 2016 amended version1—‘the Five Star Movement is not a political party and it is not intended to become one in the future’ (M5S 2009, 2016b). It is a ‘non-Association’, ‘a platform’ (art. 1) aimed at promoting a fruitful exchange of opinions and a democratic discussion ‘without the intermediation of executive or representative bodies’ (art. 4). The movement declares itself to be a community of equal people who all have the same value (‘uno vale uno’). A system of online voting allows the members of this community to choose programmes and candidates and to actively participate in the movement’s decisions. Recently, a new online platform—named ‘Rousseau’ after the father of direct democracy—was created to enable web users to propose new laws and make amendments to those initiated by M5S representatives in the Italian and European Parliaments, as well as in local councils. This should be seen as another step towards the establishment of a new form of direct and participatory web democracy, as it was originally conceived by Casaleggio and Grillo. In reality, the identity of the movement is much more complex and ambiguous. Since the very beginning, the two co-founders have controlled the movement, taking the strategic decisions (Bordignon and Ceccarini 2015, 464). The procedures followed for online voting are of doubtful transparency and legitimacy. An internal organisation has clearly emerged, with a group of people officially in charge of the coordination of the movement. The Direttorio —the main executive body of the movement—was created in 2014. It is made up of five members who were approved by an online vote but selected by Grillo and Casaleggio. Since this time, M5S has been constantly expanding its internal structure. An M5S ruling class has emerged as a result of this process, in clear contradiction of what the Non Statute says about the rejection of intermediary bodies (Becchi 2015a, b). In the Parliament, the movement has placed its representatives on

1 

The article refers to the amended version of 15 February 2016. At the time of writing, a new version of the Non Statute is currently being voted on again by M5S members (M5S 2016c). However, the proposed amendments do not affect the articles mentioned here.

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strategic committees and has even managed to elect one of its members to be a vicepresident of the Italian Chamber of Deputies. M5S looks more and more like a political party, with a strong and charismatic leadership, a ruling class and an internal structure. It has its own post-modern ideology—web democracy—but also embraces elements of populism, environmentalism and anti-capitalism. Like other political parties and movements, M5S organises regular conventions at the national level to gather its supporters together. M5S activists are a mixed crowd of individuals with diverse political opinions and different interests. Having said that, they have a few significant things in common: for instance, 84.6% of them declare their top priority to be the fight against political corruption (Putini 2016, 92), the majority of them (56%) do not personally identify with the right–left continuum and 66% of them believe that M5S goes beyond this traditional right–left classification (Putini 2016, 91). In this sense, M5S can be seen as a ‘catch-all (anti-party) party’, able to unify groups with very different and even contrasting ideological outlooks (Ceccarini and Bordignon 2016, 154).

A real revolution? If we look at the concrete results achieved so far by M5S in its political activity, they fall somewhat below the ambitions of the movement and the expectations of its voters. In the past three years, a contribution by M5S has never been decisive in getting any of the laws approved by the Italian Parliament passed (FB-Lab-FB and Associati 2016, 2). The movement has played a classic oppositional role, using parliamentary tools such as questions and motions, and engaging in filibustering activities, such as the presentation of big numbers of amendments, with the only purpose being to slow down the approval of legislation (Bordignon and Ceccarini 2015, 467). Instances of cooperation between M5S and other parties are limited and concern specific amendments, while on bigger issues the movement still refuses to take part in negotiations and maintains its selfimposed isolation. Since the very beginning it has strongly opposed the government’s reforms, but at the same time has never come up with a clear alternative proposal. At the local level, M5S administrations have not proved more successful than those of other parties. In some cases—for instance, in Quarto, Livorno and Rome—the movement has had to defend itself from scandals and allegations, as could have happened to any of the traditional political parties in Italy. In the European Parliament—where M5S is part of the Europe of Freedom and Direct Democracy Group, alongside the UK Independence Party—the movement seems more inclined to engage in dialogue with other political groups and stakeholders, most probably due to the less confrontational context in Brussels. This positively affects the potential impact that the movement has on the policymaking process (FB Lab-FB and Associati 2016, 17). However, the strategy of M5S at the European level and its positions on Europe are far from clear. Originally, the movement was strongly opposed to

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the EU and the euro. M5S strongly supported the idea of a referendum on a possible Italian exit from the EU, although such a vote would not have resulted in action under Italian law. Recently, despite denials, the movement has completely changed its position: instead of supporting an Italian exit, it now supports Italy remaining a member of the EU and has committed to the fight to reform the European institutions from within. Such a drastic shift was not the result of an online vote. On the contrary, web users were extremely surprised (and many of them upset) to find out that a blog post on the movement’s website about Brexit, explaining why Italy should also have a referendum to leave the EU, had been mysteriously re-edited—probably with the hope that nobody would notice the change—to say that M5S has no intention of leaving the EU (Zaffarano 2016). However, the movement still supports the populist idea of a referendum to leave the eurozone. Indeed, there has been nothing revolutionary so far in the actions and positions of M5S. Perhaps the only concrete achievement worthy of mention is its major contribution to a guarantee fund, established by the Ministry of Economic Development, for microcredit for small and medium-sized enterprises. Each month M5S representatives transfer a considerable part of their salaries to this fund. At the time of writing, their total contributions exceed 15 million euros. The initiative has proven very successful: so far, more than 1000 micro-entrepreneurs have had access to the fund and have benefited from the technical assistance of the wide network of business consultants involved in this project (M5S 2016a; Patti 2016). Certainly, on many occasions M5S has played an important role in denouncing episodes of corruption and the wasting of public money. M5S has been also able to keep social anger within a democratic framework, avoiding outbursts of violence and revolts in one of the gloomiest periods for the Italian economy. However, its self-imposed isolation, extreme idealism and unwillingness to compromise prevent the movement from being effective and constitute the main obstacles to its accomplishment of concrete goals. As an article recently published in the Financial Times noted, M5S ‘is still a long way from being a credible contender at the national level’ (FT View 2016).

Instability and new challenges Internal divisions and political inexperience have certainly not helped the movement to achieve results. What happened in Rome during the first steps taken by the new M5S administration is emblematic. Instead of taking immediate action to solve the city’s serious problems, the new mayor became mired in surreal internal fights about who to have on her team. The lack of experience within the movement resulted in a desperate search for competent people able to deal with complex issues. Yet, what happened in Rome is just the tip of the iceberg. At least two factions exist inside the movement and both have representatives in the M5S Direttorio. On the one hand, there is an ‘institutional’ and more pragmatic faction, which is trying to gain credibility, including at the international level, by using reassuring

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tones which better appeal to the orientations of a more moderate electorate. This faction is certainly more inclined to engage in dialogue with institutional actors and stakeholders. On the other hand, there is a ‘radical’ faction, loyal to the original approach of the movement, which maintains a strong anti-system identity and is not open to compromise with the establishment. Grillo mediates and keeps the different groups together. Throughout the years, he has considerably moderated the tones of the movement’s public interventions, in order to reach out to a wider, more moderate audience. Nevertheless, he has not abandoned the anti-system and anti-establishment rhetoric, which is still present in all his blog posts and public interventions. Without his charismatic leadership—reaffirmed during an M5S national convention in Palermo in September 2016—divisions and conflicts would prevail. That is probably why, even though he announced an intention to step back and let his creation become independent, he still has to be on the front line. Casaleggio & Associati also plays a strategic—and controversial—role in the life of the movement. Since the beginning, the company has managed Grillo’s blog and still has oversight of the movement’s presence on the web. It is responsible for the implementation of the new Rousseau platform and is behind the recently created fundraising association (Munafò and Piana 2016). Davide Casaleggio—who took over the administration of the company after his father Gianroberto Casaleggio passed away—has been working behind the scenes for many years. He does not display any personal political ambitions, but his influence on the movement’s decisions is as significant as his father’s was. This Five Star galaxy is now becoming extremely unstable due to the new circumstances in which the movement is operating. Tangible responsibilities are increasingly fuelling internal conflicts, divisions and different strategic approaches. In addition there has been a rise in protests and petitions as a result of the controversial suspensions and expulsions of M5S representatives who have supposedly violated the principles of the movement; this has called into question the presence of a real internal democracy within the movement. Furthermore, the arguments of populist propaganda, which worked perfectly in past election campaigns, are showing themselves to be insufficient when it comes to solving problems; too many contradictions have emerged from the gap between the idealistic approach of M5S and its concrete handling of power, and this has led to disillusionment as well as frustration, especially among the supporters of the revolution. All these challenges constitute big obstacles for the movement, which has the ambition to govern the country. Yet, the electoral potential of M5S, which is still considerable, and its emotional impact on voters’ orientations should not be underestimated.

Conclusion It is rather difficult to foresee the future strategy of the movement and its level of consensus. Italian politics is extremely unpredictable and so are the orientations of the Italian electorate: many different external factors could influence the performance of the movement and any prediction could easily prove wrong.

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In the short term it is most likely that the movement will simply try to handle its internal divisions and rebuild its credibility, which has been negatively affected by the messy beginnings of the new M5S administration in Rome. In other words, the movement will try to buy time and minimise its failures by pointing the finger at lobbying groups and the media, which it will blame for preventing it from achieving its goals. If there is a lesson to be learned from the Italian experience, it is that anti-system movements can win elections with their populist arguments, but they do not have the tools to handle reality. The most effective way to dismantle their rhetoric and confront them is, on the one hand, to highlight all their contradictions and, on the other, to rebuild the citizens’ trust in politics by providing credible answers to their demands. The second part of this strategy is indispensable as it is the way to win votes back from the populists. If this does not happen, these votes may simply turn into abstentions, fuelling another dangerous trend that is present in Italy as well as in many other Western democracies. Open Access  This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons AttributionLicense which permits any use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the originalauthor(s) and the source are credited.

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Conti, N., & Memoli, V. (2015). The emergence of a new party in the Italian party system: Rise and fortunes of the Five Star Movement. West European Politics. doi:10.1080 /01402382.2014.996377. Diamanti, I. (2014). Democrazia Ibrida [Hybrid democracy]. Roma and Bari: Laterza/L Repubblica. FB-Lab-FB & Associati. (2016). Dentro o Fuori dal Palazzo? Il Movimento 5 Stelle in Parlamento [In or out of the palace? The Five Star Movement in Parliament]. www.fbassociati.it/fblab/FBLAB-M5S.pdf. Accessed 14 September 2016. FT View. (2016). The risky allure of Italy’s Five Star Movement. Financial Times, 20 June. https://www.ft.com/content/7d982fb0-36d2-11e6-a780-b48ed7b6126f. Accessed 14 September 2016. Grillo, F. (2016). Italy’s five star movement now has to translate problems into problemsolving. The Guardian, 21 June. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/ jun/21/italy-five-star-movement-protest-problem-solving-elections. Accessed 14 September 2016. Ministero dell’Interno. (2013). Archivio storico delle elezioni—Camera dei Deputati 24 Febbraio 2013 [Election data archive—Chamber of Deputies 24 February 2013]. http:// elezionistorico.interno.it/index.php?tpel=C&dtel=24/02/2013&tpa=I&tpe=A&lev0=0&le vsut0=0&es0=S&ms=S. Accessed 22 September 2016. Ministero dell’interno. (2014). Archivio storico delle elezioni—Europee 25 Maggio 2014 [Election data archive—European elections 25 May 2014]. http://elezionistorico.interno. it/index.php?tpel=E&dtel=25/05/2014&tpa=Y&tpe=A&lev0=0&levsut0=0&es0=S&m s=S. Accessed 22 September 2016. M5S. (2009). Non Statuto [Non statute]. M5S. (2016a). Micro credito. Una speranza che cresce [Micro credit. A growing hope]. http://www.movimento5stelle.it/parlamento/microcredito/. Accessed 5 October 2016. M5S. (2016b). Non Statuto [Non statute]. https://s3-eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/materiali-bg/Regolamento-Movimento-5-Stelle.pdf. Accessed 14 September 2016. M5S. (2016c). Non Statuto [Non statute]. http://www.beppegrillo.it/immagini/NON%20 STATUTO%2026sett.pdf. Accessed 20 October 2016. Munafò, M., & Piana, L. (2016). M5S, chi comanda nel Movimento? Ecco come funziona la rete di Casaleggio Jr [M5S, who controls the Movement? Here’s how Casaleggio Jr’s network works]. L’Espresso, 28 June. http://espresso.repubblica. it/palazzo/2016/06/27/news/m5s-chi-comanda-movimento-rete-casaleggio-jr-rousseau-1.273947. Accessed 18 September 2016.

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Passarelli, G., & Tuorto, D. (2016). The Five Star Movement: Purely a matter of protest? The rise of a new party between political discontent and reasoned voting. Party Politics. doi:10.1177/1354068816642809. Patti, F. (2016). Microcredito a Cinque Stelle: il fondo per le piccole imprese è una cosa seria [Five Star micro-credit: The fund for small enterprises is no joke]. Linkiesta, 11 February. http://www.linkiesta.it/it/article/2016/02/11/microcredito-a-cinque-stelle-ilfondo-per-le-piccole-imprese-e-una-cos/29231/. Accessed 14 September 2016. Putini, A. (2016). Nuove forme di politica, democrazia e partecipazione [New forms of politics, democracy and participation]. Sociologia 2, 82–99. Zaffarano, F. (2016). Il M5S non vuole piu’ lasciare l’Europa e l’Euro [M5S does not want to leave Europe and the euro anymore]. La Stampa, 24 June. http://www. lastampa.it/2016/06/24/italia/politica/il-ms-ha-cambiato-idea-e-non-vuole-pi-il-referendum-per-uscire-dalleuropa-pi0QFlJ5LwZoOXkqUcdxnL/pagina.html. Accessed 14 September. Margherita Movarelli is project officer at the Wilfried Martens Centre for European Studies. Prior to this she worked in the Italian Senate for several years. She has undertaken extensive research on party politics and political institutions. She is the author of a book on the role of Italian centre–right think tanks in the policymaking process (Think tank all’italiana, Rubbettino 2013).

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European View DOI 10.1007/s12290-016-0409-3

ARTICLE

The crisis of European identity and awakening of civil society Martin Mycielski 

© The Author(s) 2016. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com

Abstract  The EU is facing its biggest threat yet—a crisis of European identity. As member states fall into the hands of Eurosceptic and nationalist regimes, for many the future of the Union seems hopeless. People are disillusioned, failing to see the added value in the community of nations they once voted to join. Institutions are struggling, unable to regain their citizens’ trust, or even to reach them at all. This new crisis requires a new way of thinking—instead of supporting the institutional machine, the EU must support the people. It needs to place trust in the awakening civil society, endorsing and funding grass-roots movements such as the Committee for the Defence of Democracy, which in a matter of days managed to ignite the biggest mass protests in Poland since the fall of Communism. Keywords  Europe | Identity | Democracy | Nationalism | Civil society | Grass roots | Protest | Movement

M. Mycielski (*)  Wilfried Martens Centre for European Studies, Rue du Commerce 20, 1000 Brussels, Belgium e-mail: [email protected]

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Introduction From its conception as the European Coal and Steel Community, through the fall of the Soviet bloc and up until the beginning of the global financial crisis, the EU was largely portrayed as a utopian idea come to life, the ultimate accomplishment of Western civilisation. It was viewed as an eternally prosperous liberal democracy, the answer to the turmoil of the first half of the twentieth century and a definitive end to hundreds of years of destructive conflicts. With this creation from the brilliant mind of Robert Schuman, Western Europe was finally safe from war, poverty, political instability, and any struggles common to the Second and Third Worlds. Secure in their bubble, the EU’s ‘old’ member states would only reach out to grab those that they deemed worthy to join them in their exclusive gentlemen’s club. The EU seemed close to sci-fi writer and creator of Star Trek Gene Roddenberry’s vision of the twenty-third century come to life (British Humanist Association 2016). In any event, that was the idea sold to us Eastern Europeans throughout the 1990s and 2000s. A beautifully packaged, flawless product, with a simple slogan: ‘Join us and be prosperous and worry-free forever’. This must surely have been one of the most successful—if unintentional—public relations campaigns in human history, with nations such as Slovakia, Lithuania and Slovenia completely buying into it, with more than 90% of their referendum votes cast in favour of joining the Union. But putting the idea of the EU in marketing terms seems cruel and superficial. After all, it is so much more than a simple product. Its goal is not for one side to profit at the expense of the other. Its underlying concept is synergy—that the community as a whole is worth more than the sum of its parts. We pitch in a bit and get more out, especially if we had not been doing too well before. In business terms it would be a 100% safe investment. No risk, just profit. Or is it?

The breakdown For a time we were all beneficiaries of this community concept. The product we had bought, the safe investment, was paying off. And it was paying off well: development funds and investors were pouring in, there were mind-blowing export opportunities, free movement—you name it. The best business idea? Producing metal signs with the European flag and the words ‘Funded by the European Union’—every village in Poland had one. But as born consumers we should have known better. Any product, even one with an Apple logo, has an expiry date. At the point when you least expect it, the product will start acting up, until it fails completely. At this point a Eurosceptic politician would conclude this metaphor, with a grin on his face, stating that the EU has done exactly that: it has crumbled under the weight of its overgrown ambitions and broken down as it was destined to do from the start. Except that… it hasn’t.

European View

But something has failed. The rising tide of nationalism, from populist powers gaining control of Poland and Hungary to the completely unexpected Brexit vote, is a symptom of a much deeper issue: the demise of European identity as a result of European self-gratification.

The enemy within To paraphrase Petrarch, the EU has no greater enemy than itself (von Zimmermann 1808). The carefully cultivated—and largely deserved—belief in the image we ourselves created led us into a phase of self-indulgence. The more we believed in the Union’s success, the less we felt we needed to do to maintain it, and while some of us continued to profit from it, more and more people were being left behind. By its own hands, the EU was dying, at least in people’s minds. We have all heard of ‘the 1%’—first a theory, then a rough estimate, now a fact reported, among others, by Oxfam (BBC.com 2016): 1% of the world’s population has as much wealth as the rest of the world combined. But in Europe financial inequality is not the only problem. There is also an inequality of European identity. This is the Brussels ‘EU bubble’, the hundred thousand officials, politicians and bureaucrats who now ‘own’ more EU identity than the other 509 million EU citizens combined. As various mounting tensions in the nations of the EU have reached boiling point, the people have entrusted power to nationalists and conservatives. This change is not the responsibility of the poorest layers of society—it has been down to the most disillusioned. The two are not the same. The disillusioned masses, the aforementioned ‘left behind’, are not critical of the EU because of their material situation. They are not per se critical of the EU at all. As recently as 2013 Eurostat (2015a) showed that Poles had a life satisfaction rating of 7.3/10, 0.2 points above the European average, and Poland still leads the EU-enthusiasm rankings, with 72% having a favourable view of the EU in 2016 (Oliver 2016). In second place? Hungary. This leads to the obvious question: how can people be content with their life, with a positive view of the predominantly liberal EU, and at the same time overwhelmingly vote national conservative parties, such as Jarosław Kaczyński’s Law and Justice (Prawo i Sprawiedliwość, PiS), into power? The answer is both complex and simple. Of course the direct causes are many—from a general fear of both real and fabricated enemies in the public consciousness (e.g. Islamic State and refugees) to more tangible electoral cornerstones such as PiS’s ‘Family 500+’ programme (a child subsidy scheme in theory, a simple cash giveaway in practice). And that is the simple answer: populism and smart political public relations (Kaczyński is undeniably a genius in that respect), leading to a relatively easy victory. It might be thought that such a boost in popularity would be hard to maintain in the long run, quickly tumbling under the pressure of having to manage the EU’s fastest-growing economy (Eurostat 2015b). Instead, nearly a year has passed since the Polish elections, and support for the conservatives and nationalists is stronger than ever. Extreme nationalist (or, more bluntly, neo-Nazi) squadrons march

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through cities on the occasion of state funerals (Sputnik 2016), with President Duda proudly publishing photos of their flags and flares (Duda 2016). From the perspective of Brussels it must seem to be a paradox—the most Euro-enthusiastic nation supporting the most Eurosceptic political powers and ideals. On the one hand of course there are extremist groups, such as the National Radical Camp (Obóz Narodowo-Radykalny) or the All-Polish Youth (Młodzież Wszechpolska), which deeply believe the EU to be the worst evil. But they are not mass movements (not yet at least) in the sense of forming the bulk of PiS’s electorate. According to recent studies, PiS’s support comes from rural areas and cities alike; from people of all ages (still with slightly higher support from the 60+ group); and predominantly with lower levels of education, but with 25% of university graduates supporting them—in other words PiS has voters across the full spectrum of the Polish population (Maliszewski 2015). Evidently voting for a Eurosceptic party does not clash with these voters’ positive views of the Union. There can only be one reason for this—a complete lack of understanding of what the EU is about. Not only do people not know what the EU does for them, but they do not care about it, or give it any thought until they are asked about it in a poll. This is a complete failure of the EU’s most fundamental principle—creating a sense of community among the European people.

The obsolete machine A recent EU Observer opinion piece—written, interestingly, by a Eurocrat—points to some of the underlying errors in the EU’s ways (Civis Europaeus 2016). While it is true that the Union is in theory an agglomeration of member states, and their governments should therefore bear responsibility for conveying the EU’s message and values to their citizens, it is irresponsible to shift the blame onto them. One does not need to be a Eurocrat to know that member states, in the best case scenario, put their own interests first, and in the worst case have only the governing party’s self-interest at heart. They will never put a set of abstract EU ideals, including European identity, ahead of their immediate interests. Hence, for the sake of the Union, it is imperative for European institutions to completely reshape their priorities and their entire way of thinking. The model of a management office fit for Schuman, Monnet, Adenauer and comrades, who believed in European unity and only needed a sewing machine to keep everything stitched together, was obsolete the moment the Berlin Wall collapsed. Certainly, as mentioned earlier, every Eastern European wanted to be part of the West, but in this new landscape this was far from enough to keep the European spirit alive. Europeans—new and old alike—do not need a machine working somewhere far away in Brussels. They need people, people who represent the EU, who are the EU, walking among them. The anonymous author of the EU Observer piece offers an idea: the Commission should employ highly professional, local spokespeople, to actively campaign in the member states for the EU. Instead of delivering midday press briefings, these people

European View

would jump from one TV studio to another, from talk show to talk show, giving a ‘face to the EU’. This is a clever idea, certainly, but would it be enough? Not even close. Such a person, even if he became a minor celebrity (‘that EU guy from breakfast TV’), would soon end up in the same basket as the other ‘talking heads’ on TV—being just another suit, another guy who has made it and is now stuffing his agenda down our throats (to avoid a more graphic metaphor). No, the EU cannot be just a term heard from our television speakers—we, the people, have to be the EU.

Project EU reconnect The deterioration of EU identity, this detachment from the European brand—to revert to the business metaphor—is eerily similar to the struggles faced by the world’s biggest marketers. Studies presented by the World Federation of Advertisers (WFA), the global association of brand owners, show that most people would not care if 74% of brands disappeared, and that only 20% of brands ‘improve our sense of well-being and quality of life in a meaningful way’ (Karmarama Good Works 2016). Is not improving well-being and quality of life the ultimate objective of the EU? It is, and on the whole it is being achieved too, in the same way that a disposable nappy vastly improves the quality of life for a parent. But what we are missing here is the ‘sense’, that knowledge of what the EU is doing for each and every one of us. Just as young parents nowadays fail to see any added value in a disposable nappy, European citizens take the EU for granted, oblivious of its accomplishments. Ask a 25-year-old parent about a reusable nappy and you will get the same response as if you had asked about national borders— ‘a what?’ Similar studies by Meaningful Brands show that 80% of brands believe they deliver great customer experiences, while only 8% of customers agree (World Federation of Advertisers 2016). The EU allegory here does not need explaining. While for the advertising world this overwhelming customer disengagement has resulted in the rise of adblocking software, the EU faces a rise in Euroscepticism and nationalism. The WFA’s answer to the issue was what they called Project Reconnect—an ‘effort to develop a better understanding of what people want and expect from brands’, requiring ‘listening, dialogue and change’ (WFA Project Reconnect 2016). But wait—you say— that’s something the EU has been trying to do all along, isn’t it? After all, whole directorates in the Commission are devoted to these goals. So how should the EU ‘reconnect’ with the people? As mentioned earlier, the primary requirement is a change in thinking, a different perspective. All the existing ideas revolve around revamping the EU’s communication methods, changing how information is handed down from institutions to citizens. And while that is hugely important, there is a limit to how many celebrity spokespeople the Commission can have in Poland, and the number of chat shows they can attend. The EU’s communication strategy should not be top down, delivering great facts about the EU to citizens who just do not care, but should work from the bottom up. It is the citizens

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who should spread the EU’s words and democratically topple any nationalist rule. This is the one thing that can save the EU: a true civil society. Of course, civil society is not something that can be artificially created by an institution. A true grass-roots movement has to rise spontaneously, be born in peoples’ hearts and not be founded by a government or institution. But that does not mean that institutions cannot support such organisations. Luckily for the EU, the groundwork has already been laid.

KOD—the Solidarity of the twenty‑first century Following the 2015 presidential and parliamentary elections, all of Poland’s power was seized by one party, PiS, and in practice by one man, Jarosław Kaczyński. He took control of the media and the judiciary, already holding the legislature and the executive. The separation of powers as such ceased to exist. With the paralysis of the Constitutional Court and a refusal to publish its verdicts, the constitution became nothing more than a page in the history books. This was more than enough to cause the people to rise up. Just as they did in the 1970s and 1980s, when they formed the Workers’ Defence Committee (Komitet Obrony Robotników, KOR) and then Solidarity (Solidarność), the people created the Committee for the Defence of Democracy (Komitet Obrony Demokracji, KOD). KOD is a textbook example of a twenty-first-century grass-roots movement. Barely weeks after the October elections, a handful of middle-class working people created a Facebook group, inspired by an article by a former anti-Communist oppositionist that warned of the impending ‘deconstruction of democracy at the hands of PiS’ (Łoziński 2015). They called it ‘Komitet Obrony Demokracji’ (Committee for the Defence of Democracy). Within just three days the group had gained 30,000 members and was the talk of Poland. And thus Polish civil society, largely dormant since Lech Wałęsa’s Solidarity, was reborn. The movement drew people of every background and every age, not only liberals but also right-wing conservatives—everyone who cared for democracy, which was being threatened for the first time since the fall of Communism. The movement quickly took to the streets, acting spontaneously and reactively: at every government attempt to dismantle the foundations of Polish democracy, KOD supporters immediately flooded the streets. Demonstrations ranged in size from 30,000 people in Warsaw, to hundreds of thousands throughout 40 Polish cities and numerous capitals worldwide, with the biggest demonstration to date, entitled ‘We are and will remain in Europe’, gathering up to 240,000 people on the streets of Warsaw (PressTV 2016). A nationwide poll in April 2016 revealed that 5% of the population, an astonishing 1.5 million people, had already attended at least one KOD event, with another 23% planning on or considering doing so in the future (ONET Wiadomości 2016).

European View

A protest movement was just the beginning. As the Committee grew, it quickly developed robust structures, with regional and local branches in practically every municipality in the country. Being a KOD supporter became ‘the in thing’, a must for every Pole who cared about democracy, the rule of law, fundamental rights and, most of all, his or her European identity. At the same time KOD cells started sprouting up all over the world, with the first KOD demonstration abroad organised in Brussels itself. KOD became a registered association in Poland, as well as in the UK and, more globally, in the US; the Brussels-based KOD International was also established, which aims to bring the KOD spirit to the entire EU and beyond. KOD has become a household name. Polls conducted after four rounds of protests showed that 46% of the population supported KOD, compared to 42% for the PiS regime (TVN 24 2016). This momentum could not be allowed to go to waste. Street protests, while attractive to the media, were not a feasible long-term solution. Having structures and manpower, the Committee established working groups tasked with a simple set of goals: to find ways for civil society to thrive, to halt Kaczyński’s dash to a dictatorship and to safeguard democracy forever. These teams of experts gave life to initiatives such as KOD Media—an online news platform, Koduj24.pl, and a future radio station—which hired all the public media journalists deemed ‘undesirable’ by the new government. A KOD think tank was formed to provide specialist knowledge and expertise in the fields of economics, political science and the social sciences. A project called ‘Space of Freedom: What Poland Do We Want?’ has gathered over 100 experts, and aims to ‘provide everyone with the solid foundation necessary to become a conscious, involved citizen of the democratic state’ (KOD International 2016) by organising a series of meetings and debates in every major Polish city. These debates include the topic of Poland’s position within the EU. Finally, one of KOD’s most daunting undertakings was to gather over a hundred thousand signatures in favour of the Citizen’s Bill on the Constitutional Tribunal—a draft law prepared by the country’s top legal minds, which would solve the crisis and safeguard the constitution for future generations. As it turned out, the bill fulfilled all of the recommendations that would be issued by the Venice Commission some three months later. Unfortunately, with PiS having a majority in parliament, this people’s initiative was doomed from the start. But the message got through—the people have risen, and they have a voice.

Conclusion Now a fully grown non-governmental organisation in its own right, KOD is still just one tree, with a forest needed to cover Europe in order to produce enough oxygen to clear the air of undemocratic pollutants. This is where the EU needs to come in, redrafting its budget and refocusing its enormous machine to support movements such as KOD, wherever they may sprout. In Poland alone there are dozens of movements and initiatives, some of them very young, combating hate speech, intolerance, racism and

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other close-minded ideologies. Across Europe as a whole, there are hundreds of similar groups. The awarding of the European Citizens’ Prize to KOD by the European Parliament was a welcome gesture, but it gave the people of Poland a pat on the back and not much more. Europe requires action on a scale never seen before. People do not need the Commission to issue press releases; they need to see it working with them, hand in hand, whenever they rise up to say ‘no’ to illiberal rule—be it in their city, in their country or on their continent. The EU must become actively involved in any initiatives that provide a positive message and are fighting to reclaim people’s minds for European ideals. These organisations are the agents of change, not the institutions’ spokespeople. As Gene Roddenberry would put it, the Commission needs to boldly go where no institution has gone before. Open Access  This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits any use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author(s) and the source are credited.

References BBC.com. (2016). Oxfam says wealth of richest 1% equal to other 99%. 18 January. http://www.bbc.com/news/business-35339475. Accessed 16 September 2016. British Humanist Association. (2016). Gene Roddenberry. https://humanism.org.uk/ humanism/the-humanist-tradition/20th-century-humanism/gene-roddenberry/. Accessed 20 September 2016. Civis Europaeus. (2016). How to save the EU. EUobserver.com, 13 September. https:// euobserver.com/opinion/134935. Accessed 16 September 2016. Duda, A. (2016). Kondukt pogrzebowy #Inka i #Zagończyk zmierza w kierunku Cmentarza Garnizonowego w Gdańsku [Funeral procession for #Inka and #Zagończyk heading towards the Garrison Cemetery in Gdańsk]. 18 August. https://twitter.com/ prezydentpl/status/769911057829748741. Accessed 16 September 2016. Eurostat. (2015a). Life satisfaction, by age group and country (mean rating), 2013. Last modified 20 May 2015. http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index. php/File:Life_satisfaction,_by_age_group_and_country_(mean_rating),_2013.png. Accessed 16 September 2016. Eurostat. (2015b). Real GDP growth, 2004–14 (% change compared with the previous year; average 2004–14) YB15. Last modified 2 June 2015. http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/ statistics-explained/index.php/File:Real_GDP_growth,_2004%E2%80%9314_(%25_ change_compared_with_the_previous_year;_average_2004%E2%80%9314)_YB15. png. Accessed 16 September 2016.

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Karmarama Good Works. (2016). Customer disengagement. WFA chief marketing officers’ forum, Cannes, 23 June. http://www.slideshare.net/WFAMarketers/customerdisengagement. Accessed 16 September 2016. KOD International. (2016). About KOD. http://www.kod.ngo/kod-who-is-who/aboutkod/. Accessed 7 October 2016. Łoziński, K. (2015). Krzysztof Łoziński: trzeba założyć kod [KOD needs to be founded]. Studio Opinii, 18 November. http://studioopinii.pl/krzysztof-lozinski-trzeba-zalozyc-kod/. Accessed 16 September 2016. Maliszewski, N. (2015). Kim jest wyborca PiS i PO? Mohery i lemingi to przeszłość [Who is voting for PiS and PO? Mohairs and Iemmings are the past]. Tajniki Polityki, 4 January. http://tajnikipolityki.pl/kim-jest-wyborca-pis-i-po-mohery-i-lemingi-toprzeszlosc/. Accessed 16 September 2016. Oliver, C. (2016). Enthusiasm for EU in sharp decline throughout Europe, not just UK. Financial times, 7 June 2016. https://www.ft.com/content/1740f3a6-2cc2-11e6-bf8d26294ad519fc. Accessed 16 September 2016. ONET Wiadomości. (2016). ‘Gazeta Wyborcza’: 40 proc. Polaków popiera KOD [‘Gazeta Wyborcza’: 40% of Poles support KOD]. 15 April. http://wiadomosci.onet.pl/ kraj/gazeta-wyborcza-40-proc-polakow-popiera-kod/eydqdd. Accessed 16 September 2016. PressTV. (2016). Some 240k demonstrate against polish government policies in Warsaw. 7 May. http://www.presstv.com/Detail/2016/05/07/464427/Poland-Warsaw. Accessed 16 September 2016. Sputnik. (2016). Polish establishment’s lurch to the right now involves tolerance of neoNazis. 6 September. https://sputniknews.com/europe/20160906/1045031546/polandnationalist-attack.html. Accessed 16 September 2016. TVN24. (2016). Sondaż: poparcie działań KOD i PiS jest zbliżone [Poll: support for the actions of KOD and PiS is close]. http://www.tvn24.pl/wiadomosci-z-kraju,3/sondazpoparcie-dzialan-kod-i-pis-jest-zblizone,617533.html Accessed 20 September 2016. Von Zimmerman, J. G. (1808). An examination of the advantages of solitude and of its operations. London: Albion Press. WFA. (2016). Customer disengagement. Paper presented at WFA CMO forum, Cannes, 23 June. http://www.slideshare.net/WFAMarketers/customer-disengagement. Accessed 7 October 2016. WFA Project Reconnect. (2016). Project reconnect. http://www.project-reconnect.com/ about-us/. Accessed 20 September 2016.

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Martin Mycielski is the plenipotentiary of the board for international affairs at the Committee for the Defence of Democracy (KOD) and founder of KOD International. With a background in EU institutions, the Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs and marketing, he writes for EU publications, represents civil society at EU-bubble events and lobbies for Poland in EU institutions.

European View DOI 10.1007/s12290-016-0404-8

ARTICLE

The Norwegian Progress Party: an established populist party Johan Bjerkem 

© The Author(s) 2016. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com

Abstract  This article sheds light on one of Europe’s successful right-wing populist parties, the Norwegian Progress Party. Since 2013 the party has been in a coalition with the Conservative Party. The history, ideology and position of the party in the Norwegian political system are factors that explain how a centre–right party and a populist one have been able to form a viable coalition. Over time the Progress Party has become increasingly well integrated into the political system. The fact that no cordon sanitaire or total boycott policy was implemented against it may explain why the party developed a more moderate and pragmatic approach than most other right-wing populist parties. In turn, this made it possible for the Conservative Party to offer to form a coalition with the Progress Party and placed the centre–right in the strategic position of cooperating with parties both in the centre and to the right. Keywords  Populism | Right-wing politics | Political parties | Centre–right | Norway | The Progress Party

J. Bjerkem (*)  Wilfried Martens Centre for European Studies, Rue du Commerce 20, 1000 Brussels, Belgium e-mail: [email protected]

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Introduction The Norwegian Progress Party is an example of a successful European populist party which has not only gained seats in parliament, but has also become a governing party. Established in the early 1970s, mainly as an anti-tax protest party, it transformed into an anti-immigration and anti-establishment party in the 1980s, before positioning itself as one of the main political forces in Norway. The Progress Party entered government for the first time following the parliamentary elections of 2013. It is therefore one of very few European populist parties to have exerted governmental power. However, the socalled cost of governing (see Jennings and Green 2014) seems to have been higher for the Progress Party than for its coalition partner, the Conservative Party. Once in power, the Progress Party—like all political parties—has had to compromise, prioritise and make concessions. For the Progress Party this has resulted in internal splits, low poll ratings and increasing tensions between its grass-roots members and political elites. This article will shed light on what has happened since this right-wing populist party entered government in Norway and the lessons we might draw from this for Europe’s centre–right. Indeed, it gives the centre–right an opportunity to assess an example of conservative-populist cooperation. Populism may be understood as an ‘ideology that considers society to be ultimately separated in two homogeneous and antagonistic groups’: the ‘pure people’ and the ‘corrupt elite’ (Mudde 2004, 562). It usually argues that politics should be an expression of the general or people’s will. In turn, right-wing populism is defined as an ideology appealing to the ‘man in the street’ rather than to specific classes or social or interest groups (Hartleb 2011). Right-wing populist parties are marked by anti-immigrant, authoritarian and anti-establishment tendencies (Jupskås 2013; Mudde 2007). Overall, the literature defines the Norwegian Progress Party as a right-wing populist party, distinguishing it from extreme, radical or far-right populist parties (Kitschelt and McGann 1995; Mudde 2007). The party holds anti-establishment, anti-immigration, and strict law and order positions. The majority of the party’s delegates view immigration as ‘a serious threat to our national identity’, while almost all agree that people who break the law should be punished ‘more severely’ than they are today (Jupskås 2013). Also the party’s slogan, ‘Partiet for folk flest’ (‘the party for most/ordinary/common people’), illustrates how the party’s populist rhetoric addresses the man in the street. This article will not enter further into the debate on what defines right-wing populism, but instead will focus on the ideology and programme of the Progress Party and the effect that governmental power has had on it.

Populism, differently? The Progress Party was established in 1973. It was initially named Anders Lange’s Party for a Strong Reduction in Taxes, Duties and Public Intervention. Its unusual name was attributed to its colourful leader, the journalist and editor Anders Lange. Lange was a staunch critic of state intervention and of what he viewed as the welfare

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state’s over-regulation. His personality played well on television and in the media. It was not uncommon to see him waving his Viking sword or drinking eggnog in his television appearances. In its early years, Lange’s party was often viewed as a typical ‘flashparty’ or ‘one-man-party’, which would fade away after the next elections (Andersen and Bjørklund 1990; Bolleyer 2013). The party would, however, not only remain part of the Norwegian party system, but also radically change it. In the 1973 elections the party gained 5% of the vote and four seats in parliament. Three factors were key to this unexpected breakthrough in what was a relatively stable party system (Bjørklund 2000): a growing anti-tax sentiment in public opinion, a change in voting patterns in the aftermath of the polarising Norwegian referendum on accession to the European Community in 1972 and the charismatic personality of Anders Lange. Internal disputes and the death of Lange left the party with no seats in parliament after the 1977 elections (Jupskås 2013). The party changed its name to the Progress Party, and in 1978 Carl I. Hagen was elected as its chair and started the process of reorganising it with a stronger hierarchical structure. In the late 1980s and 1990s, the Progress Party reoriented its political message to focus on immigration, criminality and care for the elderly (Jupskås 2013). Lange’s critique of the lavish welfare state in the 1970s was replaced with ‘welfare chauvinism’, pleading for better care for ‘our own’ inhabitants (Bjørklund and Saglie 2004). The party started arguing for an increase in public spending and tax cuts at the same time. This combination would, in most cases, be rebutted as unrealistic, but with the Norwegian oil resources available, the Progress Party became the foremost spokesperson for spending rather than saving the oil money. Over the years, the party went from being an outsider to the second largest party in the parliament after the elections of 1997, 2005 and 2009, and the third largest in 2001 and most recently in 2013. To a certain extent, the electoral success of the Progress Party can be understood as what Kitschelt dubbed the ‘winning formula’ (Kitschelt and McGann 1995). The winning formula describes right-wing parties that have an ideological profile combining socioeconomically liberal and socio-culturally authoritarian measures, snatching voters from both the traditional left and right. In the early 2000s, several right-wing parties in Western Europe moved towards the centre on economic issues, defending some aspects of the welfare system and redistribution for part of the population, in what De Lange labelled ‘the new winning formula’ (De Lange 2007). The Progress Party should best be understood as combining both formulas. On the one hand, it remains the foremost critic of welfare state overspending, arguing for minimal social benefits, downsizing the public sector and strongly reducing taxation. On the other hand, it is the foremost defender of public spending through the oil fund and on investments in infrastructure such as roads, telecommunications, hospitals, schools and nursing homes (Fremskrittspartiet n. d.). The shift towards being a right-wing populist party shaped the Progress Party as we know it today. However, its past also differentiates it from other typical right-wing populist parties. It has, for example, never had an extreme-right militant past like that of the National Front in France, the Sweden Democrats, the Freedom Party in Austria or Flemish Interest in Belgium (Mudde 2007). Comparing the programme of populist right

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parties in the Nordic region, Jungar and Jupskås (2014) conclude that the Progress Party is less authoritarian and more economically right-wing than its sister parties in Scandinavia, the Danish People’s Party, the Finns Party and the Sweden Democrats, while remaining, nonetheless, equally anti-establishment and anti-immigration. Such differences may be partly explained through the origins of those parties. The Finns Party (previously known as the True Finns) is the successor of the Finnish Rural Party and is considerably influenced by agrarian populism and social-conservatism. The Sweden Democrats was founded in the late 1980s following a merger of far-right and more militant organisations that operated under banners such as ‘Keep Sweden Swedish’ (Rydgren 2006). In contrast, the Norwegian Progress Party and the Danish Progress Party were both founded on the basis of neoliberal populist and tax protest movements in the early 1970s. Much like its Norwegian counterpart, the Danish Progress Party was established by an outspoken tax protester, Mogens Glistrup. However, long-standing internal disputes led to the party splitting and a new party, the Danish People’s Party, being created in 1995. This party, with Pia Kjærsgaard as leader, was established on the basis of an anti-immigration ideology inspired by continental radical right parties such as the French National Front (Rydgren 2007). Of the Nordic right-wing populist parties, the Norwegian Progress Party is the oldest and probably the best integrated into the political system. It entered parliament for the first time in 1973 and has been a part of the Norwegian political landscape ever since. It has exerted political power locally, regionally and nationally. But perhaps more importantly, it has not been frozen out of political cooperation to the same extent as populist right-wing parties in other countries. The National Front in France, Flemish Interest in Belgium and the Sweden Democrats, for example, have been subject to a cordon sanitaire, whereby established parties commit, more or less explicitly, to a political boycott of the party (Jupskås 2013). In contrast, the Progress Party has helped to pass several state budgets and has been included in several local governments. Most notably it has participated in local government in Oslo for a total of 10 years, where it has also held the mayoral office twice. Moreover, the fact that the Progress Party is now in a national government coalition makes it, together with the Finns Party and the Swiss People’s Party, one of the only right-wing populist parties in government in Western Europe today.

Populism in practice After becoming leader of the party in 2006, Siv Jensen put a lot of effort into transforming it into a credible office-seeking party (Jupskås 2013). When seeking office, parties need to appear as relevant and serious coalitions partners. Therefore the party is not solely addressing the voters, as it would with a vote-seeking strategy, but also potential coalition partners and their electorates. In so doing, parties may moderate their positions, expand their issues agenda and express their willingness to negotiate. Jensen is, in many ways, viewed as having a less confrontational and more balanced leadership style than her predecessor, Carl I. Hagen, enjoying better relationships with

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other party leaders (Jupskås 2013). She has distanced herself from other populist parties, criticising the Danish People’s Party’s ‘pure nationalism’ and the Sweden Democrats and the Finns Party for being ‘extremists’ (Jupskås 2013). Jensen’s office-seeking strategy has been successful. Following the 2013 parliamentary elections the party entered parliament for the first time in its existence and after 40 years of being part of the opposition. In the elections the Progress Party won 16.3% of the vote and became the third largest party after Labour (30.8%) and the Conservatives (26.8%). A Conservative-Progress Party minority coalition was formed with confidence and supply from the Christian Democratic Party and the Liberal Party in parliament. The two centre parties declined to participate in the coalition for fear of becoming ‘hostages’ without real influence in a government that included the Progress Party (Vårt Land 2012; Helljesen et al. 2013). The Liberal and the Christian Democratic parties have also hinted at the fact that they would be ready to enter government if the Progress Party were to leave (Glomnes 2015; Helljesen et al. 2013). However, in recent years, the leadership of the Progress Party has repeatedly stated that it would not give its support to a centre–right government that it was not a part of. This has made them, for the time being, an indispensable coalition partner for the Conservatives. Not having a majority on their own, the Conservative Party and the Progress Party have had to make concessions to secure the support of the Liberal and Christian Democratic parties in parliament. The government agreed, amongst other things, to rule out oil and gas explorations off the coasts of Lofoten, Vesterålen and Senja; to maintain a strict alcohol policy; and to grant permanent residency to the children of illegal immigrants who have lived in Norway for more than three years (Fossan 2013). These concessions were not well received by the Progress Party’s own electorate, as stricter immigration rules, a liberal alcohol policy, and the intensification of oil and gas explorations have, for several years, been among the party’s main electoral promises. After four months in power, support for the Progress Party had dropped from 17 to 11.7% in the polls, while support for its coalition partner, the Conservatives, increased from 25.7 to 30.5% (Pollsofpolls n. d.). This represents an all-time low for the Progress Party. The Progress Party has, nonetheless, achieved a breakthrough in relevant policy areas while in government. Various taxes and duties have been removed or reduced, such as the inheritance tax, which has been abolished. In addition the level of non-taxable income has been raised and more room has been given for private health services. A new ministry for immigration and integration has been established and overall there are stricter rules on immigration and the granting of permanent residency in Norway. There has also been a toughening of the criteria regarding the social benefits that refugees are eligible for. Further minor, but symbolically important, changes have also been implemented, such as higher speed limits on highways, and the legalisation of professional boxing and poker. However, many voters and party members feel that progress has been limited. In addition to the concessions already mentioned, the party’s electors have had difficulty

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accepting the government’s decisions not to abolish toll roads, to increase taxes on diesel and to take in more Syrian refugees (Sandvik 2014). Moreover, the refugee crisis, with the arrival of up to 31,000 refugees in Norway in 2015, has certainly caused a lot of frustration for voters who hoped for less immigration, even if the crisis is clearly global in nature (Stiegler and Zaman 2016). In the local elections of 2015 the party received just 9.5% of the vote, its lowest share in local elections since 1991. Since being in power, the party has, moreover, experienced increased internal tensions between its grass-roots members and the political elites (Pileberg 2015). The majority of politicians appointed to ministerial positions after the elections came from the party’s more moderate wing, while those from the party’s more radical wing—who are often more outspoken—were kept at arm’s length. Several high-profile, essentially more radical Progress Party politicians have, on numerous occasions, criticised the party’s work in government. Per Sandberg, the party’s deputy leader, declared that the party ‘is not anymore what it once was’ and has become too ‘vague’ (Løset 2013), while Christian Tybring-Gjedde, second deputy in the parliament’s foreign affairs committee, asked for the Progress Party to leave the coalition (Nordahl et al. 2015). Sandberg initially stated that he would step down as deputy leader in 2014, before retracting his statements a couple of months later. Even former leader of the Progress Party, Carl I. Hagen, has criticised the government and said that the party should tell the Liberal and the Christian Democratic parties to ‘get lost’ if they approach the government with further demands (Johnsen 2016). Based on interviews with regular Progress Party members, Jupskås (2015) has observed that the ideological gap between the grass roots and the elites has increased since the party entered government. Several thousand members have left the party, and the grass roots are increasingly interested in policy areas other than those of interest to the party elites. This, in combination with losing out in the polls, is quite a common trend for anti-establishment parties in power. According to Van Spanje (2011), the cost of governing is, on average, higher for an anti-establishment party, as it ‘loses the purity of its message by being seen to cooperate with the political establishment’ once in government. For the Progress Party the process of becoming an institutionalised and integrated part of the party system started before entering government. According to the literature, the party is considered to have reached the last stage of integration of political parties by entering government (Deschouwer 2008). If applying Sartori’s typology of party systems, the Progress Party would be defined as ‘relevant’ and having ‘blackmail and governing potential’ (Sartori 1976). The latter refers to a party being considered a potential coalition partner, while ‘blackmail potential’ refers to the ability of more anti-system parties to politically influence them from outside of the government. Over the years the Progress Party has gone from being a marginalised protest party to a party with political influence outside of government, to a governing party that is well integrated—at least on the party elite level—into the party system.

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Populism and Europe’s centre–right The emergence of right-wing populism in Europe is not a new phenomenon. Right-wing populist parties are, however, increasingly turning into influential and relevant governing parties. The Finns Party and the Norwegian Progress Party are examples of this. The question, then, for the centre–right political family is: how should it deal with the rise of office-seeking populism? First, centre–right parties should not implement policies that intend to freeze out right-wing populist parties. A cordon sanitaire policy, consisting of boycotting the party in question, may not only show itself to be ineffective, but may also have the opposite effect to that of weakening the party. By being marginalised, populist parties can easily highlight exactly what they see as the root cause of all problems: the establishment. In turn, such parties may capitalise on their status as outsiders and claim to be the only alternative to ‘the powers that be’. A good example of this is the National Front in France, where Marine Le Pen has gained increasing electoral support as the result of her constant references to the ‘UMPS’—a neologism alluding to the idea that the Union for a Popular Movement (now renamed The Republicans) and the Socialist Party are one and the same. In the case of the Progress Party, the fact that the party was not totally frozen out, but had exerted power locally and regionally before exerting power on the national level meant that it had already experienced being held politically accountable. Such experience may compel a party to propose more realistic and achievable policies. Second, centre–right parties should realise that a populist party well-integrated into the political system is often a better one. When still on the political margins, the ideology of populist parties can tend to become radicalised (Meret 2010). A well-integrated populist party sees the need to moderate its policies and rhetoric in order to develop effective office-seeking strategies. The Progress Party did so in the run-up to the 2013 election, and again before entering government with the Conservative Party in order to get support from the Liberal and Christian Democratic parties in parliament. Also, by becoming part of the political establishment, populist parties may lose the ‘purity’ of their message. Whether we like it or not, centre–right parties are often viewed as being associated with the established elites. And, in many ways, the claim made by right-wing populist parties that they are the party for the man in the street or ‘for most people’ (as the slogan of the Progress Party claims) has been a successful electoral strategy. This is undoubtedly one of the main electoral challenges facing centre–right parties today. Finally, centre–right parties should consider, depending on the political context, offering political cooperation to and coalitions with right-wing populist parties. Once in power, parties have to negotiate, compromise and are held politically accountable. For populist parties this may prove a challenging task. Their electorates are often more volatile and less willing to accept political compromises. In the case of the Progress Party this has been demonstrated in the recent low poll results and poor support in local elections. Moreover, when in power, populist parties may experience internal tensions between the grass roots and the party elites. Tensions may also arise between the more moderate wing of the party that defends a more pragmatic approach and its more radical wing

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that argues that the party has become unrecognisable. Centre–right parties should map out potential partners in the party’s moderate wing. Of course, the possibility of cooperating depends on the political context and the party in question. Indeed, some populist parties will remain too radical and distant from centre–right values to be included in a governmental coalition. Yet, right-wing populism, in contrast to far-right and extreme-right populism, does not operate as an anti-democratic movement (Hartleb 2011). In general, it accepts the ‘rules of the game’. Centre–right parties should therefore not discredit right-wing populist parties from the outset. They should acknowledge the legitimacy of some of the concerns of their electorate, while still fighting the parties in elections.

Conclusion The minority government in Norway is an example of a successful coalition between a conservative party and a populist party. Overall, the cooperation has gone smoothly. For the Conservative Party, opening up to cooperate with a party on its right has proven to be both difficult and strategically wise. It has been, and still is, a very laborious task to negotiate and mediate between centrist parties supporting the government in parliament and a right-wing populist party in government. And there is no guarantee that the government coalition will hold together in the long term. However, by offering cooperation with the Progress Party on its right, the Conservative Party has positioned itself strategically in the middle of the political spectrum. The party may now choose according to the political circumstances to cooperate with parties on either its right or its left. Of course, this does not mean that cooperation with populist parties will always be successful. But for the Progress Party, the fact that the party had already been held politically accountable, had developed office-seeking strategies and was well-integrated into the political system made cooperation with the Conservative Party possible. Open Access  This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits any use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author(s) and the source are credited.

References Andersen, J., & Bjørklund, T. (1990). Structural changes and new cleavages: The Progress Parties in Denmark and Norway. Acta Sociologica, 33(3), 195–217. Bjørklund, T. (2000). Om Anders Lange og ideen om et nytt parti [On Anders Lange and the idea of a new party]. Historisk Tidskrift, 79(4), 435–56.

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Bjørklund, T., & Saglie, J. (2004). The Norwegian Progress Party: Building bridges across old cleavages. Institutt for samfunnsforskning paper presented at the 12th Nasjonal fagkonferanse I statsvitenskap, Tromsø, 7–9 January. Bolleyer, N. (2013). New parties in old party systems: Persistence and decline in seventeen democracies. Oxford: Oxford University Press. De Lange, S. (2007). A new winning formula? The programmatic appeal of the radical right. Party Politics, 13(4), 411–35. Deschouwer, K. (2008). New parties in government: In power for the first time. Oxford: Routledge. Fossan, E. (2013). Her er samarbeidsavtalen for Høyre, FrP, KrF og Venstre [Here is the cooperation agreement for the Conservative Party, the Progress Party, the Christian Democratic Party and the Liberal Party]. Aftenposten, 30 September. http://www. aftenposten.no/norge/Her-er-samarbeidsavtalen-for-Hoyre_-FrP_-KrF-og-Venstre107604b.html#.Uknn4oYRB8E. Accessed 1 September 2016. Fremskrittspartiet. (n. d.). Prinsipprogram for perioden 2013–2017 [Political programme 2013–2017]. Oslo. https://www.frp.no/hva-vi-mener/prinsipp-og-handlingsprogram. Accessed 1 September 2016. Glomnes, L. (2015). Venstre klare til å gå inn i Regjeringen hvis Frp går ut [The Liberal Party is ready to enter into government if the Progress Party leaves]. Aftenposten, 10 June. http://www.aftenposten.no/norge/politikk/–Venstre-klare-til-a-ga-inn-i-Regjeringen-hvis-Frp-gar-ut-38425b.html. Accessed 1 September 2016. Hartleb, F. (2011). After their establishment: Right-wing populist parties in Europe. Brussels: Centre for European Studies. Helljesen, V., Sandvik, S., Carlsen, H., & Granbo, K. (2013). Erna Solberg: KrF og Venstre finner det ikke riktig å være med i regjering nå [Erna Solberg: The Christian Democratic Party and the Liberal Party are staying out of the government]. NRK.no, 30 September. https://www.nrk.no/valg2013/solberg_-_-krf-og-venstre-ikke-med-1.11271707. Accessed 1 September 2016. Jennings, W., & Green, J. (2014). Explaining costs of governing. American Political Science Association Annual Meeting Paper. Washington, DC. 18 August. Johnsen, A. (2016). Carl I. Hagen: Velgerne vil straffe Frp-Siv om hun øker bensinavgiftene [Carl I. Hagen: The voters will punish Siv Jensen if she raises petrol taxes]. VG.no, 27 August. http://www.vg.no/nyheter/innenriks/norsk-politikk/carl-i-hagenvelgerne-vil-straffe-frp-siv-om-hun-oeker-bensinavgiftene/a/23776817/. Accessed 1 September 2016.

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Jungar, A., & Jupskås, A. (2014). Populist radical right parties in the Nordic region: A new and distinct party family? Scandinavian Political Studies, 37(3), 215–38. Jupskås, A. (2013). The Progress Party: A fairly integrated part of the Norwegian party system? In K. Grabow & F. Hartleb (eds.), Exposing the demagogues: Right-wing and national populist parties in Europe (pp. 205–36). Berlin: Centre for European Studies and Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung. Jupskås, A. (2015). The persistence of populism. The Norwegian Progress Party 1973–2009. Ph.D. thesis. University of Oslo. Kitschelt, H., & McGann, A. (1995). The radical right in Western Europe: A comparative analysis. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Løset, K. (2013). Frp-nestleder med hard kritikk til eget parti [Deputy leader of the Progress Party criticises his own party]. TV2, 20 February. http://www.tv2.no/a/3993322. Accessed 1 September 2016. Meret, S. (2010). The Danish People’s Party, the Italian Northern League and the Austrian Freedom Party in a comparative perspective: Party ideology and electoral support. Aalborg University, SPIRIT Ph.D. Series, no. 25. Aalborg. Mudde, C. (2004). The populist Zeitgeist. Government & Opposition, 39(4), 542–63. Mudde, C. (2007). Populist radical right parties in Europe. New York: Cambridge University Press. Nordahl, A., Sandvik, S., & Skei, L. (2015). Tybring-Gjedde: Frp må ut av regjering [Tybring-Gjedde: The Progress Party should leave government]. NRK.no, 11 June. https://www.nrk.no/norge/tybring-gjedde_-_-frp-ma-ut-av-regjering-1.12404503. Accessed 1 September 2016. Pileberg, S. (2015). FrPs vei mot valgtoppen [The Progress Party’s road to successful elections]. University of Oslo, 21 May. https://www.sv.uio.no/isv/forskning/aktuelt/ aktuelle-saker/2015/frp-mot-valgtoppen.html. Accessed 1 September 2016. Pollofpolls.no. (n. d.). Stortingsvalg: Hele landet [Parliamentary elections: The whole country]. http://www.pollofpolls.no/?cmd=Stortinget. Accessed 1 September 2016. Rydgren, J. (2006). From tax populism to ethnic nationalism: Radical right-wing populism in Sweden. New York: Berghahn Books. Rydgren, J. (2007). The sociology of the radical right. Annual Review of Sociology, 33, 241–62.

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Sandvik, S. (2014). Jensen: Disse tapene har smertet mest [Jensen: The toughest concessions]. NRK.no, 2 May. https://www.nrk.no/norge/jensen-om-politisketap-1.11695379. Accessed 1 September 2016. Sartori, G. (1976). Parties and party systems: A framework for analysis. New York: Cambridge University Press. Stiegler, I., & Zaman, K. (2016). Over 31.000 søkte asyl i Norge i 2015 [More than 31,000 persons applied for asylum in Norway in 2015]. TV2, 7 January. http://www.tv2. no/a/7887404/. Accessed 1 September 2016. Van Spanje, J. (2011). Keeping the rascals in: Anti-political-establishment parties and their cost of governing in established democracies. European Journal of Political Research, 50(5), 609–35. Vårt Land. (2012). Venstre og KrF nekter å bli blå gisler [The Liberal Party and the Christian Democratic Party do not wish to be held hostage]. 9 July. http://www.vl.no/ venstre-og-krf-nekter-a-bli-bla-gisler-1.39586. Accessed 1 September 2016. Johan Bjerkem is an MA candidate at the College of Europe. He has previously worked as an intern at the Wilfried Martens Centre for European Studies, at the European External Action Service and in the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. He holds a master’s degree from Sciences Po Paris.

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European View DOI 10.1007/s12290-016-0403-9

ARTICLE

Political communication in the (iconic) Trump epoch Giovanni Maddalena 

© The Author(s) 2016. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com

Abstract Whatever the result of the 2016 US presidential election, it will signal a new era of political communication. Candidate Donald Trump defeated 16 contenders in the Republican primaries, most of them Republican Party insiders. There are several reasons for this unexpected turn of events. One of them is the different kind of communication that Trump employs. Trump’s communication method, like that of the Five Star Movement (Movimento 5 Stelle) in Italy, uses a high number of icons (signs that represent objects by their similarity, such as images) instead of the indexes (signs that indicate their object by contiguity, such as tags, labels and proper names) that have characterised the last 20 years of political communication. This change encourages politicians to focus on communication as a ‘complete gesture’, and as a meaningful action that creates an ambience rather than stressing the role of the leader. This paper deals with the semiotic characteristics of this new kind of communication and explains the consequent key features of successful political communication in the coming years.

G. Maddalena (*)  University of Molise, via de Sanctis 1, Campobasso, Italy e-mail: [email protected]

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Keywords  Communication | Semiotics | Icons | Trump | Five Star Movement

Introduction Whether Trump is the winner or the loser of the 2016 US presidential election, his campaign typifies the changes that are happening in political communication. Instead of demonising Trump or his campaign, we need to study him and it, and understand what is happening and what effect it will have on future political communication trends. Other phenomena, such as the Italian Five Star Movement (Movimento 5 Stelle, M5S), show similar trends from very different political premises. In order to accomplish this analysis, I will use some basic semiotic tools to look at several specific examples.

Three eras of political communication Let us begin with a few basics of political communication. The Italian scholar Giovanna Cosenza divides the history of political communication into ancient, modern and postmodern epochs (Cosenza 2014). The names of these epochs might differ, but the tripartite periodisation is useful and I will analyse it by looking at the three main kinds of signs—icons, indexes and symbols. These respectively represent their object by similarity (such as an image or a sound), by mere connection (such as a label or a road sign) and by interpretation (such as a sentence) (Peirce 1992). How do these signs shape the history of political communication, and what is at stake in the changes taking place? After the Second World War, politicians communicated through rallies that, from time to time, were broadcast on the radio. Obviously, the power of this kind of communication relies on words and on the way in which we pronounce them. Semiotically speaking, words are symbols, namely a type of sign that communicates its object through an interpretation that fosters a certain meaning. In order to understand symbols, one needs to know the language, the meaning of the words, and the subtle implications of irony, silence and implicit meaning. At that time, discourses were often complex, trying to encompass a complete vision of humanity and history. Slogans were the shortcuts used to make a final impression on voters. For example, in Italy, the sophisticated conceptual elements of Christian Democracy as a mixture of Christianity and liberalism, its ideas of democracy and opposition to monarchy, and its pro-US stance were summarised by the claim: ‘In the electoral booth God sees you and Stalin does not’. Thus there were symbolic shortcuts for symbolic discourses. Television changed everything. Ever since the US presidential debate in 1960 between Kennedy and Nixon, the personality of the leader during debates, including his or her body language, smiles, grunts, looks and tempers, has been the focal point of electoral campaigns. What television made possible only occasionally before the war became the usual method of political communication. However, contrary to what one

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might expect, this era of images was not an iconic era, but an indexical one. As much as images were important, they were at the service of a leader, the product on sale. Television is one-directional: you cannot participate in the images it produces. A viewer receives them, and they work as a sign to indicate the person for whom the viewer should vote. The television era was the leader’s era. From a semiotic standpoint, it was an indexical era, as indexes are those signs that represent their object through a mere connection. Even if images were central in this kind of communication, their role was to ground the indexical emergence of the leading characters. A former actor became one of the most effective presidents of the US (Ronald Reagan), while another former actor and playwright became one of the most important popes in history (John Paul II). As the perfect closing to this era, another famous actor became governor of California (Arnold Schwarzenegger) and the owner of a television company became prime minister of Italy (Silvio Berlusconi). This form of communication did not cancel out the importance of discourses. However, they increasingly became secondary elements in comparison to the focus on the personality of the leader. Parties lost their importance, giving way to the personalisation of politics. Following a leader became more important than the leader’s ideas. Personalisation went as far as political posters that presented only the face and the name of the leader. In Italy, political parties incorporated the names of their leaders into their logos. Followers wore the names of party leaders on their t-shirts and gadgets. A new era opened with social network campaigning. From US President Barack Obama’s first campaign to today, the possibility of sharing everything in real time and responding interactively has shifted the focus from the leader to emotions and feelings. Whether cries, anger or love, all sentiments can now be displayed and shared in a few minutes all over the world. To combat obesity, Obama shared his passion for basketball and his wife Michelle did the same with regard to exercise and nutrition. The Pope broadcast his entrance to the Apostolic Palace while commenting on how its riches were to be given to the poor. The new mayor of Rome, Virginia Raggi, showed herself crying while receiving the news of her victory. In conjunction with these sorts of events, ordinary people can now participate by commenting, responding and sharing through social networks. This new intimacy with emotion and simultaneous participation indicate a move to iconic communication. Icons are signs that represent their object and communicate meaning by their similarity to objects. Tears represent sadness or sudden joy, videos represent real activity that is going on, and gestures often represent what we are saying visually, while sounds and music do the same acoustically. Obviously, this is an oversimplification. The tone of the voice on the radio was an iconic element in the discursive epoch and the name of the leader has always been important in politics. Suits and smiles were iconic elements in the televisual epoch, which has always included discourses as well. Gadgets and personalised items are still important today. In language itself there are indexical and iconic aspects, hidden below the symbolic surface. Proper names are indexes and onomatopoeic sounds or

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nicknames are icons. In a sense, all three kinds of signs—icons, indexes and symbols—have always been used in political communication. However, epochs differ insofar as the prevalence of one kind of sign. My claim is that Trump’s campaign, as well as other current political phenomena signal a decisive passage from the indexical to the iconic era in political communication. Before reviewing the reasons for this claim, I want to specify the features of these kinds of signs. Symbols are the glory and the curse of humanity. Symbols permit language, reasoning and discourse. They are very precise and very cold. They call for reasoning and, of course, they are so plastic that they can form complete ideologies. Indexes work like labels on a bottle or on the shirts of football or basketball players. They are only precise in identifying a ‘mere connection’ or, in psychological terms, a belonging. They do not need interpretation or reasoning. They indicate as the finger does; there is a connection between the index finger and the object, but the connection is the only thing that one wishes to communicate. Road signs are indexes, as are obelisks. According to the American founder of semiotics, Charles S. Peirce, the obelisk is an index insofar as it only says: here! ‘Here’ is the place in which the power is located (Peirce 1998, 163). As mentioned above, proper names and pronouns are the parts of language that work as indexes. As sport fans and lovers know, the power of indexes lies in their repetition. Yelling the same name for hours on end makes that initial mere connection stronger and therefore more meaningful. Icons are vague and it is in this vagueness that their power lies. An image of a politician who is crying or of the Pope punching an imaginary adversary does not convey exactly what the person represented means. However, icons start the engine of imagination. They are connected to the object in a direct way, but not through brute or mere connections. They refer to the object insofar as they bring the object to be within them. They are not the object, but they are as close as possible to it. That is why icons are not cold. They cause an immediate reaction to the object, affecting the tone of the relationship much more than any other kind of sign. They do not specify exactly what meaning they want to convey. Technically, this vagueness means that two contradictory possibilities can be understood at the same time. Icons are very suggestive and they contain an enormous number of possibilities.

Trump and the Five Star Movement (Movimento 5 Stelle) Before his nomination as the ‘Grand Old Party’ candidate for election to the presidency of the US, Donald Trump defeated 16 contenders, most of them backed by Party mainstays who did not want to surrender to Trump. The excuse that Trump’s triumph was entirely due to money is out of place in this case, since all the candidates spent enormous amounts of money on their campaigns. Even the argument that it was the result of the enormous TV coverage of his campaign does not work: many Fox News pundits,

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who are traditionally close to the Grand Old Party, preferred other candidates. Trump’s communication mode has proven to be unstoppable and surprisingly marketable. Trump communicates with his audiences in a different way, an almost completely iconic way. He reacts to any news without political mediation and political correctness. He gesticulates with his answers and his face reveals his feelings—he is often seen frowning or upset. He yells, he mimics adversaries and he calls them names. He is as harsh towards his opponents as he is warm and captivating to his followers. He uses love–hate language and he mainly communicates in a direct way, through social networks. As is well known, he does not provide clear statements about complex political issues and he often changes his mind. And he seems to know that he does this, admits to it and continues regardless. In parallel, the growing Italian anti-system Five Star Movement, while holding very different political views to Trump, uses the same semiotic tools. Grounded in claims of political morality and strict obedience to the law, M5S unites leftist egalitarianism with anti-EU and anti-immigrant statements. The founders of the movement were the comedian Beppe Grillo and the media expert Roberto Casaleggio. The movement claims that the Internet allows us to live in a direct democracy, and members of the movement vote on many political decisions. Candidates for political office are decided by online vote, sometimes by just a few members of the online community. Regardless of any internal democracy, members of parliament who do not adhere to the party line are expelled. In addition to the use of the Internet, Beppe Grillo holds powerful and effective rallies all over the country. He often changes his mind on topics, including the adoption of stepchildren, surrogacy, immigrants and, more recently, the EU. Grillo’s rallies and shows are emotionally powerful. He yells at his enemies, mimics them and calls them names. He dispenses love for attendees and hatred for the press and his political adversaries. Grillo talks always of community and of an atmosphere of reciprocal care, even when there are several thousand people in the audience. When the movement gained a large number of members of parliament in 2013, Grillo did not want them to form a coalition with other parties. In the semiotic terms I mentioned above, Trump and Grillo are iconic politicians. They exploit emotions and images. Gesturing and mimicking are only part of this. Their word choices are often full of images, vulgarity and name calling (which insofar as it is used to describe a quality or circumstance of a person is iconic). In other words, while Berlusconi ‘sold’ his name as an index and all the other politicians in Italy followed suit, Trump and Grillo are shaping an iconic era in which you do not vote for the leader with whom you identify, but for a community shaped by a certain atmosphere. You do not know whether she is right based on reasoning (as in the symbolic era); you do not trust the leader whatever she says (as in the leader/indexical era); but rather you feel that she is right insofar as she is sincere and makes you feel cared for (the iconic era). The positive aspect of the shift that we are witnessing is that icons are closer to their objects. People are weighing up whether or not the politician is sincere. It does not matter if what he says is highly questionable or if he changes his mind. People believe what

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he says because everything is, or looks like, it flows from the heart and from experience of real life. In this way, we are getting closer to the kernel of communication—that you have to believe what you communicate. Contrary to what is often said, ideologies still exist but they are shaped in an emotional way, which is easier to approach and to talk about, or to oppose, if you know how to communicate. By their nature, icons allow suggestion and open up possibilities. There is less of the rigidity that often shaped the two previous eras of political communication. The negative aspect, of course, is that there is less reasoning too (there are fewer symbols) and, therefore, less room for compromise. Sincerity also requires adherence to the character one has shaped. In an interesting interview about a trial he has to face next December, Trump says he could have settled, but he is not ‘known as a settler’ (at rally in San Diego, reported by CNN; Bohn 2016). In Italy, Grillo refuses to form an alliance because M5S cannot be seen to be like any other party.

Parallel changes This iconic form of political communication goes hand in hand with two other changes: the arrival of Web 2.0 and globalisation. The existence of Web 2.0 is crucial to the speed of communication that the iconic epoch requires. Emotions come and go rapidly, and politicians cannot be late to any discussion. While in the epochs of leaders’ political communication and discourse political communication it could take hours or days to establish the correct interpretation or the leader’s will, iconic political communication happens in seconds. Speed is granted by the social networks and by the highly conflictual discussions that they allow. The other aspect of the passage to iconicity in political communication is the system/ anti-system dialectic. This second crucial pillar of the change shows that globalisation in the market and politics is very good for some groups of people but is highly questionable for a vast number for whom wealth, welfare and social opportunities have decreased as a result of the huge economic crises of the last 10 years. Iconic communication has tended to transform all of these people into one ‘community’ of the excluded and has prompted the call for local communities in which life would be better or more bearable. The pleas for universal values and reasoning, as well as globalisation, are no longer fashionable for those who have found these ideas to cause havoc and deceit in their day-to-day lives. In any analysis like the one presented here, the question of ‘what came first’ arises. Was Web 2.0 the cause of the change we are looking at, or was it the unbearable changes in the financial markets that pushed the wheels of change? Or was it the signs themselves that changed attitudes towards the markets and pushed people to use the web differently?

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This question reveals the usual weakness of analytical reasoning. Things happen simultaneously and there is no absolute first, because inventions, social attitudes and markets are all part of the broad development of communication that shapes reality.

Conclusions The latter consideration pushes me on towards conclusions. What can we learn from Trump and Grillo? Assuming that a change towards iconic communication in politics is taking place, what should we do? Could any politician become a professional comedian and could a not-naturally gifted politician become a natural iconic communicator? Of course, neither is a good solution. The first outcome of any analysis such as this is awareness of the situation. History has no guarantees, and things can change. However, at this time, we are facing this change and politicians must realise that the old language of discourse is out of date. In addition the era of the leader is fading. The language of community; care for the common person; and the use of social networks, not for manipulative communication but for shared communication, are on the rise. You cannot ignore this mounting tide of communication. Ignoring it would risk creating two worlds of communication, as happened with the Brexit referendum. The cultural economic elites in Britain were convinced that Britain would vote for Remain. They did not realise that the experts’ long discourses were not reaching the other world, where emotional iconic arguments were suggesting another option. A similar thing happened in the recent Italian administrative elections, when the governing parties did not expect M5S to win in cities such as Rome and Turin, where the establishment candidates were stung by the election of young representatives of the Movement. Of course, the same happened in the Republican primaries, where opponents and TV broadcasts could not forecast or prevent Trump from winning. Every politician should at least recognise that today political communication requires some iconic elements. It does not require a complete change from one’s own traditional ways, but it does require at least an acquaintance with the iconic world which we are undeniably entering. This means that social networks cannot be used for manipulative communication but that, even if manipulation is desired, individuals must be very careful to also share themselves, their world and their feelings. In a word, they must be, or look, sincere. A politician needs to embrace personal communication as far as social networks, advertising, TV messages, rallies and posters are concerned. Obama’s early use of social networks, Grillo’s rallies and Trump’s controversial attitude to the press show that standardised communication, in which one has a little bit of everything, is over. Moreover, the audience of reference is no longer tied to a party or to a particular territory, but to a community, which is always ‘glocal’—global as far as places are concerned; local as far as common interests are concerned. Summing up, politicians have to recognise that political communication is a complex ‘gesture’, that is, a determinate action that ‘carries on’ a meaning (from gero, Latin for ‘carry on’) (Maddalena 2015). When it is a successful gesture, all kinds of signs are

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mixed up together. Post-Trump, nobody should ignore the fact that any gesture in political communication also needs an iconic, imaginative, suggestive and communitarian hue. Open Access  This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits any use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author(s) and the source are credited.

References Bohn, K. (2016). Judge directs internal Trump University documents to be released. CNN, 31 May. http://www.cnn.com/2016/05/28/politics/trump-university-donald-trumpdocuments/index.html. Accessed 13 September 2016. Cosenza, G. (2014). Semiotica della comunicazione politica [Semiotics of political communication]. Rome: Carocci Editore. Maddalena, G. (2015). The philosophy of gesture. Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press. Peirce, C. S. (1992). The essential Peirce (EP1) (Vol. 1). Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press. Peirce, C. S. (1998). The essential Peirce (EP2). Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press. Giovanni Maddalena, Ph.D., is Associate Professor of the Philosophy of Communication at the University of Molise, Italy. His work focuses on American Philosophy, specifically Charles S. Peirce and classic pragmatists. He proposed a new paradigm for practical reasoning in The Philosophy of Gesture (McGill-Queen’s University Press, Montreal 2015).

European View DOI 10.1007/s12290-016-0420-8

ARTICLE

Do not trust people: lessons from political economy on how to counter misinformation and lies Juha‑Pekka Nurvala  © The Author(s) 2016. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com

Abstract  This article argues that political economy can explain how and why information distribution and opinion formation are changing. Even more importantly, political economy offers us ways to fight the negative effects of misinformation. It is argued that asymmetry of information can explain recent developments and why poor-quality information is capable of competing with good-quality information. Subsequently, the article explains how poor-quality information influences peoples’ decisions through internal decision-making processes. Keywords  Post-truth | Asymmetry of information | Decision-making heuristics | Misinformation | Communication | Market for lemons

J.‑P. Nurvala (*)  European People’s Party, Rue du Commerce 10, 1000 Brussels, Belgium e-mail: [email protected]

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Introduction This article will argue that opinion formation and information distribution are undergoing a radical transformation. As a consequence of this, mainstream media and other traditional authorities that used to have a monopoly over information distribution and the influencing of opinions have been challenged by new actors whose existence is made possible by the Internet. I will argue that this shift and the consequences can be explained by applying political economy theories, such as asymmetry of information, to the Internet-age media landscape. This article considers centrist political parties to be among the traditional authorities that used to have a strong influence over opinion formation. Therefore, after presenting the central thesis, I will make recommendations, derived from political economy, on how political parties and other traditional authorities can survive in the new media marketplace where information is distributed and opinions are subsequently formed. This article touches upon the hot contemporary topic of the ‘post-factual society’. ‘Influencing opinions’ is understood to be a public act, performed by taking part in public discussion or spreading (false or accurate) information in a way that has the potential to reach people outside of one’s own social circle. Traditional authorities are understood to comprise the people and institutions that prior to the Internet had access to mass media channels, for example political parties, broadsheet newspaper columnists, think tanks, mainstream professors and politicians. The ‘media marketplace where opinions are formed’ includes all current media channels that expose people to the opinions of those outside of their own social circles, for example, social media channels, newspaper comment sections, newspaper articles and blogs, and so on. Information distribution and opinion formation are understood to have a causal relationship, with information distribution influencing opinion formation. The basis for the fragmentation and decentralisation of information distribution was the creation of the Internet and the subsequent digitisation of the media. This is so incredibly important since it has drastically reduced the cost of information distribution and hence the cost of participating in opinion formation. Nowadays, social media and other applications of the Internet make it possible for everyone to reach, at least in theory, everyone who has access to the Internet and speaks the same language, virtually for free. Previously, only certain press and television media could be described as ‘mass’ media. Furthermore, access to the masses through the mass media was and remains expensive and is limited in other ways as well. Libel laws and the requirement for balanced and truthful reporting, including journalists’ own quasi-peer-review processes, limit the spread of certain kinds of ‘information’, which is readily available online through channels other than the traditional mass media.

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Not all opinions are equal The ability to influence opinions used to be the privilege of persons who were authorities in their fields. Their dominance is being challenged by laymen and the ever-increasing volume of information. Not all opinions are equal. This statement does not mean that everyone should not have the right to express and distribute their opinion, but it would be ludicrously naïve to equalise an expert’s and a layman’s opinion on any particular matter. Before the arrival of online media channels and social media platforms, only top experts in their fields were given the opportunity to express their opinions on a matter through the print and television media. Pre-Internet, any new controversial claim that a newspaper was considering sharing with the masses would have to have been verified by other experts, or as a minimum the opposing view would have to have been presented alongside the controversial new claim. Access to the masses through the mass media happens through a de facto quasi-peer-reviewed process in which only verifiable information is published; when mistakes are made the publication of corrections is mandatory and required by law. Pre-Internet, laymen were confined to preaching to their own social circle of close acquaintances. Scholars hoped, and to some extent they have been right, that this democratisation of public opinion formation as a result of the Internet would have a positive influence on civic participation and the production of information (Maximino 2014). However, there is a clear asymmetry of information1 that is highly problematic and so far has not been endogenously mitigated. The person exposed to information is expected to make a judgement call, occasionally even on highly technical issues, without knowing whether or not the information or opinion spread by a person is accurate. Take the subject of vaccinations as an example. Within this particular field, the opponents of vaccinations are often not medical professionals themselves. However, if the opponent of vaccinations claims to be a medical professional, the problem of asymmetry is further exacerbated. A person without expertise in the given field would find it difficult and time consuming not only to first verify the claim that the anti-vaccination person is actually a medical professional, but also to find out what the scientifically established consensus is, in this case on vaccinations. In contrast, the person spreading this information would be fully informed of the merits or otherwise of the information he or she is spreading. This asymmetry of information on the quality of the information being spread through channels other than the traditional mass media has the potential to reduce trust in all information and opinions.

1 

Asymmetric information, sometimes referred to as information failure, is present whenever one party to an economic transaction possesses greater material knowledge than the other party. This normally manifests itself when the seller of a good or service has greater knowledge than the buyer, although the opposite is possible. Almost all economic transactions involve information asymmetries (Investopedia.com n. d. b).

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Is asymmetric information driving good‑quality information from the market? In 1970 Nobel Prize-winning economist George Akerlof (1970) published a seminal paper titled ‘The Market for Lemons2: Quality Uncertainty and the Market Mechanism’. The paper explains the logic of how asymmetric information leads to adverse selection3 in the second-hand-car market. Essentially, his argument comes down to uncertainty over quality, which subsequently leads to a fall in trust among the market actors. One key aspect behind this process is that buyers are only willing to pay the average asking price between a good- and a bad-quality car due to difficulties with identifying the qualitative differences between the goods in the market. This process drives out high-quality producers and leaves the market dominated by low-quality producers. In this way, Akerlof illustrated the mechanism through which prices can determine the quality of goods in a market where there is a problem with asymmetric information. It is possible to apply Akerlof’s theory to the modern information creation and dissemination ‘market’. Creating and spreading information has a price. High-quality information has a higher price than lower-quality information or outright lies due to the time and costs related to the fact-checking processes. It is difficult to find an accurate estimate of the price for a journalistic piece for an average newspaper, let alone for a piece produced for television. The estimates range from a few dozen euros to thousands, depending on the size of the newspaper, all the way up to hundreds of thousands for high-quality investigative journalism pieces. One calculation estimates that on average each article costs The New York Times around $1750 and that this price only includes the cost of actually writing the article, excluding back office overheads. Some of their investigative cover stories have cost up to $400,000 to produce (Langeveld 2010). Naturally, it also takes longer to produce and distribute good-quality and accurate information. The problem of quality uncertainty is most potent among information spread by obscure newspapers, independent self-described ‘experts’, and celebrities and laymen who have a large following and seem like trustworthy sources. Unlike in the pre-Internet age, people with no authority over a subject can have a huge following, and have the ability to spread information and subsequently influence opinion formation without any quasi-peer review or similar processes to control whether the information that is being spread is accurate. Essentially, the problem with asymmetric information is prevalent among all people or actors who do not publish peer-reviewed or quasi-peer-reviewed material. The main issue here is that articles that are quasi-peer-reviewed by journalists and subject to editorial scrutiny are competing for the same visibility as information created and spread by actors with considerably lower production costs, such as laymen

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In the US the term ‘lemons’ refers to poor-quality second-hand cars.

 Adverse selection occurs when one party in a negotiation has relevant information that the other party lacks. The asymmetry of information often leads to bad decisions being made, such as to do more business with less-profitable or riskier market segments (Investopedia.com n. d. a).

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and independent experts. However it is difficult for consumers in this information market to distinguish between high-quality and low-quality, and accurate and false information. Carrying out the research required to establish the validity and accuracy of the information one encounters from a source other than a mainstream media outlet would take a considerable amount of time. What this can lead to is a real ‘market for lemons’, in which the price and production costs determine the quality of the information available as (most) information is cost-free online and people remain hesitant to pay for it. In other words, the average price (zero) paid, combined with the lower production costs for poor-quality information compared to high-quality information and the quality uncertainty exacerbated by asymmetric information, is driving good-quality information from the market. In a normal state of affairs, The New York Times, or similar globally respected publications, would not be affected by the problem of the asymmetry of information. This is due to its strong branding and reputation for accuracy. Creating brands and quality standards are among the main ways to mitigate asymmetry of information problems. However, recent polls show that in the US, for example, public trust in the media is at its lowest point in history. Currently, only 32% of Americans have a great deal of trust in the media, compared to the highest rating of 72% in 1976. Since 2003, when trust was at 54%, it has fallen almost continuously to its current low (Swift 2016). We do not have data that shows the exact reasons for this. However, the fragmentation of the media, polarisation and systematic efforts to discredit mainstream media are all factors (The Economist 2016). Essentially this data shows that for many people, information spread by The New York Times is not automatically considered trustworthy. Hence, the newspaper is in competition with low-quality information producers, while we can reasonably expect that it has considerably higher production costs. Worryingly, it is also possible that the information market may turn into a dualistic market with a high-price–high-quality information segment that is not available to all and a low-quality–low-price information segment, which functions according to the rules of the market for lemons. This has the potential to decouple citizens from each other and create parallel realities, based on different sets of ‘facts’. However, as I will highlight later, such different realities might already exist.

The ways in which misinformation influences peoples’ decision‑making We have to react to these developments, since the spread of inaccurate or false information influences our decision-making abilities. According to research, people instinctively accept the information to which they are exposed and must actively work to reject falsehoods; they tend to think familiar information is true, and they cherry-pick data to

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support their view (The Economist 2016). Nobel Prize-winner in economics Daniel Kahneman calls this ‘cognitive ease’. This process happens both consciously and subconsciously due to biases that are common in the heuristical4 models we employ to make estimates and decisions when uncertain. In 1974 Tversky and Kahneman (1974) published a paper on the decision-making biases that influence us all. In their paper they explain the most common heuristics employed by people when making a judgement when uncertain: availability, representativeness, and adjustment and anchoring. The key outcome was that, for most issues, decision-making is based on incomplete data of limited validity (Kahneman 2011, 410– 11). Even if we had perfectly valid data, we would still employ these heuristics and commit the same errors. If the data, equalling information, at our disposal is of lower quality and less trustworthy because of the information market increasingly becoming a market for lemons, our decisions will be affected in a negative way. Kahneman and Tversky argue that there are situations in which people assess the frequency of a class or the probability of an event by the ease with which instances or occurrences can be brought to mind (Kahneman 2011, 418). Essentially, this means that the ease with which we remember an occurrence has an influence on our decisionmaking. For example, immediately after seeing a house fire, people consider their own house burning down to be more likely than before, even though nothing has changed concerning their own house. This is called the availability heuristic. This is a bias we all suffer from, especially when making decisions without properly analysing the situation and based on intuition, or what Kahneman (2011) in his later works describes as ‘thinking quick’ instead of ‘thinking slow’. Being exposed to false stories or misrepresentations therefore clearly has an influence on our decision-making due to it being easier to remember more recent stories or occurrences. Representativeness is a heuristic employed by people when faced with one of the following types of problems: what is the probability that object A belongs to class B? What is the probability that event A originates from process B? What is the probability that process B will generate event A? When answering such questions, people typically rely on a representativeness heuristic, in which essentially probabilities are evaluated by the degree to which A is representative of B. They argue that when A is considered highly representative of B, the probability that A originates from B is judged to be high and vice versa (Kahneman 2011, 410–11). Applying this heuristic can lead to many errors, especially if one is constantly exposed to false and inaccurate information on an issue or about a group of people, particularly since, according to Kahneman and Tversky, people tend to be really bad at understanding statistics (Kahneman 2011, 410–18). Adjustment and anchoring is the third powerful heuristic used to solve problems and estimate probabilities. ‘In many situations people make estimates by starting from an 4 

A heuristic is a mental shortcut that allows people to solve problems and make judgements quickly and efficiently. These rule-of-thumb strategies shorten decision-making time and allow people to function without constantly stopping to think about their next course of action. Heuristics are helpful in many situations, but they can also lead to cognitive biases.

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initial value that is adjusted to yield the final answer. The initial value, or starting point, may be suggested by the formulation of the problem, or it may be the result of a partial computation [calculation]’ (Kahneman 2011, 421). It is a powerful heuristic because when estimating probabilities, one can have a statistically significant effect on people’s answers by manipulating the information available onto which they anchor their thinking and estimates (Kahneman 2011, 421–2). Hence, by spreading false information, for example, on the proportion of migrants in society or on the likelihood of a Muslim being a terrorist, one can have a considerable effect on people’s estimates and hence influence their opinions. The anchoring heuristic, which we use as an in-built mechanism to bring order to our thinking, is a powerful tool when it is used to manipulate people. Because of these heuristics, we should recognise the tremendous power that false information and those spreading it have over people’s opinions. One can also argue that the most dangerous part about false information is that through decision-making heuristics we internalise false information, even if we disagree with it or recognise that it is inaccurate. We are victims of our own success in creating this heuristic to help us deliver more accurate probability estimates. The sad fact is that we are already fighting an uphill battle, as polls point towards huge discrepancies between public opinion and facts. In 2013, King’s College London and Ipsos Mori polled the UK population on issues including what percentage of the welfare budget is fraudulently claimed, how common teenage pregnancy is and whether crime is falling or increasing. Citizens were grossly wide of the mark. For example, in terms of benefit fraud, the population’s estimate was that 24% of benefits are fraudulently claimed. The real figure is 0.7%: public opinion is off by a factor of 34. In terms of teenage pregnancy, the popular estimate was that 15% of girls under the age of 16 become pregnant every year. The real figure is 0.6%. Interestingly, 26% of people thought that foreign aid was among the top three items the UK government spends money on. In reality only 1.1% of the UK’s budget goes on foreign aid. The proportion of Muslims in the UK was grossly overestimated at an average estimate of 24%; in reality 5% of the population are Muslims. The proportion of Christians was grossly underestimated at 34%, whereas in reality 59% of the UK population are Christians (King’s College London and Ipsos Mori 2013). The miserable results of this survey are probably a combination of misinformation and biases in heuristics. These polling results can help to explain many political developments of late, since most policymakers and the average population seem to live in different realities.

What lessons can we draw from political economy concerning communications from political parties? Political economy offers ways to deal with asymmetry of information and we can also draw lessons from Kahneman and Tversky’s work on the heuristics people employ when estimating probabilities and frequencies. First of all, traditional authorities must

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understand that they are in competition for visibility and attention with actors that are not bound by the same rules.

Brand validation is key (asymmetry of information) Branding has been around since the Ancient Greeks, but the branding of mass consumer goods started in the late nineteenth century (Saarikoski 2012, 6). It is one of the key ways to counter asymmetry of information. Branding gives the less-informed partner information or almost a guarantee of the quality to expect. For traditional authorities, building or strengthening their brands is immensely important because it builds trust in them. In this case, applying this to political parties at the member state level, parties should avoid having completely different communication styles and strategies when in opposition compared to when in government. If the party’s brand is that it is the fiscally responsible party that values non-hyperbolic policy-focused work, then this must be communicated accordingly when in opposition as well. If not, the party’s brand will be damaged to the point that it does not have one, its credibility will be in tatters and people will not know what to expect from it. Brands only solve the problem of asymmetric information when they are credible and consistent. You would not trust a hotel chain’s brand if every second hotel was not at the level expected. Why would you trust a political party that does not act consistently, in accordance with its own principles?

Volume and repetition are kings (availability plus anchoring) If Tversky and Kahneman’s theses are correct, we must understand that the volume of information and hence the volume of communication from political parties is hugely important. When people make estimates and form opinions based on the ease with which they can recall issues, we must understand that it is hugely important to increase the volume and repetition of our messages. If we want to be known as the party that wants to go the moon, it must be part of everything we communicate. It must be ingrained in the party’s brand. For example, it must be in the logo, in the letterheads, in the notes to editors, and repeated in different forms on different channels in a disciplined manner for as long as the data shows us that this is what people think of us. This is what political economy and decision-making heuristics teach us about the current fragmented media landscape. The traditional authorities must also engage their supporters to multiply the message and reach out to others, in the same manner as those who are distributing false information do. Our supporters, and centrists in general, should be encouraged to become ‘fact-trolls’ to counter the effects of misinformation. However, this will only work if our information is completely truthful and consistent. As volume has an effect on decision-making through availability and anchoring heuristics, one must increase the volume of information and communication.

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Actively challenging falsehoods (availability plus representativeness plus anchoring) In order to counter the effects of all three heuristics, traditional authorities, including political parties, must actively challenge falsehoods. This means in practice that traditional authorities must engage online in discussions with people and show why the allegations made in the new media are wrong. They should actively work to shape peoples’ opinions. The other alternative is to wait on the sidelines and formulate one’s policies based on people’s opinions, but this can hardly be described as values-based politics. Further, the counter argument to this approach is that debating has to happen on the topic chosen by the person on the attack and hence one is bound to repeat the original false claim. Yet at the same time, not challenging false claims gives us no chance whatsoever of mitigating the effect on people’s decision-making. By challenging, and actively engaging in debate on Facebook and Twitter, in the comment sections of websites and on similar forums, one can counter anchoring, representativeness and availability heuristics and spread one’s own message at the same time. Furthermore, challenging false claims builds up the brand of the party in question and underlines its truthfulness. However, this naturally requires a highly skilled and agile communications team and humility as an organisation in order to accept that mistakes are made, since not all criticism is unfounded.

Challenging and using first‑mover advantage Traditional authorities should not only be on the defensive. They need to actively challenge populist movements and myths, even if people are biased against changing their opinions. The first-mover advantage can be applied to the modern media landscape. Essentially, the first-mover has the advantage that not all the people who see the first message will see the responses to and rejections of that information by other actors. The power of the first-mover advantage should be utilised by centrist forces to counter populist movements and those distributing false information, since these groups are most certainly taking full advantage of this factor.

Endogenous peer‑review systems and gate‑keepers (asymmetry of information) In the long term, it is possible that technology will solve part of the problem of asymmetrical information, yet it remains unlikely that it can remove our heuristical biases. As in e-commerce, it is possible that peer-review will come to solve part of the asymmetry of information problem by allowing people to rate the information to which they are exposed. Naturally, there is no reason why this would not be exploited. But such a system would be an endogenous solution to the problem so prevalent right now. An alternative to a fully diffused peer-review system would be that over time certain individuals or organisations that are universally accepted as neutral fact-checkers are promoted

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to gate-keeper status. Such a role will not be suitable for political parties, but they can support the development of different peer-review systems and elevate institutions to the status of gate-keepers.

Conclusion Information distribution is undergoing a radical transformation. Research makes it clear that we are all victims of biases that are built into our decision-making heuristics. These biases expose us to false and inaccurate information that influences our decision-making. We should explore options for how to counter these negative effects by applying political economy theories to the current information distribution and opinion formation ‘market’. We have to understand that the biases in our heuristical models mean that we have to actively counter misinformation and lies if we want to mitigate the effects of misinformation on people’s decision-making. Open Access  This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits any use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author(s) and the source are credited.

References Akerlof, G. A. (1970). The market for lemons: The quality uncertainty and the market mechanism. The Quarterly Journal of Economics, 84(3), 488–500. Investopedia.com. (n. d. a). Adverse selection. http://www.investopedia.com/terms/a/ adverseselection.asp?ad=dirN&qo=investopediaSiteSearch&qsrc=0&o=40186. Accessed 26 October 2016. Investopedia.com. (n. d. b). Asymmetry of information. http://www.investopedia.com/ terms/a/asymmetricinformation.asp. Accessed 26 October 2016. Kahneman, D. (2011). Thinking, fast and slow. New York: Farrar Straus and Giroux. King’s College London, & Ipsos Mori. (2013). Perceptions are not reality. The top 10 we get wrong. Ipsos Mori, 9 July. https://www.ipsos-mori.com/researchpublications/ researcharchive/3188/Perceptions-are-not-reality-the-top-10-we-get-wrong.aspx. Accessed 27 September 2016. Langeveld, M. (2010). How much does it cost the NYT on average to produce one news story? Quora.com, 10 December. https://www.quora.com/How-much-does-it-costthe-NYT-on-average-to-produce-one-news-story. Accessed 27 September 2016. Maximino, M. (2014). Does media fragmentation contribute to polarization? Evidence from lab experiments. Journalist’s Resource, 22 August. http://journalistsresource.org/

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studies/society/news-media/media-fragmentation-political-polarization-lab-experiments. Accessed 27 September 2016. Saarikoski, S. (2012). Brands, stars and regular hacks—A changing relationship between news institutions and journalists. Oxford: Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, University of Oxford. Swift, A. (2016). Americans’ trust in mass media sinks to new low. Gallup.com, 14 September. http://www.gallup.com/poll/195542/americans-trust-mass-media-sinks-new-low. aspx. Accessed 27 September 2016. The Economist. (2016). Briefing: The post-truth society. 10 September. http://www. economist.com/news/briefing/21706498-dishonesty-politics-nothing-new-mannerwhich-some-politicians-now-lie-and. Accessed 26 October 2016. Tversky, A., & Kahneman, D. (1974). Judgment under uncertainty: Heuristics and biases. Science, 185(4157), 1124–31. Juha‑Pekka Nurvala is political adviser for economic and social policy at the European People’s Party. He holds a B.A. in international politics from King’s College London and an M.Sc. in the political economy of Europe from the London School of Economics and Political Science. In 2016 he was on the Forbes 30 Under 30 list for Policy in Europe.

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European View DOI 10.1007/s12290-016-0407-5

ARTICLE

Media discourse on the refugee crisis: on what have the Greek, German and British press focused? Stergios Fotopoulos · Margarita Kaimaklioti  © The Author(s) 2016. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com

Abstract  This article looks at how the Greek, German and British press have addressed the issue of the refugee crisis in Europe. Using a mixed research approach that combines corpus linguistics and discourse analysis, this article examines 1340 articles that were published online between 20 March and 31 May 2016 in Greece (Kathimerini, To vima), Germany (Die Welt, Süddeutsche Zeitung) and the UK (The Guardian, The Telegraph). The results presented by this article suggest that the press in all three countries mostly presented the refugee crisis in numbers. Geographical qualifiers were also deployed in the effort to broach this thorny issue, while the managerial aspect of the refugee crisis, the critical issue of child refugees and the EU–Turkey agreement were all among the most frequent topics covered by the press. Keywords  Refugees | Immigrants | Asylum seekers | Media discourse | Discourse analysis | Online news | Refugee crisis S. Fotopoulos (*)  Avenue Livingstone 6, 1000 Brussels, Belgium e-mail: [email protected] M. Kaimaklioti  European Parliament, Rue Wiertz 60, 1047 Brussels, Belgium e-mail: [email protected]

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Introduction Europe is facing an unprecedented migration and refugee crisis as a result of the ongoing civil war in Syria, which began in 2011 and has resulted in over 250,000 casualties as well as millions of refugees and internally displaced persons. According to the International Organisation for Migration (2015), more than one million irregular migrants and refugees crossed into Europe in 2015. This has given rise to a series of issues, including those involving EU security, Europe’s common values and destiny, the readiness and policy planning of the Syriza-led government in Greece, and the willingness of Turkey to cooperate with the EU. Some media outlets soon began to write about ‘the largest movement of people that Europe has seen since 1945’ (Financial Times 2015). Others, adopting a more critical approach, stressed the need for concerted EU action (Barakat and Zyck 2015). Indeed, since 2011 several humanitarian organisations have been sounding the alarm about the growing refugee crisis. However, the wake-up call in public opinion did not come until four years later, when the shocking images of the drowned three-year-old Syrian refugee Aylan Kurdi emerged. This sharp increase in interest from the public and the media was one of the main factors that pushed the EU to pursue an agreement with Turkey that would aspire to end the irregular migration from Turkey to the EU. This article aims to explore the ways in which the migrant and refugee crisis has been covered by online media in Germany, Greece and the UK. More concretely, the article aims to both identify the way the sampled online newspapers in the above-mentioned countries portray the migrants and refugees, and provide a preliminary analysis of the aspects on which journalists focused when covering this crisis. In this regard, this study does not constitute a large-scale analysis of the media discourse on the refugee crisis as a whole.

Prior efforts to investigate the media discourse on immigrants and refugees The media holds a pivotal role in disseminating information, spreading knowledge and shaping ideologies, as well as exerting influence over societies. In this regard, the media discourse on immigrants and refugees has attracted considerable attention from several scholars. Focusing on discursive mechanisms of representing and interpreting the ‘others’ (i.e. immigrants and refugees), Van Dijk (2000) argued that the media contribute to the reproduction of stereotypes, prejudices and eventually racism. In a seminal paper that employed a critical discourse analysis of two Australian newspapers, Teo (2000) unravelled how criminal-related stereotypes for Asian immigrants had been systematically reproduced. Moreover, Santa Ana (1999), focusing on metaphors in the discourse of the Los Angeles Times, noticed that immigrants were presented as animals, debased persons, weeds or disease, while Erjavec (2003), when identifying the media discourses of immigration in Slovenia, stressed that they promoted ‘moral panic’,

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were highly concerned for national security and were hostile towards foreigners. More concretely: In the construction of moral panics, the journalists gave up their right to take reporting as a process of searching for the truth and the story was told by the dominant ideology, instead of by them. As loyal followers of the professional ideology, they objectified the adopted xenophobic discourse of the dominant ideology by reference to the creators of such discourse (Erjavec 2003, 99). In the same vein, while Leudar et al. (2008) conducted interviews with refugees/asylum seekers in the UK, they simultaneously examined the way that the British broadsheets presented refugees/asylum seekers, and identified ‘hostility themes’ in the newspapers’ treatment of them. These themes were reflected in media coverage and local inhabitants’ social expressions (Leudar et al. 2008). Finally, Gabrielatos and Baker (2008) documented negative representations of migrants within the British press. More concretely, among the most frequently used verbs in their sample were ‘fleeing, sneaking, and flooding’ (Baker et al. 2008). In contrast, during the Balkan conflict of 1999, the newspapers in the UK seemed supportive of affected/displaced people, adopting positive discursive practices, although some stereotypes and prejudices were reproduced (Khosravinik 2009).

Methodology Two mainstream online newspapers from each of the above-mentioned countries were selected, and a combination of the methodologies associated with corpus linguistics (CL) and discourse analysis was employed (see Table 1). First we examined the wording of the articles in detail by enumerating the words (collocates) that were most likely to appear in the text either before or after the following keywords: (i) migrants, (ii) immigrants, (iii) refugees, and (iv) asylum seekers. In a similar study, examining the discourse on refugees and asylum seekers in the UK press, Baker et al. (2008, 277) indicate: ‘the CL analysis started with the examination of relative frequencies and emerging statistically significant lexical patterns in the corpus and sub-corpora mainly involving the four terms in focus: refugee(s), asylum seeker(s), immigrant(s), migrant(s)’. The following collocates were employed:

•  Those words placed immediately to the left of the above-mentioned keywords or descriptors, labelled ‘L1 collocates’. •  Those words that regularly emerged within 10 words of our keywords, either to the left or to the right, labelled ‘consistent collocates’ (c-collocates) (see Baker et al. 2008; Allen and Blinder 2013).

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L9

L8

L7

L6

L5

Source: Allen and Blinder 2013

L10

Table 1  L1 and c-collocates

L4

L3

L2

L1

Keywords: migrants, immigrantsrefugees, asylum seekers

R1

R2

R3

R4

R5

R6

R7

R8

R9

R10

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In this regard, we endeavoured to collate the vocabulary that the various online newspapers used to portray the migrants and refugees, as well as to highlight the aspects on which the selected online media focused when covering this crisis. Our research is based on an analysis of a corpus of 1340 articles published online between 20 March and 31 May 2016. In contrast to previous studies that covered several years of research and a large amount of data (e.g. Baker et al. 2008; Allen and Blinder 2013), we did not use CL software. Rather, we manually documented the words that appeared in conjunction with our keywords. Having adopted this approach, we were able to identify and interpret the meaning of the phrases that included the descriptors and the c-collocates as well as the relevant sentences. According to Allen and Blinder (2013), computer-assisted methods are able to analyse a large amount of data, eliminating the possibility of human error. However, the authors would argue that the current study did not require a computerised method since the period of research was so short (approximately two months). This period went from 20 March 2016 to 31 May 2016.1 With regard to the selection of 10 words either side of our keywords (‘c-collocates’), this number was partly decided on arbitrarily and partly in such a way that several words could be captured for meaningful analysis. However, CL studies seem unable to provide a qualitative analysis of the linguistic context (e.g. tone and meaning) where collocates are used within sentences or phrases. Therefore, as a second step, we tried to further present and interpret the main aspects of the top collocates of our target words (see Table 3). For instance, what was written about ‘Idomeni’, ‘hotspots’ or ‘Turkey’? As was noted above, this research takes the EU–Turkey deal of 20 March 2016 as a landmark. The selection of online broadsheets was based both on ease of research and the authors’ consideration that the content and discourse of the online versions of the mainstream media are to a great extent consistent with the print and broadcast media. In addition, online journalism is progressively gaining a significant audience. The online newspapers were selected in accordance with their political affiliation— centre–right/centre–left, as well as their circulation (see Table 2). From Germany, we selected Die Welt and Süddeutsche Zeitung, while from Greece Kathimerini and To vima. Last but not least, from the UK we examined The Guardian and The Telegraph. Regarding the countries that serve as case studies, the selection of Germany, Greece and the UK serves the purpose of covering as many EU member states as possible and representing countries from the northern and the southern part of the EU. Additionally, Greece seems to have been the EU country most affected by the refugee crisis, especially since the closure of the ‘Balkan route’, as it is playing host to tens of thousands of refugees

1 

We selected 20 March 2016 as a landmark date since this is when the EU signed an agreement with Turkey with the aim of reducing the number of refugees arriving on the Greek islands, while 31 May 2016 was chosen as closing date due to our belief that gathering data from articles that were published over a duration of two months would allow us to export firm conclusions without the need to employ computerised methods.

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Table 2  Categorisation of the online broadsheets in accordance with their political affiliation Germany

Greece

The UK

Centre–right

Die Welt

Kathimerini

The Telegraph

Centre–left

Süddeutsche Zeitung

To vima

The Guardian

Source: Authors’ own compilation

and irregular migrants, according to the latest reports. A humanitarian crisis has been sparked in Greece due to its geopolitical position, primarily its border with Turkey, along which smugglers continue to operate. With regard to Germany, it was agreed that it would be interesting to capture how the online coverage from the German newspapers presents and comments on the crisis, taking into consideration the decisiveness and efforts of German Chancellor Angela Merkel to implement the quota plan to deal with the refugee crisis. Another important element regarding the selection of the aforementioned countries is that extreme right-wing populist parties have gained significant support within both Germany (Alternative für Deutschland) and Greece (Golden Dawn), and there has been a notable rise in Euroscepticism in these countries. As far as the UK is concerned, taking into consideration its sceptical position within the EU as well as the result of the EU referendum, it was agreed that it would be interesting to capture and analyse the UK newspapers’ perspectives of the refugee crisis. Unfortunately, due to language and space limitations, the eastern part of the EU was not covered.

Findings and discussion L1 collocates Table  3 shows the words (L1 collocates) that, in the articles examined, preceded the target words of ‘migrants’, ‘immigrants’, ‘refugees’ and ‘asylum seekers’. L1 collocates are the words used to describe or define these words. To begin with, as one might expect, the most common collocate in all three countries of our study was not a word but a number (in 62.9% of cases in Greece, 36.1% in Germany and 71% in the UK), specifying the number of immigrants/refugees/asylum seekers arriving/being deported/being repatriated to/from Greece, Turkey and Italy. This rather highlights the fact that the online media in our sample seemed to focus on the perspective of quantity. The second most common L1 collocate in Greece, was ‘management’ (10% of the relevant articles), while in Germany it was ‘Syrians’, which appeared in 6.3% of the examined articles. In this regard, one could argue that the press in Greece focused on the managerial aspect of the refugees arriving in the

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country, while the selected online newspapers in Germany provided a geographical qualifier. In the UK, the second most common L1 collocate was the word ‘child’ (21.5%), a fact that underlines the emphasis given by the British press to the sensitive issue of Table 3  L1 collocates of ‘migrants’, ‘immigrants’, ‘refugees’ and ‘asylum seekers’ (top 30) Greece

%

Germany

%

UK

%

Reference to a number

62.9 Reference to a number

36.1 Reference to a number 71

Management

10

Syrians

6.3

Child

21.5

Hotspots

7.7

Many

5.4

Syrian

20

Transport

7

Number

4.4

Anti-

14

Number

6.4

Repatriation (forced)

4.3

Illegal

10

Arrival(s)

5.8

Registered (‘anerkannte’)

3.2

Stranded

6

UN

5.5

Accommodation

3

Irregular

6

Treatment

4.5

Young

2.8

Economic

5.5

Turkey

3.5

Minors—children

2.8

Deport

5

Syrian(s)

3.5

Registration (‘Aufnahme’)

2.6

Unaccompanied

5

Camp

3.1

Fewer

2.5

EU

5

Illegal/Irregular

3.1

Distribution

2.3

Pro-

5

Refoulement

2.5

Integration

2.1

Incoming/inward

4

Movement

2.5

Incoming

2.1

Reject/rejected

4

To host/hosting

2.5

Other

1.8

Welcome

3.5

Trapped

2.2

Against

1.7

Border

3

Flows

2.2

Influx

1.6

Group of

3

To reside/residence

2.2

Those who have entered (‘Eingereisten’)

1.6

Short-term

3

Return(s)

1.9

Civil war (‘Burgerkriegs’)

1.4

Uncontrolled

3

Trafficking

1.9

Migration

1.3

Flow

3

Right(s)

1.9

Illegal

1.2

Inciting

3

Registration

1.9

Plenty

1

Cut

3

Relocation

1.9

Handling

0.9

Against

2

Administrative authority

1.9

To supply

0.9

Mass

2

To integrate

1.6

Group

0.8

Wave of

2

Conditions

1.6

Turkey

0.8

Europe’s

2

Agreement

1.6

Total number

0.8

Deter

2

Greece

1.6

Balkan route

0.8

Long-term

2

Weight

1.6

Hundreds of thousands

0.8

Afghan

2

Protection

1.6

Muslim(s)

0.5

Women

2

–

–

To arrive

0.5

Plight

2

–

–

To return/to take back

0.5

Handle

2

Source: Authors’ own compilation Note: The percentages constitute the result of data collection from Kathimerini, To vima, Die Welt, Süddeutsche Zeitung, The Guardian and The Telegraph in accordance with the above-described methodology. They have been calculated approximately, accepting that there is a risk of deviation or statistical error.

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child refugees. In addition, the L1 collocate ‘unaccompanied’ appeared before the word ‘refugees’ in 5% of the articles examined in the British press. The Guardian, reporting on the change of attitude of former Prime Minister David Cameron towards the ‘unaccompanied children’ from Syria, questioned whether ‘David Cameron’s U-turn on unaccompanied child refugees [should] be celebrated’ (Gentleman 2016). A different article in the same paper noted that ‘Britain will take thousands of unaccompanied child migrants from EU camps’, as a result of the recent vote in the House of Lords ‘to amend the immigration bill in order to require the government to let the children, currently in Europe, come to Britain’ (Gentleman and McVeigh 2016). Unsurprisingly, during our analysis, we noticed that the word ‘hotspots’ was among those that most often appeared before the words ‘immigrants’, ‘refugees’ or ‘asylum seekers’ in the Greek newspapers Kathimerini and To vima (7.7%). The online coverage of both Greek newspapers condemned the ‘extremely poor living conditions’ in the hotspots, the ‘violent scenes’ among immigrants/refugees and the process of ‘immigrant/ refugee registration’, while reporting/commenting on the accumulation of refugees in Greece, and ‘the ongoing tensions among the refugees’ within hotspots. To vima (2016a), presenting the conclusions of a Human Rights Watch report, stressed that ‘the refugee hotspots are unsafe and unsanitary’, while underpinning that ‘women and children in particular are left unprotected and Greek police appear to be indifferent to their plight’. Moreover, Kathimerini described the situation at the makeshift camp in Elliniko as a ‘health time bomb’, while underlining that not a single day passes without clashes (Georgiopoulou 2016). Of course, the ‘inhumane’ living conditions in the refugee camps were often reported by the German and British press as well. In an article with the headline, ‘Refugee camps on Greek islands “bursting at the seams”’, The Telegraph wrote that ‘living conditions are rough, food is often inadequate and thousands of children, many of them Syrians who fled the war, are missing out on their schooling’ (Squires 2016), highlighting the lack of moral and safe conditions in the camps. In the same vein, Die Welt (2016a) reproduced pictures of the muddy landscape at the makeshift camp in Idomeni, where refugees’ tents were underwater. In its article, Die Welt argued that Idomeni was a place of drugs, prostitution and violence. As listed in the table below, the third most used L1 collocate in the British press was the word ‘Syrian’. Significantly, immigrants were not so frequently described as ‘irregular’ or ‘illegal’ in our Greek and German samples (3.1% in Greece and 1.2% in Germany), something that does not apply to the British sample: 10% of the instances of the word ‘immigrant’ were preceded by the word ‘illegal’ and 6% by the word ‘irregular’. The latter collocate did not concern the words ‘refugees’ or ‘asylum seekers’, as by definition refugees and asylum seekers cannot be described as illegal/irregular. The German newspapers analysed also seemed to also focus on unaccompanied children who had been forced to abandon their countries (‘young’ and ‘minors—children’). Significantly, Die Welt (2016b) underlined that the cost of supporting the unaccompanied underage refugees is insurmountable for the German local authorities, invoking mention of the German Association of Towns and Municipalities. Furthermore, the same newspaper hosted articles which expressed concern about the living conditions of children from

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Syria at the hotspots in Greece, as well as the fact that they have been cut off from education. In another report, Die Welt (2016c) put forward the extremely odious issue of refugee child prostitution, describing it as a ‘catastrophic condition’ that the refugee children face. At the same time, various other terms appeared in the selected Greek newspapers just before our keywords, such as ‘refoulement’, ‘registration’, ‘relocation’ and ‘integration’ (‘to integrate’), that indicated discussion of the procedural actions relevant to migration, while on several occasions migrants, immigrants, refugees and asylum seekers were described as ‘trapped’ in the Greek territory. Another important element that can be seen from Table 3 is the frequent use of the metaphors of ‘flows’ and ‘influx’ in the Greek, German and British press, highlighting the high volume of migrant and refugee arrivals. Although this seems to suggest a generally negative representation of migrants/refugees (Khosravinik 2009), this was not the case in our sample. At this point, before proceeding to the c-collocates (Table 4), it is worth noting some general assumptions regarding the examined online newspapers’ discourse on the refugee crisis. In this context, the sample of online newspapers tended to be favourable towards refugees. The latter, inter alia, were represented as victims of the civil war in Syria, and as helpless and desperate. Last but not least, the personal stories of the migrants and refugees were shared extensively by the online media analysed, adding a dramatic tone to the presentation of the news.

C‑collocates The most common ‘c-collocate’ in the Greek newspapers Kathimerini and To vima was ‘Greece’, usually accompanied by the adjectives ‘Central’, ‘Northern’ or ‘Southern’ in order to provide a geographic location for the migrants’ and refugees’ arrival, and their accumulation, registration and relocation, as well as to present other incidents related to migrants/refugees (e.g. violent scenes, living conditions). Similarly, the German online media referred to ‘Greece’ to a significant extent according to Table 4 (25.8%). In general the selected German and British newspapers were sympathetic towards Greece, which seems to have been the EU country most affected by the refugee crisis, hosting tens of thousands refugees and irregular migrants, while a humanitarian crisis has been sparked there. However, the problems of accommodation and care for the migrants and refugees were issues that were also highlighted, and were touched upon by the Greek newspapers as well. Nevertheless, the most common c-collocate in Die Welt and Süddeutsche Zeitung was ‘Turkey’ (46.8%), something that interestingly applies to the British newspapers as well (69%). It seems that all six online newspapers paid a lot of attention to the EU–Turkey deal, referring to the nature and provisions of this agreement, as well as to the perspective of its implementation. For instance, Süddeutsche Zeitung (2016) expressed ‘hoffnung und Skepsis nach Flüchtlingspakt mit der Türkei’ [hope and scepticism about the refugee pact with Turkey]. What is worth noting is that the word ‘controversial’ was very often deployed to describe this accord. Various articles included politicians’ statements stressing the importance of the implementation of this deal, while international organisations such as

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Table 4  C-collocates of ‘immigrants’, ‘refugees’ and ‘asylum seekers’ (top 30) Greece

%

Germany

%

UK

%

(Central/Northern/Southern) Greece

46.4

Turkey

46.8

Turkey/Turkish (e.g. authorities)

69

Hotspots

40.9

EU

27.8

Camps/camped/encampment

59

Turkey

40.9

Greece

25.8

Greece/Greek islands/Greek shores

58

Idomeni

30.9

Greek

17.6

EU–Turkey deal/migration deal/ accord

45

Country

29.3

To come/arrive

17.3

Children/minors

44

Piraeus

27.4

Island(s)

16.2

Lesvos/Mytilene

43

EU

27.4

Germany

15.8

Crisis

39

Islands

27.4

People

13.6

Syria/Syrian

32

Located

26.1

Syrian

13.6

Unaccompanied

31

To remain

26.1

To return

12.2

Libya/Libyan

30

Port

25.1

Number

10.7

Italy

29

Camp

22.2

March

10.5

Europe

29

Borders

20.9

Border(s)

10.3

Boats

28

Agreement

20.9

Many

10.2

Asylum

26

To arrive

19

Refugee pact (‘Fluchtlingpakts’)

10

Deportations

25

Flows

18

Registration

9.8

Idomeni

19

Conditions

17.7

Other/different

9.6

Mediterranean

19

Lesvos

16.1

Against

9.5

Smugglers

18

Police

15.8

Goods

8.4

Terrorism/terrorists/IS/ISIS/ISILa

17

To be transferred

15.1

Idomeni

7.7

Balkan route/Balkan migrant trail

16

Europe

14.5

Lesvos

7.2

Women

16

Returns/to return

13.8

Federal government

7.2

UN High Commissioner for Refugees/UN

16

Government

13.5

Illegal

6.9

Resettled/resettlement programme

15

Chios

12.6

County

6.6

EU

14

Situation

12.2

To give

5.9

Greek–Macedonian (border)

14

Transfer

11.9

Year

5.7

Conditions

14

Spaces

11.9

Chios

5.6

Britain

14

Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia/FYROM

11.9

State/country

5.4

Detention/detention centre/immigration centre/holding centre

13

Asylum request

11.9

Repatriation (forced)

5.4

Afghanistan/Afghans

12

Italy

11.6

Europe

5.4

Piraeus

11

Source: Authors’ own compilation Note: The percentages constitute the result of data collection from Kathimerini, To vima, Die Welt, Süddeutsche Zeitung, The Guardian and The Telegraph in accordance with the above-mentioned methodology. They have been calculated approximately, accepting that there is a risk of deviation or statistical error. a

 Respectively, Islamic State, Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, and Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant.

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the UN High Commissioner for Refugees and Amnesty International raised their voices against the very substance of the agreement, expressing their scepticism regarding the legality of the planned deportations. At the same time, they did not neglect to underline that Ankara must respect the relevant provisions found in international law regarding the protection of refugees. Last but not least, serious concerns about a possible collapse of the EU–Turkey agreement were unanimously expressed in the newspapers studied, while the Turkish threats regarding its implementation were reflected as well. Turning our attention to the coverage of this crisis by the Greek newspapers in our sample, they seem to focus on the state of play at the hotspots within Greece: at the makeshift camp in Idomeni where violent incidents and protests have taken place, and at the port of Piraeus where several migrants and refugees have been trapped in makeshift camps. ‘Hunger strike in Chios’ where ‘the situation has been derailed’, ‘turmoil in Idomeni’, ‘the deadlock in Idomeni remains’, and ‘stone-throwing in overcrowded Idomeni’ were some of the headlines in Kathimerini (2016a, b, c). On the other hand, To vima (2016c) likened the situation in Piraeus and Idomeni with the living conditions in favelas. Of course, the transfer of refugees from the improvised camp at the port of Piraeus was an issue of high concern, which was covered by all the newspapers examined. For instance, The Guardian wrote that ‘Athens is under pressure: city races to clear port’s refugee camp before tourists arrive’ (Smith 2016). Furthermore, both in Greece and in Germany, the word ‘borders’ appeared frequently, while the British press often referred to the ‘Greek–Macedonian border’. The word ‘FYROM’2 appeared in 11.9% of the articles analysed in the Greek papers. These references to ‘FYROM’ were mostly made in the context of the closing of the Balkan route or the violent scenes between the authorities of the Former Republic of Macedonia and the refugees and migrants at the borders between Greece and that country. The British press also highlighted that clashes took place. The Guardian reported on several injuries after ‘clashes at Greece–Macedonian borders’, when ‘Macedonian police fired teargas and rubber bullets at crowds on the Greek side of the border’ (The Guardian 2016). On 11 April 2016 The Telegraph presented the strong opposition of Alexis Tsipras to the abovementioned practices of the authorities from the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, writing that ‘Greece’s prime minister accused Macedonia of “shaming” Europe after the Balkan country’s police used plastic bullets, stun grenades and tear gas to beat back refugees from a border fence’ (The Telegraph 2016). At the same time, the critical reaction of President of the Hellenic Republic Prokopis Pavlopoulos concerning the stance of the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia in Idomeni was noted in both Kathimerini and To vima. ‘FYROM has no place in the EU and NATO’ (To vima 2016b) said Mr Pavlopoulos. In general, both Kathimerini and To vima published articles or statements which expressed their scepticism and disapproval regarding the attitude of the authorities of the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia at the border between it and Greece. Importantly, all the newspapers in the study made mention of the Greek islands, and more specifically of Chios and Lesvos, where the numbers of migrant and refugee arrivals rocketed. Additionally, from an examination of Table 4, it seems that there were 2 

Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia.

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several references to Italy in the Greek and the British press, something that cannot be said for the German press in our sample. At this point, it is interesting to note that when analysing the articles from the two British newspapers, the authors of this article expected a significant reference to the Brexit debate on migration. However, references to the word ‘Brexit’ or to the EU referendum appeared in only 4% of the articles examined. Finally, we were surprised to note that the articles studied in the Greek and the German press did not include in a percentage worth mentioning the words ‘terrorists’, ‘terrorism’, ‘ISIL’, ‘IS’ or ‘ISIS’.3 This contrasts with the British press, where the above-mentioned terms emerged in 17% of the articles examined. The authors of this article can only assume that the almost complete absence of any reference to terrorism in the German and Greek media is part of the wider effort of (opinion) leaders to tackle the spike in hate crimes in the two countries.

Conclusions The findings of this article suggest that with Europe shaken to its foundations and the EU’s values and common future having been called into question, the media seems to have taken a uniform approach to covering this crisis. This contrasts with the conflicting views of Europe’s leaders. At the same time, it seems that hate speech has caught the attention of the media and caused public concern. As mentioned earlier, refugees were portrayed as victims of the civil war in Syria, helpless and desperate, while there was also a focus among all the newspapers on the ‘numbers’ of the crisis. Unsurprisingly, the EU–Turkey agreement was at the heart of the daily coverage. Apart from references to the nature and provisions of this agreement, as well as its implementation, various articles expressed scepticism regarding its legality and concerns about its possible collapse. Finally, all the newspapers examined paid a good deal of attention to the tragic issue of child refugees, who are living in extreme peril and facing inhumane living conditions and various atrocious threats. Open Access  This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits any use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author(s) and the source are credited.

References Allen, W., & Blinder, S. (2013). Migration in the news: Portrayals of immigrants, migrants, asylum seekers and refugees in national British newspapers, 2010–2012. The Migration Observatory report, COMPAS, University of Oxford. 8 August. http:// www.migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Report-Migration_ News.pdf. Accessed 6 September 2016. 3 

Respectively, Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, Islamic State, and Islamic State of Iraq and Syria.

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Baker, P., Gabrielatos, C., Khosravinik, M., Krzyżanowski, M., McEnery, T., & Wodak, R. (2008). A useful methodological synergy? Combining critical discourse analysis and corpus linguistics to examine discourses of refugees and asylum seekers in the UK press. Discourse Society. doi: 10.1177/0957926508088962. Barakat, S., & Zyck, S. A. (2015). The Syrian refugee crisis and the erosion of Europe’s moral authority. Brookings blog. https://www.brookings.edu/blog/order-fromchaos/2015/09/15/the-syrian-refugee-crisis-and-the-erosion-of-europes-moral-authority/. Accessed 5 September 2016. Die Welt. (2016a). Flüchtlingszelte in Idomeni stehen unter Wasser [Refugee tents are under water]. 23 May. https://www.welt.de/politik/ausland/article155563065/Fluechtlingszelte-in-Idomeni-stehen-unter-Wasser.html. Accessed 6 September 2016. Die Welt. (2016b). Minderjährige Flüchtlinge kosten Städte Milliarden [Minor refugees cost billions to the hosting cities]. 17 May. https://www.welt.de/politik/deutschland/article155401038/Minderjaehrige-Fluechtlinge-kosten-Staedte-Milliarden.html. Accessed 6 September 2016. Die Welt. (2016c). Minderjährige Flüchtlinge werden als Prostituierte eingesetzt [Minor refugees are used as prostitutes]. 27 May. https://www.welt.de/politik/ausland/article155550588/Minderjaehrige-Fluechtlinge-werden-als-Prostituierte-eingesetzt.html. Accessed 6 September 2016. Erjavec, K. (2003). Media construction of identity through moral panics: Discourses of immigration in Slovenia. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies. doi:10.1080/1369183 032000076731. Financial Times. (2015). What is the Europe migrant crisis and how has it evolved? 4 September. https://www.ft.com/content/cdd88362-524e-11e5-b029-b9d50a74fd14. Accessed 5 September 2016. Gabrielatos, C., & Baker, P. (2008). Fleeing, sneaking, flooding. A corpus analysis of discursive constructions of refugees and asylum seekers in the UK press, 1996–2005. Journal of English Linguistics. doi: 10.1177/0075424207311247. Gentleman, A. (2016). Should David Cameron’s U-turn on unaccompanied child refugees be celebrated? The Guardian, 7 May. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/ may/07/should-david-camerons-u-turn-on-unaccompanied-child-refugees-be-celebrated. Accessed 6 September 2016. Gentleman, A., & McVeigh, K. (2016). House of Lords votes to let lone child refugees come to Britain. The Guardian, 21 March. https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2016/ mar/21/house-of-lords-votes-to-let-lone-child-refugees-come-to-britain. Accessed 6 September 2016.

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Georgiopoulou, T. (2016). Ygeionomikh vomva to Elliniko, kathe mera symplokes [Elliniko is a health time bomb, clashes take place every day]. Kathimerini, 19 April. http://www.kathimerini.gr/857251/article/epikairothta/ellada/ygeionomikh-vomva-toellhniko-ka8e-mera-symplokes. Accessed 6 September 2016. International Organisation for Migration. (2015). Irregular migrant, refugee arrivals in Europe top one million in 2015. 22 December. https://www.iom.int/news/irregularmigrant-refugee-arrivals-europe-top-one-million-2015-iom. Accessed 5 September 2016. Kathimerini. (2016a). Apergia peinas sti Chio, se anavrasmo h Idomeni [Hunger strike in Chios, turmoil in Idomeni]. 19 May. http://www.kathimerini.gr/860275/article/epikairothta/ellada/apergia-peinas-sth-xio-se-anavrasmo-h-eidomenh. Accessed 14 September 2016. Kathimerini. (2016b). Paramenei to adieksodo stin Idomeni [The deadlock in Idomeni remains]. 4 May. http://www.kathimerini.gr/858480/article/epikairothta/ellada/paramenei-to-adie3odo-sthn-eidomenh. Accessed 14 September 2016. Kathimerini. (2016c). Petropolemos stin asfyktika gemath Idomeni [Stone-throwing in overcrowded Idomeni]. 11 May. http://www.kathimerini.gr/859233/article/epikairothta/ ellada/petropolemos-sthn-asfyktika-gemath-eidomenh. Accessed 6 September 2016. Khosravinik, M. (2009). The representation of refugees, asylum seekers and immigrants in British newspapers during the Balkan conflict (1999) and the British general election (2005). Discourse and Society. doi:10.1177/0957926509104024. Leudar, I., Hayes, J., Nekvapil, J., & Turner Baker, J. (2008). Hostility themes in media, community and refugee narratives. Discourse and Society. doi:10.1177/0957926507085952. Santa Ana, O. (1999). ‘Like an animal I was treated’: Anti-immigrant metaphor in US public discourse. Discourse Society,. doi:10.1177/0957926599010002004. Smith, H. (2016). Athens under pressure: City races to clear port’s refugee camp before tourists arrive. The Guardian, 26 April. https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2016/apr/26/ athens-under-pressure-city-port-refugee-camp-tourists. Accessed 6 September 2016. Squires, N. (2016). Refugee camps on Greek islands ‘bursting at the seams’ as crossings from Turkey begin to pick up. The Telegraph, 16 August. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/08/16/refugee-camps-on-greek-islands-burstingat-the-seams-as-crossing/. Accessed 6 September 2016. Süddeutsche Zeitung. (2016). Hoffnung und Skepsis nach Flüchtlingspakt mit der Türkei [Hope and scepticism about the refugee pact with Turkey]. 19 March. http://www.sueddeutsche.de/news/politik/

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migration-hoffnung-und-skepsis-nach-fluechtlingspakt-mit-der-tuerkei-dpa.urn-newsmldpa-com-20090101-160318-99-264507. Accessed 6 September 2016. Teo, P. (2000). Racism in the news: A critical discourse analysis of news reporting in two Australian newspapers. Discourse Society. doi:10.1177/0957926500011001002. The Guardian. (2016). Hundreds hurt in police clashes at Greece–Macedonia border. 10 April. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/apr/10/clashes-between-migrantsand-police-at-border-between-greece-and-macedonia. Accessed 6 September 2016. The Telegraph. (2016). Refugee crisis: Greek PM accuses Macedonia of ‘shaming’ Europe. 11 April. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/04/11/greek-officials-condemnmacedonians-for-use-of-force-after-300-r/. Accessed 6 September 2016. To vima. (2016a). Human Rights Watch criticizes refugee hotspots in Greece. 20 May. http://www.tovima.gr/en/article/?aid=801071. Accessed 6 September 2016. To vima. (2016b). Pavlopoulos: ‘FYROM has no place in the EU and NATO’. 11 April. http://www.tovima.gr/en/article/?aid=791576. Accessed 6 September 2016. To vima. (2016c). Synthikes favelas me xiliades prosfyges se Peiraia kai Idomeni. [Favela-like conditions for thousands of refugees in Piraeus and Idomeni]. 11 May. http://www.tovima.gr/society/article/?aid=798368&wordsinarticle=%CF%86%CE%B1% CE%B2%CE%AD%CE%BB%CE%B1%3b%CE%B5%CE%B9%CE%B4%CE%BF%C E%BC%CE%AD%CE%BD%CE%B7. Accessed 6 September 2016. Van Dijk, T. A. (2000). New(s) racism: A discourse analytical approach. In S. Cottle (ed.), Ethnic minorities and the media (pp. 33–49). Buckingham: Open University Press. Stergios Fotopoulos is currently a Ph.D. student at the Vrije Universiteit Brussels, writing about the prospect of a European public sphere. He graduated in media and communication from the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, and holds a master’s degree in European studies from the KUL and a master’s degree in communication from the Vrije Universiteit Brussels.

Margarita Kaimaklioti studied political science at the University of Cyprus and holds a master’s in European politics and policies from the KUL. In the past, she has worked in the European People’s Party Secretariat as assistant to the spokesman and is currently a parliamentary assistant in the European Parliament, while studying philosophy at the KUL.

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European View DOI 10.1007/s12290-016-0422-6

ARTICLE

The Visegrád Group in the EU: 2016 as a turning‑point? Milan Nič 

© The Author(s) 2016. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com

Abstract  The past year has witnessed a major shift in the relationships between the four Central European countries that make up the Visegrád Group. In matters related to migration, the members of the alliance have worked together in Brussels as a cohesive bloc throughout 2016. But in the wake of Brexit, simmering internal divisions have arisen within this regional alliance over the EU’s future. The Visegrád Group acts as an amplifier, an ad hoc coalition, reinforcing regional positions where they exist. Its diplomatic infrastructure and other structural factors are here to stay, but the key drivers of its stances are now domestic politics and the role of the countries’ leaders. In the absence of a shared vision for the future of Europe and the role of EU institutions, the honeymoon period seems to be over. A ‘conservative revolution’ in Poland has created an illiberal axis with Hungary, where a sovereigntist narrative holds sway, while the Czech and Slovak governments have maintained a more pragmatic line on the EU. The new risk is that reinventing the EU will come at the expense of (divided) Central Europeans. Keywords  EU | Visegrád | V4 | Central Europe | Regional cooperation | Brussels | Diplomacy | Migration | Geopolitics M. Nicˇ (*)  GLOBSEC Policy Institute, Klariská 14, 811 03 Bratislava, Slovakia e-mail: [email protected]

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Introduction In the history of the Visegrád Group (V4) and its influence within the EU, the year 2016 will be seen as a turning point. This informal Central European alliance—which includes the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia—entered the year on a high. Amidst deep divisions between the member states on how Europe should approach the refugee and migration crisis, the V4 was able to defend its line of strongly opposing mandatory relocations. Eventually, once the EU–Turkey deal and other measures had achieved a dramatic drop in the flow of migrants, the V4 was able to leave its stamp on the new EU policy approach to the crisis: the roadmap agreed at the Bratislava Summit on 16 September places emphasis on the protection of external borders and promotes the concept of ‘flexible solidarity’. And yet, the V4 will not end this year in a celebratory mood. The new reality is an internal split over the future shape of the Union itself. From a distance, all four governments are considered to be Eurosceptic and proponents of a weak EU with strong member states. On closer inspection, however, there is a growing divergence between this ‘sovereigntist narrative’ promoted by Budapest and Warsaw, and the moderate ‘pragmatic line’ pursued by Bratislava and Prague. So what is this mysterious Visegrád Group? What drove it to be so organised during the migration crisis? And what can one expect from Central Europeans at a time of existential crisis for the EU?

Bad image, not substance The high profile of the V4 on the refugee and migration crisis from mid-2015 has earned it more coverage than ever before in the 25 years of its existence. Yet most of this coverage was predominantly negative, as furious politicians and public opinion in Western Europe continued to remind the Visegrád countries of their lack of solidarity and burdensharing on refugee issues. ‘The migration crisis has given an unsettling new direction to an old alliance’, remarked The Economist in January 2016 under the catchy headline ‘Big, bad Visegrád’. ‘What do you want to do about the negative image of Visegrád?’ was the question asked of the foreign ministers of all four members of the V4 as they met in Prague in February to mark the twenty-fifth anniversary of the V4’s founding. Their responses were defensive, and in the case of the Hungarian and Polish ministers, also confrontational. Hungary’s Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó claimed that heavy criticism of the V4 by its EU partners was a sign of its increasing relevance, and would, in the end, encourage the V4 governments to close ranks even more. His Polish counterpart Witold Waszczykowski dismissed concerns about the future cuts in cohesion funds from Germany and other Western European net payers as totally overblown. For Slovakia’s Foreign Minister Miroslav Lajcˇ ák it was a shock to be treated as a ‘younger brother’ by many of his Western European counterparts during the migration crisis. At the same time, Lajcˇ ák was concerned that the wedge between the EU’s East and West

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was becoming too large. As the host of the meeting, Czech Foreign Minister Lubomír Zaorálek was the last to speak, and tried to offer a moderate voice: both the EU and the V4 share a common fate, and neither can succeed without the other. This image problem will stick with the V4 into the future. We should be under no illusion—Central Europeans are not the only ones that have problems with solidarity or continue to meet as a regional club in the fractured EU. Look at the Nordic Council, the six founding members, the Franco–German alliance or even the loose Mediterranean club. Coordinating in small groups now seems to be the name of the game: it can be effective, and is sometimes even necessary within the complex EU system. It can also have a positive outcome for the Union as a whole. At the same time, the Nordic or Benelux countries are not lumped together conceptually if one or more of them does something unworthy of the spirit of European solidarity.

A bit of history The regional cooperation of the V4 was born shortly after the collapse of Communism, under the leadership of former dissidents turned politicians. The presidents of Czechoslovakia and Poland, Václav Havel and Lech Wałe˛sa, met in February 1991 in the scenic little town of Visegrád with Hungarian Prime Minister József Antall. The place was chosen to create a historical link with the meeting of the Central European kings there in 1335 to settle their neighbourly disputes and regional rivalries, and to create new commercial routes that bypassed Vienna. This time the common goal was to try to distance their countries from Russia and the geopolitical legacy of Soviet dominance. As Rupnik (2016, 58) reminds us, the V4 was ‘forged with democratic ideals, aspirations and leadership… It also represented a strong opposition to nationalism… in the region. And thirdly, there was a European dimension—the common goal was to join Europe, to create a new Central Europe while simultaneously integrating it with the broader European project’. In a quarter of a century, the V4 has developed as both a consequence and a source of historically unprecedented stability in Central Europe. Initially it struggled to find a new purpose once all four countries had become full members of the EU and NATO. After 2004, common interests became less obvious as the V4’s governments saw greater benefit in setting their policy preferences and alliances individually. Over time, however, similarities among the V4 countries in terms of economic profile, geography and history have led to a greater awareness of how their intra-EU interests tend to overlap.

How does the V4 operate? The V4 operates as a diplomatic framework for regional intergovernmental cooperation, without its own institutions or formal structures. Thus the V4 often acts as an amplifier,

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an ad hoc coalition, to reinforce regional positions where they exist and bring them together through an established set of procedures: the rotating one-year presidency and regular high-level meetings at the presidential, prime ministerial and ministerial levels, often down to the expert level of the directors of departments. The only permanent institution in the V4 is the International Visegrád Fund which promotes joint projects and networks among civil society and other non-state actors in the four countries. In recent years, the V4 has developed into a multi-layered regional cooperation scheme among various branches of government, complemented by a dense web of connections between stakeholders in the private and non-governmental sectors. What is underestimated by outsiders is the high level of socialisation among the V4 state officials and experts. Phone calls to their Visegrád counterparts are often the first they make when they need to consult on EU policy issues. Yet a lot still depends on mutual interests, functional synergies and even on personal chemistry at the highest level. ‘Some would like to see the Visegrád countries pursuing convergent or even identical policies within the EU. They seem to be surprised that, in reality, their national interests differ. The Czech, Hungarian, Slovak, and Polish governments often do not seek optimal results through cooperation, but compete for resources, attention or prestige’, acknowledged Schneider (2015, 1). As former Czech first deputy foreign minister, Schneider also outlines reasons why the V4 format can bring added value to Central Europeans on the EU level: ‘[A]mplifying each nation’s voice through cooperation is the most effective way to gain attention and influence in Brussels… the V4 potentially strengthens the leverage of Central European states in coalition building within the EU’ (Schneider 2015, 1).

Previous tensions and divisions Over time, the regional alliance has developed a sense of diplomatic flexibility and the ‘art of disagreeing’, so that when countries do not share the same opinions, it does not mean an end to the cooperation in that policy area, or that the disagreement spills over into other areas. There have been periods of ‘passive Visegrád’ as one country or another has become an outlier, or as members of the group have been riven by mutual tensions. The most frequent V4 outlier is Poland: due to its size and relevance in European politics, it has always had more opportunities to join other coalitions and alliances, such as the Weimar Triangle, or to ally itself with the Baltic countries or Scandinavia. Another flashpoint in regional cooperation has been Slovak–Hungarian relations: there were diplomatic spats over the 2009 language law amendment in Bratislava, followed by controversies over the nationalist agenda in Budapest when Orbán’s Fidesz came to power in 2010. The internal flexibility of the group was tested to the limit by deep divisions at the outset of the Ukrainian crisis in 2014. The positions taken range from Poland’s strong antiRussia stance to Hungary’s privileged partnership with Moscow, with the Czechs and

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Slovaks standing somewhere in between. At the time, many observers predicted that new geopolitical fault lines in the region over Russia would splinter the V4 ‘to the point of irrelevance’ (Lucas 2014). To some extent this was true, as within NATO Poland organised a wider coalition of countries on the Eastern flank, including Romania and the Baltic countries. The unwavering anti-Russian position of the Polish government was clear. The other three V4 governments, however, were very reluctant to agree on EU sanctions against Russia. In parallel, the focus of the V4’s cooperation shifted to the EU agenda. A new window of opportunity was opening up, with a less Eurosceptic and more constructive approach to Europe in Prague under the new centre–left government of Bohuslav Sobotka, which came to power in early 2014.

A better‑organised bloc in Brussels The strengthening of the V4’s cooperation on key EU issues can be traced back to the 2009–11 period. An important catalyst was the 2009 gas crisis and subsequent coordination on energy, which helped the Group to use EU funding and the EU Commission’s regulatory framework to build interconnectors and other missing infrastructure, and also to challenge Russia’s Gazprom as the monopolistic gas supplier. In addition, the V4’s cooperation on the EU agenda was strengthened by the learning experiences of the Czech (2009), Hungarian (2011) and Polish (2011) EU presidencies. Gradually, Visegrád governments were becoming policy-shapers rather than policy-recipients on cohesion, the single market, energy, enlargement, the Eastern Partnership and other EU policy areas. Clear signs of the V4 maximising its clout by working and voting together in Brussels were already apparent in 2014, such as in the appointment of Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk as the president of the European Council. Another example was the balanced compromise made over the EU’s climate package deal in October 2014 for the Paris global climate conference. Rather than blocking the whole deal, the V4 plus other supporters, such as Romania and Bulgaria, presented a common set of demands for the final deal. Benefiting from the requirement to find a unanimous consensus among all member states, the Central Europeans engaged in detailed technocratic negotiations with the EU Commission and powerful members, and ultimately managed to secure better conditions for the future emission reduction targets for their industries. At the time Slovakia was holding the rotating V4 presidency, and its permanent representative to the EU Ivan Korcˇok was quoted by the Financial Times as calling it ‘a realisation moment. It became so obvious to us all that this group was a tangible and effective way of achieving something… It was like when a small child learns how to first ride a bicycle. Now there is high confidence among the members that we can continue to fight and win EU battles’ (Foy 2014).

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A survey of V4 policymakers prior to the migration crisis This high confidence was also reflected in attitudes among policymakers at home. In June 2015, just before the flow of refugees and migrants into Europe dramatically increased, a consortium of four think tanks conducted a unique regional survey of foreign policy trends. Data was collected from over 400 foreign policy experts and practitioners in all V4 countries. The results indicated several interesting trends. First, there was a high expectation that the V4 would remain a cohesive bloc on the EU level for some time. Perceptions of priorities on the national and the EU levels overlapped a lot, including on migration and energy issues. Also, bilateral relations within the V4 were perceived as excellent—which has not always been the case. Second, the survey showed that on the future of EU integration, the V4 countries’ expectations were divergent and fragmented. Polish and Czech experts expected more differentiated (multi-speed) integration, the Slovaks supported deeper integration of the euro area, and the Hungarians thought that the larger member states would increasingly dominate the institution. These results offer a warning that if fundamental questions about Europe’s future arise, the V4 is no longer likely to act as a coherent bloc (Nicˇ and Dostál 2016).

Diverging views on Europe’s future As the migration crisis settled down and the Brexit vote in the UK on 23 June 2016 accelerated the EU reform debate, the simmering divisions among the national views of the V4 came to the surface. In the run-up to the Bratislava Summit on 16 September, the V4 prime ministers met three times. The ambition of the Polish V4 presidency, as announced by Prime Minister Beata Szydło, was to table substantial proposals at the summit that would address sensitive issues regarding the functioning of the EU: the institutional balance in Brussels, relations between the EU institutions and the member states, and the EU’s political agenda. In the preparatory stages, however, an offensive approach towards EU institutions presented by Budapest and Warsaw generated a lot of concern in the two other national capitals. Prague and Bratislava did not want to support any radical moves that would create more discord and confrontation among EU leaders at the Bratislava Summit. Such a course of action would also go against the interests of the Slovak EU presidency, which as the host of the summit, had hoped to secure an agreement among the EU leaders on general principles for the post-Brexit EU. In the end, the V4 managed to achieve concessions from its EU partners on migration policy. The Bratislava roadmap adopted the concept of ‘flexible solidarity’, which enables EU member states to decide, on a voluntary basis, on specific forms of contribution to the EU response, taking into account their experience and potential. Now it is up to

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the V4 countries to fill out the concept of ‘flexible solidarity’ with content and practical deliverables, so that it does not become an excuse for solidarity ‘a la carte’ and opt-outs from common EU migration policy in the future. At their final press conferences after the Bratislava Summit, the V4 leaders again offered contrasting assessments of what had been achieved. Most notably, Hungary’s Prime Minister Orbán blasted the summit as a failure, while Slovakia’s Prime Minister Fico declared that it was ‘exceptionally successful’. So what is going on in the V4 and between its four countries? Although the regional group continues to meet and to coordinate in Brussels on a regular basis, there has recently been more creeping tension and discord. Several factors are now pulling the V4 in different directions, and some of them are long term and structural. First, Poland has experienced a conservative revolution under Law and Justice’s oneparty government, with fast, far-reaching changes being made to domestic and foreign policy. Controversial changes to the Constitutional Tribunal led to the European Commission’s decision to place Poland in a structured dialogue and under monitoring—the first time the relatively new Rule of Law framework (introduced in 2014 due to general concern about democratic backsliding in Hungary) has been triggered against a member state. The procedure could still progress to the next stage, potentially leading to the launch of sanctions under Article 7 of the Lisbon Treaty—a long-dormant law that could ultimately lead to the suspension of voting rights for the targeted member state. At the time of writing, there was no sign of willingness on the side of the Polish government to search for compromises and a successful resolution of the case. This is a sign of the rapid decline of Poland’s influence in Brussels. This carries several risks for the V4’s cooperation: with Poland now in charge of the V4 rotating presidency, its agenda could be hijacked by Warsaw’s quarrel with EU institutions. Even more relevant is the fact that to hold sway as a powerful regional bloc in Brussels, the V4 has thus far to a large extent relied on Warsaw. It is fair to note that Poland’s position in debates about the post-Brexit EU is still evolving. In a mixture of pragmatism and ideology, two chief factors seem to be the personal inclinations of Jarosław Kaczyn´ski, the country’s leader in practice if not in title (formally he is just the chair of the ruling party), and the future evolution of the domestic political context (Buras 2016, 1). There are some important overlaps between Orbán’s vision and the conservative nationalist ideology of Law and Justice. The Polish ruling party believes that a polycentric Europe exists in which the periphery needs to balance the dominance of the Franco–German core. In order to elevate its peripheral and subordinated position in relation to ‘core Europe’, Warsaw is seeking allies in Central and Eastern Europe (and before Brexit also in the Eurosceptic UK) with which it wishes to construct a regional coalition to counter the Western European vision of further EU integration (Dostál 2016, 4). However, it is not clear who in the region would be interested, except Hungary.

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Second, Hungary’s controversial referendum against a mandatory EU quota on refugees on 2 October was another step forward for the ‘cultural counter-revolution’. In spite of an insufficient turnout to be valid, Prime Minister Orbán used the vote as an argument (with 98% of those who took part supporting the government’s call to reject the outdated EU plan) to propose constitutional amendments that included a claim that the nationstate should be the basis for EU decisions, not vice versa. Orbán actively supported the UK to stay in the EU but now he sees the post-Brexit period as a fantastic opportunity to overhaul institutions in Brussels and to move towards a less integrated Europe with stronger nation-states. In a weakening, fragmented EU with cohesion funding running out after 2020 (when the current budget period is over) Hungary could boost its relative position in Europe and vis-à-vis Germany by forming regional blocs with strong national and religious identities. Both conservative governments, Budapest as well as Warsaw, are now trying to massage the V4 into a regional platform that supports their ideas. Third, the centre–left governments in Prague and Bratislava are broader three-party coalitions, and their Social Democratic prime ministers do not want to be part of a conservative counter-revolution against the EU institutions. Although Fico may have personal affinities with some aspects of Orbán’s line, he moderated his anti-migrant rhetoric after the March elections as Slovakia took over the EU presidency. In addition, Fico’s political power at home is not so absolutely dominating as that of Orbán or Kaczyn´ski. Furthermore, both Fico and Sobótka, who is considered a weak prime minister even by Czech standards, have to deal with strong opponents in the form of the presidents of their countries (the liberal Andrej Kiska in Slovakia, and the populist Social Democrat Miloš Zeman in the Czech Republic). That said, a plurality of key decision-makers in both Prague and Bratislava have so far tended to agree on two things—first, on recognising Germany’s centrality in any future EU configuration, and second, on not sharing Polish or Hungarian concerns about this. On the contrary, they do not want to be part of any entrenched, consistent alliance against Berlin or Chancellor Angela Merkel (no matter how much they may criticise her refugee policy). The fundamentals of European policy in the respective V4 countries are now diverging. The Czech Republic has always valued its relationship with neighbouring Germany as more important than that with any of its Visegrád allies. Likewise Slovakia is part of the eurozone, making it more integrated with Germany and core Europe than the other V4 countries, and even ready to move further ahead with more fiscal integration. However, in a V4 alliance dominated by the larger and better coordinated ‘illiberal tandem’ led by two strong populist leaders, the Czech and Slovak space to manoeuvre will be limited. As one Czech official has recently described the situation, Visegrád has become a toxic brand, and all they can do is send messages to the West and attempt damage limitation (Foy and Byrne 2016). This has been quietly celebrated by many EU partners as a good thing. Yet it also carries new risks and uncertainty—this time from the opposite direction: a lack of

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engagement from Central Europeans in reconstructing the Union could be a negative factor, contributing to more disintegration (Krastev 2016).

Conclusion While divisions within the V4 will make it more constrained and narrow-minded, there is no reason to think that the alliance will go away. On EU issues in which their interests converge—such as safeguarding the free movement of labour, completing the single market or migration—the V4 will continue to throw its weight around. If more flexibility is applied to the EU project, movements favouring integration could gain momentum after the French presidential and German parliamentary elections in 2017. Berlin and Paris should try to engage Central Europeans in constructing a flexible Union to the extent and within the layers that each country is prepared to consider. As the push for opt-outs is increasing, more opt-ins could be introduced: this would pull the Warsaw–Budapest axis in the opposite direction to Bratislava, with Prague caught somewhere in the middle as it approaches its own parliamentary elections in late 2017. The post-Brexit EU will continue to become more and more differentiated, and the same development is very likely to occur in Central Europe. However, as the regional voice is going to be increasingly marginalised in this process, the reinvention of the EU could move forward at the expense of Central Europeans. In this respect, Donald Tusk, the Polish president of the European Council, has an important role to play in keeping the region connected to the EU project even as some countries ostentatiously keep their distance from Brussels. Ultimately, this is about the Western anchor and European orientation of not only the Visegrád alliance, but the whole of Central Europe. Open Access  This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits any use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author(s) and the source are credited.

References Buras, P. (2016). View from Warsaw: The Polish riddle. European Council on Foreign Relations, 15 September. http://www.ecfr.eu/article/commentary_view_from_warsaw_ the_polish_riddle7114. Accessed 5 October 2016. Dostál, V. (2016). Understanding new Polish intermarium: Trap or triumph for the Visegrád Group? Association for International Affairs. Prague, June. http://www.amo.cz/wpcontent/uploads/2016/06/amocz_PP_03_2016_web.pdf. Accessed 5 October 2016.

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Foy, H. (2014). EU’s eastern members plot joint raid on €315bn Juncker fund. Financial Times, 8 December. https://www.ft.com/content/70e1089a-7ba9-11e4-b6ab00144feabdc0. Accessed 5 October 2016. Foy, H., & Byrne, A. (2016). Splits over EU test relations between Visegrád Four. Financial Times, 6 October. https://www.ft.com/content/f5d017f8-84b2-11e6-88972359a58ac7a5. Accessed 6 October 2016. Krastev, I. (2016). Pessimists hold the key to Europe’s future. Financial Times, 24 August. https://www.ft.com/content/1b4179ba-4aa1-11e6-8d68-72e9211e86ab. Accessed 6 October 2016. Lucas, E. (2014). Grappling with irrelevance? Politico EU, 3 July 2014. http://www. politico.eu/article/grappling-with-irrelevance/. Accessed 2 December 2016. Nicˇ, M., & Dostál, V. (2016). Central Europe’s outlook on the EU and foreign policy. Strategic Europe blog, Carnegie Europe, 8 January. http://carnegieeurope.eu/ strategiceurope/?fa=62423. Accessed 5 October 2016. Rupnik, J. (2016). What is alive and what is dead in the Visegrád project. Visegrád Insight, 1, 58–60. Schneider, J. (2015). What future for Visegrád cooperation? GLOBSEC Policy Paper. Bratislava, May. http://www.globsec.org/upload/documents/policy-paper-1/globsec-pp3-b.pdf. Accessed 5 October 2016. The Economist. (2016). Big, bad Visegrád. 30 January. http://www.economist.com/ news/europe/21689629-migration-crisis-has-given-unsettling-new-direction-old-alliance-big-bad-Visegrád. Accessed 5 October 2016. Milan Nicˇ is head of the Europe programme at the GLOBSEC Policy Institute in Bratislava. He has previously been adviser to the Slovak deputy foreign minister and to the EU special representative in Bosnia and Herzegovina. His expertise includes EU foreign and security policy, NATO, populism in Central Europe, enlargement and the Western Balkans.

European View DOI 10.1007/s12290-016-0425-3

ARTICLE

The impact of demographic developments in Africa on Europe Ruth Gursch‑Adam · Lívia Benková 

© The Author(s) 2016. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com

Abstract  This article looks at the causes and impact of a range of current events related to migration, examining them from the perspective of present-day demographic trends in Africa and the Middle East. The quest for decent prospects in life acts as the incitement and rationale behind the push–pull factors which underlie the movements of people from these parts of the world. The article sheds light on the extraordinary nature of modern migration, which is creating pressure on policymakers to ensure appropriate policy and economic resolutions are formulated, as well as providing answers to how the formation of trenches between nations and nationalities occurs, which stems from collective identity discourses. By applying a structural and socio-economic featurefocused approach to explaining the migration process, the article highlights the impact of socio-psychological mechanisms on shared decision-making processes, and aims to build an improved and broader conceptual understanding of the ongoing demographic shifts. R. Gursch‑Adam (*)  Federal Ministry for Europe, Integration and Foreign Affairs, Minoritenplatz 8, 1010 Vienna, Austria e-mail: ruth.gursch‑[email protected] L. Benková (*) 

Austrian Institute for European and Security Policy, Tivoligasse 73a, 1120 Vienna, Austria e-mail: [email protected]

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Keywords  Africa | Migration | Europe | Refugees | Demographic development | Measures

Introduction Demographic shifts have existed since ancient times as an integral and collective component of civilisation on the African continent. The leading causes of these shifts were environmental and meteorological conditions, which matched the human and animal requirements of the former tribal and nomadic societies. These shifts were also guided by subjective views that interpreted the underlying ‘realities’ and were inspired to a certain degree by communal group interests in the respective geographic locations, that is, tribal claims over water resources, territory or agricultural areas. In modern history, large movements in populaces continue to occur, transferring a complex combination of economic and political issues from the countries of origin into the countries of destination. The unprecedented developments in terms of recent migration movements have provoked a multitude of challenges. The lack of conceptual clarity among European policymakers to find sustainable solutions, and the lack of political will and cooperation to achieve suitable ‘crisis management’ at hot spots and in countries of entry into Europe, are contributing to the proliferation of unexpected economic and social collisions in modern societies and are hampering the creation of meaningful tailored solutions.

General observations on demographic developments in Africa Demographic shifts in Africa in the recent past can be linked to fast-paced globalisation, violence, armed conflict and crises. In recent years these factors have had an increased impact on changes in population density and can also be linked to changes in birth and death rates, economic decline and migration. In order to produce reliable demographic projections in Africa, national census figures and health and demographic surveys— which provide fertility, mortality and migration data—are taken into account, along with historical data on births, deaths and migration. Using this data, population estimates are calculated for every country in Africa and the estimates are then aggregated for the continent. It is important to note that census figures for many African countries are not accurate. In some instances, current population estimates are based on old census data and are little more than projections themselves. Migration is the single most difficult component of population change to measure reliably, according to the UN (2013). The primary reasons for demographic change in Africa are substantive disruptions of the peace and a lack of adaptable economic measures and provisions, both of which create a perpetual inability to cover essential needs and support livelihoods. Consequently people are forced to leave their home countries for both safety reasons and to achieve their aspirations for a decent life. People who are forced out of their original countries create pressure on the social and economic systems in the receiving countries, not only at the time of their arrival through initial high numbers in a certain area,

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but also in the generations to come, as ultimately their children and grandchildren swell the base population to several times its original size. Finally clichés, information received through communication and media channels, and unrealistic promises of a better life at the other end of the journey in countries such as Germany, Sweden, Austria and the UK, become ‘pull’ factors for people who have been pushed out of their countries of origin by terror, war and human rights abuses. The worldwide almost instant and unlimited access to the communication technology network and a steady development of cheaper and faster transport facilities, allow for better mobility in remote areas and less developed countries on the globe. Particularly in Africa, the resulting developments were seen in an increasing use of mobile devices during the past decade. The global media dissemination of high-standard life perspectives in countries where peace, social stability and security seem to be a granted criterion in everyday life, provide people with a ray of hope for a better life and an incentive for people to migrate to Europe. The confusion regarding how to face the additional problems in Europe connected with the influx of migrants is highlighted by the way in which European leaders are grasping for uncoordinated solutions, as well as the lack of consensus about how to share the burdens amongst all EU member states. According to Eurostat, the highest number of first-time asylum applicants in the second quarter of 2016 was registered in Germany (with more than 186,700 first-time applicants, or 61% of total applicants in the EU member states), followed by Italy (27,000, or 9%), France (17,800, or 6%), Hungary (14,900, or 5%) and Greece (12,000, or 4%). These five member states together account for 85% of all first-time applicants in the EU28 (Eurostat 2016a, b).

Impact and consequences of migration flows on Europe The armed conflicts in the Gulf and the Middle East have added considerably to the migrant flows coming from the African continent as the result of pre-existing conflicts, and hardship (i.e. in Nigeria, Somalia and Sudan) has exacerbated the situation. Thus both these factors have contributed to the demographic changes in Europe. Europe is confronted with a mixed-migration flow, comprising economic migrants as well as asylum seekers (Park 2015). In 2014, EU member states received about 650,000 asylum applications, followed by over 1,015,078 migrant arrivals in 2015 (Park 2015). In 2015 the highest number of first-time asylum applications was in Germany (497,110), Hungary (202,330) and Sweden (175,490) (Eurostat 2016a). In 2016, Europe received over 262,935 arrivals by sea, mainly from Nigeria (5%), Eritrea (4%), Gambia (3%), Côte d’Ivoire (3%) and Guinea (2%) (UN High Commissioner for Refugees 2016, for main migratory routes into the EU, see Figure 1). During the first few months of 2016, the highest number of first-time applicants was registered in Germany, with almost 175,000

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Figure 1  The main migration routes into Europe.

first-time applicants, followed by Italy (22,300, or 8%), France (18,000, or 6%), Austria (13,900, or 5%) and the UK (10,100, or 4%) (Eurostat 2016b).

Migrants from Africa as a possible solution for the ageing labour force in Europe Demographic pressures, such as those caused by the ageing labour force in Europe, increasing critical labour shortages and deficits of skilled workers in developed countries, have resulted in the growth of mixed migration, both regular and irregular. The migration crisis presents a big challenge for Europe and is steering discussions among the member states on the issue of demographic pressure as the result of the ageing European society, concerns over national identity and migrant integration, and questions regarding the economic impact of migration on the member states, as well as the importance of finding a common asylum policy and sufficiently managing the external borders of the EU. Europe is facing the worrying demographic trend of an ageing and shrinking population. The EU’s total fertility rate is not much more than 1.5 children per woman. According to The 2015 Ageing Report of the European Commission, the population of the EU member states will reach 523 million in 2060, with the working-age

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population (15–64 years old) falling to just 202 million (European Commission 2015c). As the EU’s working-age population will decrease by 17.5 million (European Commission 2015a) in the next decade, there will be a high dependency ratio, most probably resulting in reduced pension and welfare systems and a scarcity of labour by 2035 (International Migration Institute and University of Oxford 2011). Germany, for example, having the oldest population of all countries in Europe, is facing increased labour demands, as jobs in the country are being created so fast that the native society is unable to fill them. In the long term, migration could significantly contribute to maintaining the sustainability of the welfare system and ensuring the sustainable growth of the EU economy by filling niches in both the fast-growing and the declining sectors of the economy. Thus incoming educated migrants are assets with regard to the future European labour market (European Parliament 2015). To a large extent the future of economic growth in the EU will depend on whether young migrants arriving in Europe possess the skills needed to contribute to the efficiency of European labour markets compared to the native population. More highly educated migrants could affect the labour market outcomes for native workers as they could have an adverse effect on the wage and employment levels of existing workers and affect the labour supply. An increase in the population could also increase the demand for goods and services and thus affect aggregate demand (Aiyar et al. 2016a). The level of education and the labour status of the migrants in their countries of origin is often a decisive factor when seeking further employment in the European labour market. However, even highly skilled migrants often face discrimination, as a large number of migrants with higher education qualifications experience professional downgrading after entering the European labour market; this is the result of a lack of recognition of qualifications from third countries and the poor transferability of professional experience (European Research Area 2013). Less-educated low-skilled migrant workers may increase pressure on public services such as health care, housing and education systems, and this poses a risk of depression in public wages and increased unemployment (Ellyatt 2015). Low-skilled migrants are willing to work for lower wages than native workers and thus this puts downward pressure on wages, temporarily lowering the wages of incumbents and reducing the capital–labour ratio. Such migrants also create a less favourable net fiscal position because as households they contribute less in taxes and social security (Dadush 2014).

Migration steers political divisions across Europe Europe is currently experiencing political divisions on the issue of migration, with the conflicting views of member states, driven by economic, social and cultural divergences, creating a highly fragmented environment, endangering future European integration. The inflow of refugees is likely to continue for years, if not decades, and therefore Europe has to find a common solution and take coordinated policy action. The Schengen system of open borders lacks the ability to cope with a crisis situation of this scale (Aiyar et al. 2016b). The uneven exposure to the migration crisis has caused diversity in societal attitudes towards migration, with the largely globalised societies of Western and

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Northern Europe open to accepting migrants, while the societies of Central Europe are much less willing to deal with the influx (Lehne 2016). Anti-immigration sentiments are also a rising concern across Europe, with political parties such as the UK Independence Party, Alternative for Germany and France’s National Front enjoying increasing popularity (Ellyatt 2015). Many member countries are hesitant to accept large numbers of migrants from the Middle East and North Africa due to security concerns, which have been heightened by the terrorist attacks in Paris and Brussels. Immigration and terrorism are the two main concerns of the European population. According to the latest Eurobarometer survey conducted in spring 2016, over 48% of respondents cited immigration as one of the two most important issues facing the EU at the moment, with concern about terrorism reaching 39%. Terrorism was cited as one of the most important issues in all member states, with the highest figures in Ireland and Cyprus (50%), Romania (49%), Croatia (48%), Luxembourg (47%), France (39%) and Belgium (35%) (Maurice 2016). Although with rising migration many Europeans express an increased fear of terrorism, there is no evidence-based link between the two phenomena. The lack of agreement on burden sharing regarding migrants has caused many EU member states to consider the reintroduction of internal borders within the EU (Funk and Parkes 2016). In 2015 Germany reinstated border controls, and it was followed by Austria, the Netherlands, Slovakia and Hungary. These actions are impeding the free movement of cross-border EU workers and the exchange of goods, and are endangering the very idea of the Schengen area. The EU is taking several measures to effectively overcome the obstacles and negative effects of the increasing migration crisis. In April 2016 the European Commission adopted a Communication launching the process for a reform of the Common European Asylum System, which would meet the need for options that ensure a fair and sustainable system for allocating asylum applicants among member states (European Commission 2015b). The EU has also launched Common Security and Defence Policy operations in the Mediterranean and strengthened the role of Europol, both with the aim of continuing to dismantle the human trafficking networks. Furthermore, the new concept of hot spots will allow the European Asylum Support Office, Frontex and Europol to work on the ground in the EU member states concerned, providing identification and fingerprint registration in order to maintain a better system of control for arriving migrants (European Commission 2016).

Impact of migration flows on Africa A snapshot of Africa’s population in the UN’s 2015 population review (UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division 2015) shows that by 2015, the continent was home to 1.2 billion people (16% of the earth’s population). It is estimated that by the year 2050, the population will have doubled. The vastness of Africa is best illustrated by the fact that with around 30 million square kilometres of land, Africa takes up one-fifth of the total global land surface.

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A look at the present situation suggests that the European leadership tends to solve the challenges created by African problems by trying to apply tailored European solutions; the same paradigm applies to Arab problems. Europe accepts and adapts to the increased inflow of African skilled labour forces by attempting to rapidly integrate the migrants into European countries, which is intensifying the already critical brain drain in African countries. The creation of temporary accommodation in hot spots in buffer countries such as Turkey or Morocco for those who have been forced out of African countries could prove to be a better solution in social, cultural and economic terms than long-term integration procedures that do not sufficiently consider the difficulties of integrating people from ethnically distant countries, cultures and traditions. Such integration procedures have a tendency to negatively tint assumptions and perceptions. It should be noted that looking for solutions in Europe for African problems seems to cause other unwanted effects, such as radicalisation and the spread of violence and terrorist movements. It also puts additional pressure on governments and societies to handle emigrants’ everyday needs within a very short time frame and leaves experts struggling as volatile developments call for flexibility from state actors in the receiving countries. The visible discomfort reflected in reports of growing criminal offences and terrorist threats among the various European populations is becoming increasingly obvious. European state actors do not seem to have found the necessary spontaneity and flexibility regarding the introduction of additional security measures or specific expert capacity, or in terms of suitable infrastructure. While there is no question that there is a need to protect life and respect human rights, the equal claim across Europe for the protection and respect of the people’s rights in their home countries is getting louder. Unrealistic expectations of the newcomers combined with unwillingness to adopt to European standards can result in increased violence as a means to express frustration. Moreover, such expectations can feed further polarisation and already existing nationalist tendencies, culminating in xenophobic outbursts, radicalisation and hate crimes. We should learn from past events, such as the case of Zimbabwe, when a downturn in development, which started with the land reforms of 1998 and 2000, led to military and police brutality against the citizens, ordered by the Mugabe administration, and forced people out of the country. Zimbabwean men and women immigrated to the US, the UK, Canada, Australia and New Zealand; many also moved to neighbouring countries such as Botswana (Tevera and Crush 2003). According to a January 2014 World Bank report, the number of African migrants doubled between 1980 and 2010, reaching 30.6 million. This represents around 3% of the continent’s total population. Approximately half of these African migrants stay in Africa, with Côte d’Ivoire, South Africa and Burkina Faso as the most popular destinations. However, the number of African migrants who stay in Africa has decreased steadily over time (from 59% in 1980 to 51% in 2010). There is a growing movement of North African migrants to the Middle East as well as to Europe, which is the second most popular destination (Ehrhart et al. 2014).

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Recommendations for proactive measures and options Shifting the focus onto who the most dominant international stakeholders in Africa are, it can be seen that there is a prominent Chinese presence, which has increased over the past two decades, fairly undisturbed by and away from European attention. China plays a significant economic role, with substantial control of the mineral resource market (Alessi and Xu 2015). Based on ample political investment, China has contributed much to enhancing stability and has simultaneously extended its strategic presence (in the area of military security too). Equally, followed by Brazil, India, Israel, and Turkey, the current trend for China is to develop a strategic presence and intensified economic leverage in Africa. The development of the infrastructure in agriculture and mining is bringing employment creation for Africans, and keeping an eye on wage conditions in the labour market can help to prevent workers from looking for better circumstances elsewhere. The development of the market comes with a requirement for investment security and improved political and economic environments. This means in particular that there must be the political will to eliminate corruption and carry out structured political reforms. The development and modernisation of infrastructure requires training, education and capacity building. By inviting international academic institutions and economic stakeholders and manufacturers to the continent to develop tailored programmes in specific areas (e.g. health care or high-end technology), the progressive transfer of knowledge and technology will allow for greater compatibility among and better functionality of services in African countries. The massive numbers of people who have forced entry into Europe through regular and irregular migration clearly show that trying to build solutions here can hardly be of sustainable long-term value for European countries. The unexpectedly large numbers of foreigners are overstretching social welfare due to constraints on the budgetary resources and economic capabilities of individual governments. The basic human needs for acceptable standards of safety and economic prospects, which are the notable push-factors from the African conflict belt, act as pull-factors in the receiving countries of Europe. Destination countries such as Germany, Austria, the UK and Sweden are well known for their sophisticated social welfare systems. These factors attract migrants and encourage even greater flows through the misleading messages being conveyed that the doors are wide open and that the charitable social welfare packages are a ‘free for all’ opportunity.

International economic connectivity to create employment in less conflict‑ridden countries and regions Economic connectivity can serve as a basic method, depending on individual circumstances and needs, to establish temporary accommodation hot spots in buffer countries

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and regions. The groundwork can be prepared through international cooperation that builds political and economic bridges with more stable countries in the Mediterranean region for migrants originating from Arab countries. Here Turkey could serve a pivotal role and gain economic importance as an EU partner country by providing temporary economic arrangements for migrants. This approach could replace the EU’s expensive investment in securing its external borders. Investment incentives aimed at promoting public–private partnerships based on intergovernmental cooperation treaties between European and African countries could build the bridges which bring politics and the economy together. People with African roots from the Horn of Africa and beyond could be settled in more stable countries in the sub-Saharan region. International economic connectivity as a new aspect of development cooperation would bring actors together in a multi-stakeholder approach with financial support from the international donor community. This would serve to promote a viable economic production industry, and create and modernise basic infrastructure, such as transnational road and rail transport corridors and networks. European–African partnership agreements with an increased emphasis on the development of road and rail transport systems across the continent would serve to create employment and to feed into more efficient resource management, with increased benefits for the African population. Attractive and investment-friendly packages for international trade and industrial investors, combined with security for investments, would have a positive impact on the creation of employment. Furthermore, the provision of skilled workers from industrial countries to assist in ‘train the trainers’ programmes, combined with the transfer of modern technology, would boost the abilities of the skilled labour force in the temporary establishments and equip them for realistic employment conditions in competitive labour markets. This particular model reflects the likelihood of people who are forced out of their native countries temporarily acquiring better positions and opportunities and improving their skills. This would prepare them for a return to their countries once conflict has ended and there is a need to rebuild society and destroyed or dysfunctional infrastructure.

Development of trade and industrial productivity through the transfer of expert knowledge, capacity building and training Building economic bridges with the aim of temporarily settling migrants, including refugees, means countries are identified for specific roles (e.g. Morocco for migrants stemming from the Middle East, and Israel, which already hosts refugees from Eritrea) and given substantial political and financial support to serve as buffer and/or transition countries of closer proximity to the particular countries in the region. Directing migrants into such transition countries, which have a simpler way of life and where the more familiar eco-social systems better match their original backgrounds, has the implied advantage of shorter assimilation periods and a much quicker integration time for newcomers. This, in return, means a more rapid turnaround in terms of productivity and earlier economic returns in the new transition countries. At the end of this equation there is the potential for another positive outcome: once the countries of origin have established a

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Figure 2  Migration in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

stable peace and are rebuilding, the chances of encouraging the skilled labour force to move back and rebuild their home countries will be higher as they will be transferring within the region and thereby the risk of an enormous decline in the quality of life will be lower. Their living standards would be boosted by training and employment, and the ultimate goal would be repatriation to their country of origin after the end of the conflict. This measure would prevent further brain drain from the African continent.

Migration in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development For the first time, the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development includes migration in the global development framework and provides countries with comprehensive directions on effective migration governance. UN agencies, such as the International Organization for Migration, elaborate on the specific references made in the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and set them as the basis for their activities. Amongst the various initiatives being developed is the Migration Governance Index, which has been created as a tool to measure the effectiveness of national policies for safe and regular migration as per target 10.7 of the SDGs (see Figure 2). SDG 10.7, in particular, calls on countries to ‘facilitate orderly, safe, and responsible migration and mobility of

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people, including through implementation of planned and well-managed migration policies’ (International Organization for Migration 2016).

Conclusion At the present time more than 85% of refugees and migrants are being hosted in developing countries. This points to a need for the international community to adopt a new and more creative approach. Concerted action is required to create for migrant populations a better social environment in areas less affected by conflict. For decades European policymakers have tried to persuade African governments to introduce democratisation procedures with the hope of creating more stability and reducing the potential for violence and conflict. However this process will take time. In fact, international political interference has not had the desired result and further migration flows from African countries are evidence of this. Africa’s population will double by 2050. Given these dynamic trends and the economic, political and security challenges that African countries have to face, further major migration waves to Europe can be expected, augmented by support for migration from the growing African diasporas. Europe will have to tackle growing migration pressure from Africa, as illustrated in the UN forecasts. All facts considered, the current level of integration in Europe in the areas of freedom of movement, migration and asylum is insufficient, and will hardly allow an effective common response to be made to the further development of the crisis (Lehne 2016). European countries should be more willing to show mutual political will, agree on a common migration management policy and take responsibility for their individual shares of migrants, without arguing over the actual numbers of migrants in Europe. It can be inferred that the current level of global mobility is manageable when dealt with pragmatically, locally and on its own terms. Open Access  This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits any use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author(s) and the source are credited.

References Aiyar, S., Bergljot, B., Nicoletta, B., Helge, B., Enrica, D., Allan, D., Christian, E., Huidan, L., Linda, K., Sebastian, S., Antonio, S., & Petia, T. (2016a). The refugee surge in Europe: Economic challenges. International Monetary Fund. January. http://www.imf. org/external/pubs/ft/sdn/2016/sdn1602.pdf. Accessed 29 August 2016. Aiyar, S., Helge, B., Detragiache, E., & Spilimbergo, A. (2016b). Europe’s refugee surge: Economic and policy implications. Vox.com, 29 February. http://voxeu.org/article/ europe-s-refugee-surge-economic-and-policy-implications. Accessed 2 September 2016. Alessi, C., & Xu, B. (2015). China in Africa. Council on Foreign Relations. http://www. cfr.org/china/china-africa/p9557. Accessed 14 October 2016.

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Dadush, U. (2014). The effect of low-skilled labour migration on the host economy. Global Knowledge Partnership on Migration and Development Working Paper. April. http://www.knomad.org/powerpoints/working_papers/Effect%20of%20Low%20 Skilled%20Labor%20Working%20Paper%201.pdf. Accessed 14 October 2016. Ehrhart, H., Le Goff, M., Rocher, E., & Jan Singh, R. (2014). Does migration foster exports? Evidence from Africa. World Bank Policy Research Working Paper no. 6739. https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/bitstream/handle/10986/16810/WPS6739. pdf?sequence=1. Accessed 14 October 2016. Ellyatt, H. (2015). Four reasons why Europe’s migrant crisis matters. CNBC, 14 September. http://www.cnbc.com/2015/09/14/four-reasons-why-europes-migrant-crisismatters.html. Accessed 30 August 2016. European Commission. (2015a). A European agenda on migration. Communication (2015), 240 final, 13 May. http://ec.europa.eu/dgs/home-affairs/what-we-do/policies/ european-agenda-migration/background-information/docs/communication_on_the_ european_agenda_on_migration_en.pdf. Accessed 10 August 2016. European Commission. (2015b). Common European Asylum System. Last updated 23 June. http://ec.europa.eu/dgs/home-affairs/what-we-do/policies/asylum/index_en.htm. Accessed 17 August 2016. European Commission. (2015c). The 2015 ageing report. March. http://www.cnfp.lu/en/ publications/com-ageingreport2015-assum/index.html. Accessed 17 August 2016. European Commission. (2016). European agenda on migration. Last updated 3 August. http://ec.europa.eu/dgs/home-affairs/what-we-do/policies/european-agenda-migration/ index_en.htm. Accessed 17 August 2016. European Parliament. (2015). Economic challenges and prospects of the refugee influx. December. http://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/BRIE/2015/572809/EPRS_ BRI(2015)572809_EN.pdf. Accessed 26 August 2016. European Research Area. (2013). African migrants at work: Labour market integration in Europe & re-integration of returnees. MAFE Project Policy Briefing no. 4. January. https://ec.europa.eu/research/social-sciences/pdf/policy_briefs/policy-briefsmafe-012013-02_en.pdf. Accessed 14 October 2016. Eurostat. (2016a). Asylum in the EU member states. Number of first time asylum seekers down to fewer than 290 000 in the first quarter of 2016. 16 June. http://ec.europa. eu/eurostat/documents/2995521/7494855/3-16062016-BP-EN.pdf/4ff50bf8-82fc-4af09907-9c8546feb130. Accessed 25 August 2016. Eurostat. (2016b). Asylum quarterly report 2016. March. http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/ documents/6049358/7005580/Asylum+quarterly+report+-+Q4+2015.pdf/7c7307b1a816-439b-a7d9-2d15e6e22e82. Accessed 10 August 2016.

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Frontex. (2016). Migratory routes map. http://frontex.europa.eu/trends-and-routes/ migratory-routes-map/. Accessed 17 August 2016. Funk, M., & Parkes, R. (2016). Refugees versus terrorists. The European Union Institute for Security Studies. June. http://www.iss.europa.eu/uploads/media/Alert_6_Refugees_versus_terrorists.pdf. Accessed 1 September 2016. International Migration Institute & University of Oxford. (2011). Exploring the future of migration in Europe. IMI Policy Briefing no. 8. July. https://www.imi.ox.ac.uk/publications/pb-08-11. Accessed 14 August 2016. International Organization for Migration. (2016). 2030 agenda for sustainable development. https://unmissionny.iom.int/2030-agenda-sustainable-development. Accessed 16 October 2016. Lehne, S. (2016). How the refugee crisis will reshape the EU. Carnegie Europe, 6 February. http://carnegieeurope.eu/2016/02/04/how-refugee-crisis-will-reshape-eu/itj7. Accessed 22 August 2016. Maurice, E. (2016). Terrorism and migration top EU public’s concern. Euobserver.com, 29 July. https://euobserver.com/social/134534. Accessed 9 August 2016. Park, J. (2015). Europe’s migration crisis. Council on Foreign Relations, 23 September. http://www.cfr.org/refugees-and-the-displaced/europes-migration-crisis/p32874. Accessed 18 August 2016. Tevera, D. S., & Crush, J. (2003). The new brain drain from Zimbabwe. Southern African Migration Project, Migration Policy Series no. 29. Cape Town. http://www.queensu. ca/samp/sampresources/samppublications/policyseries/Acrobat29.pdf. Accessed 16 October 2016. UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division. (2013). Global migration: Demographic aspects and its relevance for development. Technical Paper no. 2013/6. New York. http://www.un.org/esa/population/migration/documents/EGM. Skeldon_17.12.2013.pdf. Accessed 24 August 2016. UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division. (2015). World population prospects, the 2015 revision. Key findings and advance tables. New York. https://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Publications/Files/Key_Findings_WPP_2015.pdf. Accessed 24 August 2016. UN High Commissioner for Refugees. (2016). Refugees/migrants emergency response—Mediterranean. http://data.unhcr.org/mediterranean/regional.php. Accessed 19 August 2016.

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Ruth Gursch‑Adam has gained her expertise on Africa during two decades of service in Africa with the Austrian Ministry for Europe, Integration and Foreign Affairs. She still spends part of her time in Zimbabwe. She studied international politics at the University of South Africa in Pretoria and holds a master’s degree in international relations from the Donau University in Krems (Austria).

Lívia Benková is a research fellow at the Austrian Institute for European and Security Policy in Vienna. She obtained her doctorate in law at the PanEuropean University in Bratislava and holds a master’s degree in European studies.

European View DOI 10.1007/s12290-016-0410-x

ARTICLE

Consolidating pluralism under the terrorist threat: the Tunisian case and the Algerian experience Dario Cristiani  © The Author(s) 2016. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com

Abstract As Tunisia continues to move forward on the path of democratisation and pluralism, the problems it may still face remain significant. A comparative analysis of the (failed) Algerian attempt to democratise and the current process underway in Tunisia could shed light on what Tunisia needs to do to avoid a setback in its democratisation process. Keywords  Tunisia | Algeria | Arab Spring | Democratisation | Terrorism | State

Introduction Tunisia is, in every way, the front-runner among the Arab Spring countries and the only country in which the Arab Spring has produced a real, democratic transformation. The country has moved from having an autocratic government to a more plural and open

D. Cristiani (*)  Vesalius College, Pleinlaan 2, 1050 Brussels, Belgium e-mail: [email protected]

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system, in which elections are free and fair, and losers accept the results without contesting the legitimacy of the overall system. Despite these positive developments, Tunisia is now facing a number of old and new problems, from regional dualism to terrorism, and from the spread of radicalism to economic problems. These issues may undermine its path towards democratic and pluralistic consolidation. To understand what Tunisia must avoid to save its democratic achievements, it is worth looking at the experience of another country in the Maghreb region, where the opening up of the political system turned into a bloody civil war which has prevented the country from consolidating its democratic and pluralistic opening: Algeria. Algeria and Tunisia are two very different countries in terms of demographic size, political and social systems, geopolitical orientations, colonial histories and economic structures. Nevertheless, analysing them comparatively can provide insights into how to safeguard the process of democratisation and move forward in pluralising the political and social system. It is also worth noting that in terms of democratisation and pluralism, Tunisia is currently more advanced in every way than Algeria was at the end of the 1980s. Still, Algeria’s experience is a powerful reminder of the potential for crisis that democratic setbacks may embody. Moreover, Algeria was the first Maghrebi country to experience the emergence of an internal terrorist threat as a result of the halted democratic process. This represented a systemic menace to its political and social system. As such, analysing its tortuous path to ending terrorism and the civil war, returning to normality and strengthening civilian rule over the military, and how it missed the chance to promote a deeper and more consistent democratic system after the riots of October 1988 and the first multi-party elections in its history, is helpful in analysing the challenges Tunisia is facing today. In particular, such an analysis can highlight what Tunisia must avoid and what it should take from that experience to strengthen the consolidation of its path towards pluralism and democracy.

The Algerian experience When discussing the Arab Spring, many scholars have observed that Algeria remained immune from this wave of protests, despite the presence of a socio-economic situation that could be considered prone to triggering revolution. However, revolution did not happen for two main reasons: divisions between the various opposition groups in the country and the political use of economic tools to reward loyalty and reduce discontent (Cristiani 2011). However, it is also worth noting another critical factor that prevented Algeria from experiencing the Arab Spring: the country had already experienced something similar in the late 1980s and early 1990s, and the political instability of that period triggered the eruption of the civil war, memories of which are still vivid in the political psychology of the country today. This was an influential factor that prevented Algeria from experiencing a new wave of destabilisation (Addi 2011). Nevertheless, that experience offers a number of potential lessons for Tunisia, and more for all countries

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which are undergoing a process of pluralistic opening up and changes in their political structures. At the end of the 1980s, Algeria experienced the first serious domestic political crisis in its post-independency era. The crisis placed significant pressure on the socialist rentier state built in the aftermath of independence by Ahmed Ben Bella and Houari Boumedienne1 and which centred around oil, the National Liberation Front (Front de libération nationale, FLN) and the military. A decade of declining oil prices put this socialist–dirigist economic model under pressure and contributed to the progressive erosion of the legitimacy of the FLN. This dynamic was also accompanied by the rise of conservative, hardline nationalists, who had grown stronger after quelling the Berber Spring in the early 1980s, and Islamist organisations, which were re-emerging after the marginalisation they had suffered prior to the 1980s (Le Sueur 2010, 30). The October riots in 1988 signalled the beginning of a new phase. The FLN’s decision to resort to using the military to quell the revolts contributed to the end of the little legitimacy that it still enjoyed in the eyes of the Algerian citizens. This paved the way for the end of the FLN’s hegemony in the political system. President Chadli Benjedid introduced a number of ground-breaking changes to the political system, terminating the identification of the state with the party. He also abandoned reference to the ‘revolutionary socialist option’, opening up the political system to multi-party politics2 through elections which were won by the Islamist Islamic Salvation Front (Front Islamique du Salut, FIS) (Aghrout 2008, 32). The FIS’s political discourse was characterised by a number of controversies and ambiguities, particularly among those sections of the party closer to Ali Belhadj.3 Nevertheless, the FIS’s stance in the window of pluralist opportunity that opened up following Benjedid’s changes was not anti-democratic and accepted de facto the rules of the democratic game and political pluralism, despite the military’s attempts to provoke the FIS to make it appear undemocratic—a plot later known as the ‘Nezzar plan’.4 While it is now impossible to know whether, once in power, the FIS would have halted the democratic process, what we do know is that the support for them in first the local and then the national elections prompted a response from the military, who suspended the democratic process, a decision that the FIS condemned but that did not prompt any calls to arms.

1 

Ahmed Ben Bella was the first president of independent Algeria, deposed in a coup d’état by Houari Boumedienne in 1965. The latter would rule Algeria until his death in 1978. 2

 After winning local elections with a comfortable margin, and despite the attempts of the Algerian authorities to co-opt and contain its members, the FIS gained 47.3 % of the vote, worth 231 out of 430 seats in the first round of the national elections of 26 December 1991, with the FLN winning less than half of the FIS votes (23.4 %). As other, smaller Islamist parties won around 8.5 % of the vote, more than 50 % of the votes cast were for Islamist groups, which shows how widespread opposition was to the FLN. 3

 Ali Belhadj co-founded the FIS with Abassi Madani, and he was the most important figure among the radical/revolutionary group within the party. 4

  The plan was named after General Khaled Nezzar, who revealed its existence in his Mémoires [Memoirs] (Le Sueur 2010, 48–50).

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In the following years, a number of developments radically changed the overall picture: the FIS’s status as a legal political party was revoked by the Algerian authorities; its leadership—particularly the old guard that represented a buffer against radical groups—disbanded; and the party split into many smaller groups, including militant branches that grew increasingly strong and independent (Heristchi 2004, 117–18). Ultimately, the military repression carried out by the Algerian state and the halting of the democratic process, combined with a number of international factors—for instance, the Western acquiescence towards the end of the Algerian democratic process and the Gulf War in 1991, which radicalised further Islamist groups around the world (Cavatorta 2009)—paved the way for the eruption of the Algerian civil war and the dominance of the military, particularly the Department of Intelligence and Security (Département du Renseignement et de la Sécurité, DRS).5 The first years of the civil war were the most violent, with the army adopting an eradication stance, aimed at wiping out radical Islamist groups. As the civil war deepened, the political approaches to how to handle this threat became less unified, signalled by the emergence of a dialectic between the so-called éradicateurs (eradicators) and dialoguistes (dialoguers), the two sides in an unending political debate that would characterise Algerian politics in the years to follow. The dialoguistes would later get the upper hand, particularly once Abdelaziz Bouteflika rose to power. President Bouteflika promoted a policy of reconciliation with different parts of the Algerian Islamist world (Le Sueur 2010, 90–5). He also brought the military back under civilian control, through a policy that experienced significant resistance within Algeria but culminated in the disbanding of the DRS in 2016 (Nield 2016). However, Bouteflika failed to promote real democratisation in Algeria.

The Arab Spring and Tunisia: a new beginning Tunisia was the birthplace of the Arab Spring6 and, as noted at the start of this article, is also the sole successful story of the wave of revolutionary change that was too quickly named, and as it is still known by some, the ‘fourth wave of democratisation’ (Abushouk 2016; Howard and Hussain 2013; Grand 2011). This revolutionary wave affected almost all the countries of the Middle East and North Africa but the outcomes have been very diverse, even among those countries that have experienced an actual regime change (Anderson 2011). Despite these achievements, the Tunisian democratic transition and the path towards consolidation remain fragile (Murphy 2016, 239). Breakdowns and potential reverse

5 

As Algeria fell into civil war, the DRS became one of the most important players in the Algerian political landscape. It was run by Mohamed Mediène, also known as ‘Toufik’, from 1990 to 2015, and for many years represented the real decision-making authority in Algeria.

6

 On 17 December 2010, Mohamed Bouazizi, a street fruit seller who was also a young university graduate unable to find another job, set himself on fire to protest about police harassment and unemployment in Sidi Bouzid. This extreme act of protest, which led to his death, unleashed riots that later spread across Tunisia, reaching Tunis and triggering a mass protest movement which forced President Ben Ali to step down.

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waves continue to represent a threat. The country’s structural economic and regional dualism (Bousnina 2012), one of the key triggers of the revolution in 2011, has not yet been addressed successfully. In addition the wave of protests that hit the Kasserine region and the surrounding areas in the south in January 2016 was a warning of the potential for crisis that still exists in significant portions of the Tunisian territory. In addition, since 2015 the country has experienced a growing terrorist threat,7 which has put pressure on the Tunisian political system and its economy, as tourism has been hit hard, worsening an already bleak economic picture. These attacks have shed light on the existence of radical Islamism in Tunisia, a fact that the post-Arab Spring Tunisian authorities had known about but were reluctant to address openly. In 2014 Tunisian fighters made up the single biggest national group among Islamic State (IS) foreign fighters in Syria and Iraq—as many as 3000 as of the end of 2014—and Tunisian press reports at that time suggested that about 9000 Tunisians were ready to join IS (Cristiani 2014). Under increasing armed pressure from the international coalition, IS started to send some of these militants to Libya. The presence of IS militants in Libya increased the risks for Tunisia significantly, and indeed a rise in the number of terrorist attacks on Tunisian soil was one of the outcomes of this dynamic. Thus, the picture for Tunisia in the first five years after the Arab Spring has been mixed. On the one hand, the country has made a genuine attempt to pluralise and democratise its institutions, and all the political actors in the system have managed to keep the political struggle, with some exceptions, within the limits of the democratic game and dialectics. In this context, the election of the Islamic Ennahda Party in 2011 and its defeat in 2014—with acceptance of the ballot’s results and the party’s continuous evolution as a democratic actor (Ghannouchi 2016)—and the resilience of Tunisian institutions despite the terrorist threat are proof that this process is robust. On the other hand, there is the menace of terrorism: a radical and revolutionary Islamist culture, with many youngsters, particularly from the south, willing to join IS; unaddressed regional dualism and economic problems; and the persistent temptation from a number of secularist actors to exclude Islamist parties tout court from the political system continue to pose serious threats to the wider stability of the Tunisian path to consolidation.

Avoiding marginalisation To start with, the Algerian experience suggests that political and social marginalisation often causes a reaction. This was the case for many social groups in Algeria at the time of the one-party system, and was even more the case when those political groups were barred from power after they had won elections. Such a reaction can provoke a violent downward spiral which may contribute to securitising and militarising the confrontation. Indeed, at that time FIS was not obviously a radical organisation, and the militarisation

7 

In 2015, Tunisia suffered three major terrorist attacks: the Bardo attack in March, the Sousse attack in June, and lastly, the suicide bombing of a presidential guard bus in Tunis, in the area of Lac I, at the end of November.

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of the confrontation contributed to triggering a fully fledged civil war that lasted for almost 10 years. For Tunisia, it is even more important to avoid the militarisation of this issue, as, in contrast to Algeria, the government lacks the military strength and security capabilities to fight such a war. This does not mean that terrorism and radicalism should be tackled only with non-military tools: the Tunisian authorities must also address this issue from that point of view, but always within the limits of the rule of law and proportionality, and by accompanying any such actions with social and economic measures to address the grievances that nurture radicalism. Avoiding marginalisation does not mean accepting and including all political groups or ideologies. It only implies rejection of the impulse, still present in certain ultra-secularist sections of Tunisian society—particularly in Tunis—to consider all Islamist groups as the same. This goes hand in hand with avoiding losing the support of and alienating the conservative middle class. While it is true that youngsters often fuel radicalism, their beliefs can be somewhat moderated by the presence of groups of older people who are political and social protagonists. The latter represent cultural and social buffers against the spread of radicalism, particularly in those societies and local communities in which family links still matter. The Algerian response to the rise of Islamist political parties alienated most traditional constituencies and, because some parties were also considered enemies by the more radical groups who fought in the civil war, they lost their capacity to influence the silent mass of young people targeted by radical Islamist propaganda.

Global jihad, the radicalisation of discontent and the erosion of traditional social buffers Again referring to the Algerian experience, there is another important point to underline. It is not a coincidence that the emergence of the Algerian crisis that paved the way to civil war happened at the end of the 1980s, a decade in which the global, radical Islamist movement changed considerably. This decade was central to the radicalisation and, to some degree, the emergence of the more revolutionary character of these groups. Beginning in the early 1990s the global Salafi–Wahhabi movement, from which first AlQaeda and later IS emerged, morphed into a revolutionary movement and turned its sights against the Saudi regime that had originally started to promote this ideology in the 1970s in a politically passive form (Gause III 2016, 119). As the jihadist movement expanded globally in the 1980s, it enabled the spread of this ideology to areas that were historically far from the centre of its dissemination, particularly following the return of the so-called Arab Afghans to their home countries from Afghanistan. Having spread, this revolutionary version of Salafism represented a potent tool for destabilisation in many areas. This was also the case in those countries in which central governments were known to take a rather robust approach to Islamism, such as Tunisia under Ben Ali. This dynamic thus created a local environment conducive to the radicalisation of many groups, particularly in rural and suburban areas, through the spread of an ideology that was mostly alien to the local cultural environment. At the same time, the lack

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of opportunities for other, less radical Islamist organisations prevented the erection of a ‘natural fence’ against the spread of this ideology. From this point of view, another lesson that Tunisia can draw from the Algerian experience is that rediscovering and strengthening local, traditional identities can create a cultural barrier against the spread of alien, radical ideologies, and that the presence of Islamist political players can also stop militant proselytism. Thus, there is the risk that the rising wave of terrorism that has hit Tunisia could tempt certain secular groups to use it as a tool in rhetoric against all Islamist players. It is always important to differentiate, and the FIS experience is telling from this point of view, as disbanding moderate Islamist organisations could pave the way for the emergence of more radical groups. In this respect, the need to promote more efficient policies to reduce the regional dualism that still characterises Tunisia must also be considered: marginalisation was crucial in prompting the October riots in Algeria in 1988. It was also one of the reasons why radicalism emerged in rural Tunisia, and regional dualism was one of the key triggers of the Arab Spring, which did indeed start in the Tunisian interior’s underdeveloped areas. Addressing this dualism would also serve the aim of removing the structural conditions that underlie the spread of radicalism, which is ultimately a key risk for the future of Tunisian democracy. Last, but not least, the Algerian experience shows that without reconciliation, it is impossible to move forward. This option should be considered in a cautious manner, for instance when dealing with groups and militants who persist in refusing to accept pluralism and tolerance. But reconciliation should be used to welcome back into Tunisian society those people who show a genuine change and to demonstrate the inclusive nature of a pluralistic regime.

Conclusion The Algerian experience during the 1990s shows that the emergence of radical Islamist terrorism can become a systemic threat which has the potential to put the structure of the state at risk and to inflict political, social and psychological wounds that are particularly complicated, if not impossible, to heal. Although the countries of the Maghreb are all very different, despite being part of the same geographical area, it is still possible to draw certain comparisons and to isolate factors and dynamics that represent either a model of inspiration or mistakes to avoid. Tunisia was the country that started this wave of change, and so far it is the only one which has moved forward, despite a number of problems. The problems Algeria experienced after the opening up of its authoritarian and single-party system—that is, the subsequent emergence of radical Islamist movements and the eruption of terrorism—help us understand the challenges that, if not met, can undermine and derail the path towards the consolidation of pluralism, and thus democracy, in Tunisia.

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The disruption of the democratic and pluralist process in Algeria opened up the chasm of civil war. While Tunisia does not seem to be taking the same path, the risks of a reverse wave are still significant. The country must avoid making the same mistakes that halted the democratic process in Algeria and radicalised some of its domestic constituencies. Open Access  This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits any use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author(s) and the source are credited.

References Abushouk, A. (2016). The Arab Spring: A fourth wave of democratization? Digest of Middle East Studies, 25(1), 52–69. Addi, L. (2011). Le régime algérien après les révoltes arabes. Mouvements, 66(2), 89–97. Aghrout, A. (2008). Policy reforms in Algeria. Genuine change or adjustments? In Y. H. Zoubir & H. Amirah-Fernandez (eds.), North Africa. Politics, regions, and the limits of transformation (pp. 31–52). Oxon: Routledge. Anderson, L. (2011). Demystifying the Arab Spring: Parsing the differences between Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya. Foreign Affairs, 90(3), 2–7. Bousnina, A. (2012). Le Littoral et le Désert Tunisiens. Développement humain et disparités régionales en Tunisie. Paris: L’Harmattan. Cavatorta, F. (2009). The international dimension of the failed Algerian transition: Democracy betrayed?. Manchester: Manchester University Press. Cristiani, D. (2011). Al-Qaeda and Algiers struggle to cope with the implications of the Arab Spring. The Jamestown Foundation Terrorism Monitor, 9(42), 8–11. http://www. jamestown.org/single/?tx_ttnews%5Btt_news%5D=38682&no_cache=1. Accessed 11 October 2016. Cristiani, D. (2014). The geography of discontent: Tunisia’s Syrian fighter dilemma. The Jamestown Foundation Terrorism Monitor, 12(20), 7–9. http://www.jamestown.org/ single/?tx_ttnews%5Btt_news%5D=42998&no_cache=1. Accessed 11 October 2016. Gause, G., III. (2016). The future of U.S.-Saudi relations. The Kingdom and the power. Foreign Affairs, 95(4), 114–26. Ghannouchi, R. (2016). From political Islam to Muslim democracy. The Ennahda Party and the future of Tunisia. Foreign Affairs, 95(5), 58–67.

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Grand, S. R. (2011). Starting in Egypt: The fourth wave of democratization? Brookings, 10 February. https://www.brookings.edu/opinions/starting-in-egypt-the-fourth-wave-ofdemocratization/. Accessed 11 October 2016. Heristchi, C. (2004). The Islamist discourse of the FIS and the democratic experiment in Algeria. Democratization, 11(4), 111–32. Howard, P. N., & Hussain, M. M. (2013). Democracy’s fourth wave? Digital media and the Arab Spring. Oxford Studies in Digital Politics. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press. Le Sueur, J. D. (2010). Algeria since 1989: Between terror and democracy. London and New York: Fernwood Publishing and Zed Books. Murphy, E. (2016). The fragility of transition in Tunisia. In Y. H. Zoubir & G. White (eds.), North African politics. Change and continuity (pp. 225–39). Oxon: Routledge. Nield, R. (2016). Why Bouteflika dissolved Algeria’s powerful spy agency? Al Jazeera, 26 February. http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2016/02/algeria-dissolvedpowerful-spy-agency-160225171417842.html. Accessed 11 October 2016. Dario Cristiani is assistant professor in international affairs and conflict studies at Vesalius College, Vrije Universiteit Brussels.

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European View DOI 10.1007/s12290-016-0406-6

ARTICLE

‘Nobody told me we could do this’: why fiscal union is not the answer to eurozone woes Eoin Drea 

© The Author(s) 2016. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com

Abstract  The economic and financial crises evident since 2007 have refocused the debate as to the future structure of the European Economic and Monetary Union (EMU). This article looks at the issue from the perspective of economic history and identifies that current proposals for fiscal union are based on an over-reliance on Optimum Currency Area theory and are not realistic in the current political environment. In addition, European fiscal rules have become over-complicated, inefficient and open to widespread manipulation. In the medium term, rather than risk the lessening of political commitment to the EMU through divisive fiscal union proposals, the EU should focus on developing unique governance mechanisms that better reflect the current characteristics of the EMU. In this context, this article proposes four actions to complement existing initiatives such as the Banking Union: (1) simplified EU budgetary rules, (2) the creation of an independent European Fiscal Board to assess and enforce national compliance, (3) a commitment to retaining core national fiscal autonomy with a strict ‘no bailout’ rule, and (4) increased levels of investment through an expanded European The quote in the title is attributed to veteran socialist intellectual Sidney Webb (Lord Passfield) on hearing of Britain leaving the gold standard in September 1931. E. Drea (*)  Wilfried Martens Centre for European Studies, Rue du commerce 20, 1000 Brussels, Belgium e-mail: [email protected]

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Fund for Strategic Investments. Only following the successful completion of these measures should fiscal deepening be discussed at a political level. Keywords  European monetary union | Euro | Economic history | Germany | Monetary unions | Banking

Introduction Nearly a decade after the beginning of the Great Recession, debates over the future structure and design of the European Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) are about to return to centre stage.1 While the ongoing work on completing the Banking Union and revamping the European Semester process is urgently required, the plethora of new fiscal rules which have been deployed—for example the Two Pack, the Six Pack and the Fiscal Compact—have significantly increased the role of the EU in national budgetary frameworks. At the same time, the eurozone continues to be characterised by relatively low growth, high unemployment and an increasing sense of political fragmentation. The latter sentiment is driven primarily by the success of more populist and anti-EU movements in several member states. In this context, this article addresses whether emerging proposals for a fiscal union among eurozone members are actually required for the medium-term sustainability of the EMU. Rather than applying a strictly economic assessment based on Optimum Currency Area (OCA) criteria, this article views the situation from an economic history perspective and considers whether OCA theory itself provides an accurate baseline for assessing the future needs of the eurozone.2 In addition, three further issues are considered. The first is the importance of independent and non-biased assessments of member states’ adherence to the EU’s fiscal rules. The second is a consideration of why maintaining core national fiscal autonomy (with a strict no-bailout provision) is key to developing a credible political commitment to the EMU. The third is an acknowledgement that investment can act as a driver to return growth to the European economy, thus ensuring long-term debt sustainability.

Politics and Germany, not economic theory, will determine if the EMU survives OCA theory has come to dominate the debate about the future structure of the eurozone. The standard narratives, even before the euro was introduced, were remarkably 1 

The European Commission is due to publish a white paper on the future of the EMU in the first half of 2017.

2

 Optimum Currency Area theory (OCA) was developed by Mundell (1961) and highlighted four criteria necessary for an OCA to be achieved. These are (1) a high level of labour mobility, (2) the mobility of capital and price/wage flexibility, (3) currency risk sharing, and (4) similar business cycles.

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consistent for such a subjective profession as economics: the creation of the EMU was driven by politics and the countries setting up the euro certainly did not constitute an OCA. From the 1990s onwards economists identified the problems associated with responding to asymmetric shocks in the EMU. The EMU was (and remains) a monetary union characterised by an absence of centrally coordinated fiscal policies and quantitative criteria for national debts and deficits (see e.g. Eichengreen and Wyplosz 1998). From US academic economists, a veritable library of research emerged in the late 1990s that highlighted the fact that the EU was a suboptimal currency area (e.g. Dornbusch 1997; Eichengreen and Frieden 1998). The absence of exchange rate flexibility was seen as a key impediment to future EMU stability (Feldstein 1997). It is, therefore, hard to disagree with the assessment that many US (and indeed some European) economists’ negative views of the EMU project were based on an overemphasis on OCA theory, which resulted in a ‘static, ahistorical approach’ and ignored the ‘dynamic, political and institutional aspects of monetary integration’ (Jonung and Drea 2010). OCA theory, while a useful tool in framing the development of monetary unions, has been identified as having little predictive capacity (Goodhart 1998). Events since the onset of the economic crisis in 2007 have not changed the underlying economic assessment. The notable exception to this is the increasingly dismissive tone of newly convinced Eurosceptics (e.g. Krugman 2010, 2015). What then can economic history tell us about the future sustainability of a non-OCA euro area? Two important points are relevant. First, the EMU is unique and there is no precedent for independent countries surrendering their national currencies to form a common monetary union. Earlier historical examples, such as the creation of the US monetary system and the establishment of national monetary authorities in Germany and Italy in the nineteenth century, highlight that previously monetary union usually followed after political union had been achieved (Bordo and Jonung 1999). With this EMU, the utilisation of monetary union as a driver of eventual political union highlights the clear political basis of the current project. In this context, it is the political will of its members, not the application of economic theory, which will decide whether the euro lives or dies in the long term. Second, history is very clear in highlighting that in functioning monetary unions, such as the Federal Reserve System (the Fed) in the US, decision-making (whether formally or through an informal bias) is dominated by those members with major economic power (Bordo and Jonung 1999). The example of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York underpinning the Federal Reserve System from its creation in 1914 to at least the mid-1930s highlights this clearly. Power within decentralised monetary unions—such as the pre-1930s Fed and the current EMU—will inevitably flow to the strongest economic components. The death of the commanding Benjamin Strong (Governor of the New York Fed) in 1928 has been identified as a partial explanation for the Fed’s later disjointed response to the Great Depression (Kindleberger 1973). For the EMU and the EU this lesson is clear. Retrofitting greater political and fiscal integration to match an already achieved monetary union will be very difficult, if not

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impossible, to achieve. This is particularly important in light of the current high levels of public antipathy towards the wider European integration project. The situation is compounded by existing national debt levels, relatively low economic growth and high youth unemployment in several member states. Moves towards fiscal integration could actually lead to further political dislocation at the EU level. As primarily a political project, the survival of the EMU in the long term will require not just political commitment, but also a newfound willingness (among larger members) to develop atypical governance mechanisms. These mechanisms will be necessary to support the unique characteristics of the non-OCA euro area in the medium term. Without this willingness, the longer-term goal of transforming the EMU into an OCA is largely irrelevant and the euro will not outlast the possible lessening of political commitment in the future.

Please, please, please: no more fiscal rules! The constraints now placed upon the budgetary plans of member states have developed into a veritable cottage industry. However, it is not clear if such an intrusive approach is actually working (O’Rourke and Taylor 2013). European fiscal rules have become overcomplicated, inefficient and open to widespread manipulation (Mody 2013). National histories play an important role in fiscal preferences. The composition of national taxation systems and state expenditure patterns are reflective of the national consciousness (Eichengreen and Wyplosz 2016). The levels of personal taxation evident in Belgium or Germany would never be politically acceptable in Ireland. Conversely, the low level of public pension provision evident in Ireland would not be acceptable in countries such as Italy and France. History matters in the design of economic priorities. The fiscal governance of the EMU has become a poor mirror of the German ‘centralised-federal’ approach, notwithstanding its debatable operational performance within Germany itself (Wyplosz 2013). Rather than attempting to achieve minimal fiscal union at great political cost, a cost which could weaken overall political commitment to the EMU (Matthes and Iara 2016), the EU should re-evaluate the actual constraints under which countries operate in the EMU. Realistically, the divergent opinions of member states will result in any fiscal union proposals lacking the required level of centralisation or transferability to be truly effective. The general vision for a ‘euro area stabilisation fund’ is short on positive rationale, but long on what it will not become (European Commission 2015). Such a negative, lowest common denominator bias will be reflected in discussions with member states in the years ahead. In this context, the reality is that eurozone members are confronted by an increasingly complex set of fiscal rules, the inconsistent implementation of such rules by the European Commission and ongoing moves towards more fiscal integration. In a low growth

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economy, the eurozone’s fiscal rules (and their patchy implementation) are increasingly seen by member states as barriers to growth and employment creation. Rather than seeking to push forward with further fiscal union proposals, the EU should prioritise the creation of an independent body (i.e. a European Fiscal Board comprised of independent economists and administrators) which would evaluate member states’ compliance with a simplified set of EU budgetary rules and make final binding decisions. This approach would remedy the increasingly politically driven findings of the European Commission, ensure transparency and allow greater public understanding of the entire budgetary process. The European Commission and Council in 2016 may still deem it acceptable to exempt France from existing rules ‘because it is France’, but such an approach reduces the credibility of the EMU and increases the perception that larger member states are treated differently (Guarascio 2016). One of the lessons from the monetary development of the US is that perceptions of central institutions matter a great deal and that credibility is difficult to achieve, but easily lost (Frieden 2016). The current roadmap for the EMU provides for the creation of a European Fiscal Board in the period up to June 2017 (European Commission 2015). However, this body will be purely advisory in nature and while its advice will feed into decisions taken by the Commission, it will not be responsible for the decisions made. In this guise, such a fiscal board could actually further reduce the credibility of the EMU, with the Commission likely to ignore its advice in the face of political realities. It will therefore become another powerless EU body in an increasingly congested fiscal policy arena. Rather than seeking the further centralisation of fiscal policy, the EU should commit to maintaining core national fiscal autonomy within the context of simplified EU budgetary rules. For members of a non-OCA with a centralised monetary authority, the ability to stabilise national economies through fiscal tools becomes even more important (Eichengreen and Wyplosz 2016). Such fiscal autonomy should also include the ability of member states to set their own personal and corporate tax rates, as tax competition can drive economic growth at an intra-EU level. Concerns regarding the potential for national fiscal policies to destabilise the EMU can be alleviated in three ways. First, the establishment of the European Fiscal Board, set out above, will provide independent assessment/enforcement of simplified budgetary rules, thus increasing market credibility. Second, the continued (and much needed) evolution of the Banking Union will further lessen the link between banks and domestic sovereign bonds. Finally, the introduction of a no-bailout rule of the type evident in the US for over 150 years will further enshrine the credibility of this system, while also having a national-level fiscal stabilisation function. There were many crises along the road to achieving a functioning monetary and fiscal union in the US. However, the creation of a credible no-bailout rule and allowing state (national) fiscal independence are necessary conditions for an eventual fiscal union to function properly in the long term (Bordo et al. 2013).

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The EMU as a barbarous relic? Brussels is awash with debates on what kind of fiscal stabilisation measures are required for the EMU to survive. A common unemployment insurance scheme is particularly in vogue (e.g. Benassy-Quere et al. 2016). However, in the short term the most pressing requirement is to refocus on the ability of the eurozone to create growth and jobs in Europe. Unfortunately, events since 2008 have seen the eurozone become synonymous with stagnation and fiscal constraints. The internal devaluation processes undertaken by countries such as Ireland, Portugal and Greece highlight the dangers of imposing self-defeating (and often very poorly targeted) fiscal consolidation measures on economies already experiencing large asymmetric shocks. The example of Ireland shows that it is the return of economic growth that acts a key driver in ensuring long-term debt sustainability. Ireland’s general government debt as a percentage of GDP declined from 119.5% in 2013 to around 90% by 2015, or less than 80% if statistical anomalies are taken into account (Ireland, National Treasury Management Agency 2016). In addition to fiscal credibility within the EMU framework, external credibility regarding Ireland’s ability to grow strongly in the future is a key determinant of current growth levels. The lack of expansionary fiscal measures elsewhere in the euro area magnified the economic contraction in states such as Ireland, Portugal and Greece (Pisani-Ferry et al. 2013). The example of Britain’s experience in a reconstituted Gold Standard between 1925 and 1931 clearly highlights the difficulties of pursuing internal devaluation in the context of a fixed exchange rate regime. These difficulties are magnified when there is no corresponding increase in investment (or inflation) in other members. Britain’s rejoining of the Gold Standard at its pre-war exchange rate of $4.86 resulted in dramatic deflationary effects on income and employment (Collins 1988). The relentless grind of the austere situation in Britain in the 1925–1931 period, including large-scale public unrest, bears many resemblances to that experienced in Greece over the past decade. However, it is the experience of Britain on leaving the Gold Standard in 1931 that should be of most interest to EU decision-makers. Freed from the burden of a fixed exchange rate and high interest rates, Britain grew steadily in the 1930s, notwithstanding the worldwide economic contraction caused by the Great Depression. Spearheaded by Montagu Norman and the Bank of England, a policy of ‘cheap money’ was complemented by refinancing existing debts and a strong banking system with large capital reserves. The parallels (or lack of) with the current position of EMU members are obvious. Rather than seeking to build politically divisive fiscal union proposals at a time of increasing Euroscepticism across Europe (and the ongoing Brexit saga), the EU should focus on tackling the chronic investment shortfall that currently exists, including in member states in strong fiscal positions. Germany is a good example of a member state that should be investing more, particularly with regard to transport infrastructure (Drea 2016). The application of the EU’s budgetary rules should not be mistaken for a

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prohibition on investment. Rather, the European Fund for Strategic Investments (EFSI) should become the primary tool with which EU members enhance their capacity to create jobs within a pan-European context. Rather than acting purely as a stabilisation tool as proposed by the European Commission, the EFSI should be developed as the EU’s primary (and permanent) investment vehicle, acting as a conduit for EU governments to access private sector funds for investment purposes. The EFSI should complement, not replace, national investment strategies and be based on a rigorous economic assessment of all proposed projects. Similarly, the wider socio-economic lessons from the ongoing internal devaluation process in Greece, and other states, should not be ignored. Here again, history points to a core commonality: austerity policies that are perceived to be undertaken as a matter of principle, and not as a tool to restart economic growth, are self-defeating (in terms of improving economic performance) and often result in political fragmentation and the weakening of traditional political parties. Greece, Portugal and Spain offer clear examples of this increasing political division. In Ireland, there has been a marked shift away from the political centre towards independent, non-aligned politicians. On this point the experience of Germany in the early 1930s is relevant. The impact of the Great Depression was exacerbated by the restrictive economic policies favoured by Chancellors Bruning and Von Papen up to 1932. These economic policies were complemented by an unwillingness to devalue the Reichmark, even after the devaluation of sterling in 1931. This combination was partially responsible for rising unemployment, increased social unrest and ultimately the accession of the National Socialists to power in 1933. It is an irony of history that the expansionary fiscal and monetary programmes implemented by Hitler in 1933 were in fact largely developed by the preceding conservative government of General Schleicher (Tooze 2006).

Conclusions The economic and financial crises have fundamentally changed the political dynamic underpinning the EMU and the euro. Although significant institutional reforms have already been adopted, or are in the process of being formulated, it is clear that the existing architecture of the EMU must be further developed if the euro is to remain sustainable in the long run. European fiscal rules have become over-complicated, inefficient and open to widespread manipulation. However, this article identifies that the debates surrounding fiscal union suffer from two fundamental weaknesses. The first is an over-reliance on a static and ahistorical OCA theory as a framework for future development. This over-reliance has resulted in a disproportionate focus on the fiscal union issue. The second is the limited understanding of existing political realities within the eurozone and a failure to comprehend how events since 2008 have altered many member states’ perceptions regarding the future of the EMU.

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In the medium term, rather than risk the lessening of political commitment to the EMU through divisive fiscal union proposals, the EU should focus on developing atypical governance mechanisms that better reflect the unique characteristics of a non-OCA EMU. Therefore, the goal should be to allow member states to return to growth within a common currency area characterised by a single monetary policy. The EU needs to allow member states the necessary autonomy to respond to large asymmetric shocks while at the same time ensuring the credibility of simplified EU budgetary rules. In this context, this article proposes four actions to complement existing initiatives such as the Banking Union: (1) simplified EU budgetary rules, (2) the creation of an independent European Fiscal Board to assess and enforce national compliance, (3) a commitment to retaining core national fiscal autonomy with a strict ‘no bailout’ rule, and (4) increased levels of investment through an expanded EFSI. Only following the successful completion of these measures should fiscal deepening be discussed at a political level. Open Access  This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits any use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author(s) and the source are credited.

References Benassy-Quere, A., Ragot, X., & Wolff, G. B. (2016). Which fiscal union for the euro area? Bruegel Policy Contribution No. 5. Brussels. Bordo, M. D., & Jonung, L. (1999). The future of EMU: What does the history of monetary unions tell us? NBER Working Paper No. 7365. MA. Bordo, M. D., Jonung, L., & Markiewicz, A. (2013). A fiscal union for the euro: Some lessons from history. CESifo Economic Studies, 59(3), 449–88. Collins, M. (1988). Money and banking in the UK: A history. London: Croom Helm. Dornbusch, R. (1997). Fiscal aspects of monetary integration. American Economic Review, 87(2), 221–3. Drea, E. (2016). Germany and the Juncker Plan IN FOCUS: 3 steps to reconcile fiscal consolidation and investment. Wilfried Martens Centre for European Studies. Brussels. http://www.martenscentre.eu/publications/germany-and-juncker-plan-focus-3-stepsreconcile-fiscal-consolidation-and-investment. Accessed 27 July 2016. Eichengreen, B., & Frieden, J. (1998). Introduction. In B. Eichengreen & J. Frieden (eds.), Forging an integrated Europe (pp. 1–17). Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.

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Eichengreen, B., & Wyplosz, C. (1998). The stability pact: More than a minor nuisance. In D. Begg, J. Von Hagen, C. Wyplosz, & K. Zimmerman (eds.), EMU: Prospects and challenges for the euro (pp. 67–113). Oxford: Blackwell. Eichengreen, B., & Wyplosz, C. (2016). Minimal conditions for the survival of the euro. Vox.eu, 14 March. http://www.voxeu.org/article/minimal-conditions-survival-euro. Accessed 28 July 2016. European Commission. (2015). Completing Europe’s economic and monetary union (The five presidents’ report). Brussels: European Commission. Feldstein, M. (1997). The political economy of European economic and monetary union: Political sources of an economic liability. NBER Working Paper No. 6150. MA. Frieden, J. (2016). Lessons for the euro from early American monetary and financial history. Bruegel Essay and Lecture Series. Brussels, 25 May. Goodhart, C. (1998). The two concepts of money: Implications for the analysis of optimal currency areas. European Journal of Political Economy, 14(3), 407–32. Guarascio, F. (2016). EU gives budget leeway to France ‘because it is France’— Juncker. Reuters, 31 May. http://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-eu-deficit-france-idUKKCN0YM1N0. Accessed 28 July 2016. Ireland, National Treasury Management Agency. (2016). Historical debt. http://www. ntma.ie/business-areas/funding-and-debt-management/debt-profile/historical-debt/. Accessed 26 August 2016. Jonung, L., & Drea, E. (2010). It can’t happen, it’s a bad idea, it won’t last: US economists on the EMU and the euro 1989–2002. Econ Journal Watch, 7(1), 4–52. Kindleberger, C. (1973). The world in depression 1929–39. London: Allen Lane. Krugman, P. (2010). Euroskeptic, me. New York Times, 15 February. http://krugman. blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/15/euroskeptic-me/. Accessed 22 July 2016. Krugman, P. (2015). The Euroskeptic vindication. New York Times, 19 July. http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/07/19/the-euroskeptic-vindication/. Accessed 22 July 2016. Matthes, J., & Iara, A. (2016). On the future of EMU: Targeted reforms instead of more fiscal integration. Cologne Institute for Economic Research Report No. 17. Cologne. Mody, A. (2013). A rest stop for Europe. Project Syndicate website. https://www.projectsyndicate.org/commentary/advancing-european-integration-by-taking-a-step-back-byashoka-mody. Accessed 27 July 2016.

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Mundell, R. (1961). A theory of optimum currency areas. American Economic Review, 51(4), 657–65. O’Rourke, K. H., & Taylor, A. M. (2013). Cross of euros. Journal of Economic Perspectives, 27(3), 167–92. Pisani-Ferry, J., Sapir, A., & Wolff, G. B. (2013). EU–IMF assistance to euro-area countries: An early assessment. Bruegel Blueprint No. 19. Brussels. Tooze, A. (2006). The wages of destruction: The making and breaking of the Nazi economy. London: Penguin. Wyplosz, C. (2013). Europe’s quest for fiscal discipline. European Commission Economic Papers No. 498. Brussels. Eoin Drea, Ph.D., is a research officer working at the Wilfried Martens Centre for European Studies. His research expertise includes the EMU, central banking and the political economy of European integration.

European View DOI 10.1007/s12290-016-0405-7

ARTICLE

Complementing traditional diplomacy: regional and local authorities going international Filippo Terruso 

© The Author(s) 2016. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com

Abstract Regional and local authorities already promote their own policies and actions in the international arena for humanitarian, political, commercial, cultural and institutional reasons. From cross-border to decentralised cooperation, under the concept of City diplomacy, local authorities often move independently and actively, both in the international arena and in the EU’s decision-making processes. They act during conflicts, providing peace-building and dialogue opportunities, and take action in post-conflict regions or regions in need. This form of diplomacy complements traditional diplomacy and is mostly activated when the latter is frozen or required to remain low profile for contingent, political reasons. These new actors, with strong devolved powers at home and strong political leadership, deserve more attention from international players such as the European Commission and some of the United Nations’ agencies. The current scheme of international cooperation is overly rigid. There is a need for more flexibility so that support—including financial support—can be better targeted to meet specific needs. This could lead to regional and local actors becoming direct recipients

F. Terruso (*)  Committee of the Regions, Rue Belliard 99‑101, 1000 Brussels, Belgium e-mail: [email protected]

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of international financial support for planning and running decentralised or bottom-up forms of cooperation, partnership and political dialogue. Keywords  City diplomacy | Diplomacy | International cooperation | Decentralised cooperation | Subsidiarity | Global challenges | Local | Regions

Introduction Even if major international actions remain in the hands of chancelleries and are almost entirely left to international bodies, other public bodies—such as cities and regions—do take initiative independently of the national sphere. Indeed, local authorities are led by elected political actors who share similar responsibilities to state actors (but with less means) when it comes to protecting universal and fundamental rights, including peace, democracy and the rule of law, or providing humanitarian aid. Channels for dialogue are therefore also created by local actors, who may serve as a first point of contact for all levels of governance to resolve emergency situations, propose confidence-building measures, support capacity-building actions or provide assistance to deliver services of general interest in conflict or post-conflict regions. Local authorities’ direct involvement in the programmes run by the UN’s agencies for decentralised cooperation, or in the negotiation of International Conferences offer new opportunities which can be embraced by the international community to enhance citizens’ participation in, ownership of and commitment to tackling common challenges. In this context, local and regional authorities have become fully fledged partners in multilevel international governance relations, a role which has been developing under the EU’s management of its own policies.

Adapting the instruments In an evolving political environment, where traditional political players are being required to adapt to better understand and address new issues, and where national actions have become inadequate to deal with global challenges—from the financial and economic crisis to global, cross-border threats such as climate change or international terrorism—classical diplomacy cannot remain static and immune to the multiplication of players and targets on the international scene. Diplomacy which remains anchored to the national horizon and to the classical instruments of dialogue risks slowing down the solution-finding process and diluting its effects. By limiting the instruments at hand to the classical ones, the international community risks losing time, momentum and opportunities to forge pragmatic solutions. In contrast, ‘quick wins’ with local, but visible, impact and relief can provide tangible solutions for citizens through their political representatives in local authorities. A closer approach, built up by local politicians for local politicians, that is, non-state actors with a territorial dimension, can help to pave the way towards sustainable, political solutions on the ground.

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Unfortunately, classical diplomacy as practised by a large number of small or mediumsized powers has the activity and limitations of a no man’s land, despite the fact that the involvement of other actors could change this. There is also the issue of the persistent vacuum that exists when ‘non-war’ solutions instead of peace are proposed, as in the ‘frozen conflicts’ in the Caucasus; such diplomacy lives in the shade of the weakness of international law, where it gains little and concedes too much. When, for example, the rule of law is not rigorously applied, it enables the consolidation of cases such as the occupation of the eastern and southern regions of Ukraine; the 40-year-old stalemate dividing Cyprus; and the constant interim solutions for the Western Sahara, the Kurds, and the Palestinian refugees. Finally, classical diplomacy bears the embarrassment of the incapacity to implement the decisions taken, as in the case of enforcing the Oslo Agreement concerning the settlement policy in the Holy Land. These are only a few of classical diplomacy’s recent results and do not even mention the unbalanced behaviour of EU member states on the national level with regard to refugees, the Geneva Convention or the Copenhagen criteria for EU enlargement. Of course, diplomacy must be sufficiently flexible to avoid situations reaching breaking point, which risks creating room for unwelcome alternatives. However, in this regard, other measures are available to local actors who are working for both political results and pragmatic solutions on the ground. National governments acting in the context of ‘international cooperation’ often tend to focus on rebuilding central government structures after conflicts, ignoring the impact of conflict on local or regional authorities and underestimating their role, both in internal stabilisation processes and in forging external links with potential partners. International cooperation that aims to rebuild political dialogue in a conflict zone should take advantage of the bottom-up approach: for this approach to be operational, it must be driven by local actors, the closest level of governance to the citizens, who should have a leading role in shaping and managing activities alongside non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and international institutions or bodies.

New actors and new instruments of diplomacy The consolidation of the EU as a major actor in economic, financial, environmental, trade, migration and other horizontal contexts, such as climate change and extreme poverty, has strengthened the emergence of this new non-state actor in the international arena. The EU, and its External Action Service, is no longer an inter-governmental body, but rather a multilevel broker, coordinating 28 national diplomacies in the international context (from various UN conferences to trade and investment partnership agreements). It is in this new context that innovative ways of working are called for, which complement classical diplomacy when circumstances require or, if a given context calls for action on the ground, enables people-to-people contact and open dialogue. Regional and local authorities (RLAs), with their proximity to citizens, can play a role on the international scene by offering new, alternative solutions. This multilevel governance of

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diplomacy is occurring in several fields, leading to cooperation between parliaments and research agencies, through the arts, culture and in sport. Furthermore, due to decentralisation processes in many countries, today RLAs share competences with national or federal governments in areas such as trade and the environment: this further enhances RLAs’ ambitions to develop their own international policies. For instance, the Covenant of Mayors (now merged with the Compact of Mayors for a new global Covenant for Climate and Energy) brings together thousands of RLAs voluntarily committed to implementing EU climate and energy objectives within their territories, both within and outside the EU, independent of their national governments’ roadmaps; in several cases, regions have seen fully fledged results prior to national commitment to common goals.

City diplomacy City diplomacy (CD) is a concept whereby regions or cities act directly; in association with each other; or through international bodies, institutions and civil society, to help partner regions and cities by sharing expertise and advice, based on their duties as service providers. Rogier van der Pluijm (2007) defines the role of CD as a ‘form of decentralization of international relations’ management choosing cities as the key actors.’ Services (e.g. waste management or water treatment) are often jeopardised in conflict or post-conflict areas. In this context, RLAs are becoming peace brokers. Local politicians, often already active in cross-border or macro-regional cooperation, are keen to apply the universal rights which national and international institutions stand for at the local level, and in a very practical and tangible way for their citizens. However, CD has never been conceived or ‘structured’ as a way to stop conflicts on the ground or to impose ceasefires or sanctions, which ultimately remain the duty of international organisations and other levels of governance. The geopolitical sphere of city intervention is nevertheless the same; RLAs share the ultimate goals of stability, peace and the rule of law, enshrined in the international treaties which apply to them as political bodies and, to some extent, as individuals. Enjoying a less political, more civilian role, cities can bring added value compared to international actors, particularly in post-conflict dialogue and the stabilisation phase. That said, so far CD has mostly been used to build bridges, confidence and capacity in conflict or post-conflict areas. CD is not a new phenomenon, having its roots in the post–Second World War years when city-to-city post-conflict policies were developed, often based on cultural exchanges, and initially as a result of migration flows. The post-war situation pushed cities to promote integration policies; undertake economic missions, often in cooperation with the local chambers of commerce; and promote tourism. After the Second World War, the enthusiasm for direct participation in an international context grew, with public debate over international issues echoed within national politics. Citizens and their directly elected local representatives began to feel the need to be more involved in international affairs. As a result, civil society started to organise itself, alongside NGOs and local authorities, to claim an active role in international relations. This led to the creation

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of citizens’ movements in the 1960s and following decades. At the Helsinki Conference in 1975, non-state actors, including civil society organisations, developed a certain selfconfidence and put themselves forward as the new players on the international political scene, promoting the so-called third-basket issues. These groups also took individual stands during the Cold War (with some cities supporting Solidarność in Poland) and in the struggle for human rights (acting against apartheid in South Africa), to give just a couple of examples. This trend grew and has since provided the setting for the development of various local authority movements, ranging from cities’ policies against nuclear power, notably during the Cold War, to today’s involvement in international trade agreements or conferences on environmental issues. In addition, some cities’ or regions’ activism is deeply rooted in the past, in the era prior to the emergence of nation-states, when cities were commercial or military powers, or political or even religious points of reference for the whole European continent and beyond. In some respects, the inheritance of these diplomatic or political roles has never faded and can still be seen in the proactive roles that some places take today, particularly in certain cross-border areas and in certain actions covered by decentralised cooperation. Decentralised cooperation probably remains one of the most visible external actions managed by local authorities, currently promoted and financed by the EU and the UN in order to achieve sustainable development, eradicate extreme poverty and hunger, promote gender equality and ensure primary education for all (UN 2015). Furthermore, some local actors have stepped in to resolve specific issues due to historical political connections, such as the city of Antwerp’s work on waste management in Beirut in cooperation with the UN Environment Programme, or certain regional governments’ commitment, alongside nation-states, to directly funding UN agencies such as the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine in the Near East for Palestinian refugees.

Confidence building Actions on the ground can develop into confidence-building instruments if they involve dialogue between communities. The development of the Nicosia Master Plan which involved the Greek-Cypriot and Turkish-Cypriot communities is a good example. A similar approach has been taken by local authorities in Cyprus in order to rehabilitate the ghost town of Varosha (south of Famagusta, still sealed off from the rest of the island after the events of 1974). They have proposed that urban planners from the UN enter the town with a fact-finding mission to plan actions for the future restoration of the town. Likewise, the proactivity of local actors in Libya in 2015 tried to help to overcome the internal stalemate there by proposing the setting up of a temporary assembly formed of elected local authorities. This proposition was put forward as a result of informal contacts during the UN-led efforts to form a unity government in 2015. The proposal was all the more compelling because it was grounded in the legitimacy given to the local authorities by the citizens’ votes.

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Peace building Local authorities can also promote dialogue during conflict: an example is the confidence-building talks that took place between the Serbians and the Croatians in East Croatia in 1998, brokered by the Dutch town of Wageningen. Peace-building actions require established cooperation and trust at all levels of governance. The overcoming of internal conflicts through dialogue between local parties can be facilitated by local authorities, particularly when democracy is in some way ‘imposed’ by the international community: when this happens during the interim phase (before elections or the setting up of a government after conflicts), it can lead to stabilisation and regular democratic processes within a given country. Libya represents an interesting case as, in 2015, about 30 mayors met to facilitate the process for the ceasefire under the auspices of the UN and the international community, marking the start of an internal dialogue which was instrumental to the ending of the civil war and paved the way for the formation of a national unity government. With or without the intervention of third parties, local authorities have demonstrated the value they add when restarting a political dialogue: in this case the process involved more internal local authorities than external ones acting as brokers.

Proximity diplomacy As global challenges increase, international policy and classical diplomacy need to integrate new forms of partnership and relationship at all levels of governance, reflecting the emergence of local and regional policymakers. Proximity, or bottom-up diplomacy, is not only possible for RLAs willing to help partners to achieve peace and stability, but is also a necessity given RLAs’ role in shaping and implementing international commitments. For instance, the 2015 Paris Conference on Climate Change invited RLAs to both the preparatory meetings and the conference due to their role in implementing the objectives on the ground (the reduction of CO2 emissions and measures for energy efficiency). Prior to the latest Conference of the Parties in Paris, RLAs shaped the final decisions for their own countries and worked together at the international level. One could consider this proactive policy as mere lobbying, but RLAs are a distinct stakeholder, clearly representing the public and not just sectoral or private interests. They enjoy an institutional legitimacy due to their governance role and their political function. RLAs have proven adept at using EU tools for territorial development, such as crossborder cooperation (for instance the European Neighbourhood Policy’s Cross-Border Cooperation instrument), macro-regional strategies (covering the Baltic Sea, Danube area, Alpine area and Adriatic–Ionian area) and the European Grouping of Territorial Cooperation, which also includes non-EU member states and can therefore play a role within the European Neighbourhood Policy. International contacts built up through proximity diplomacy actions have proven to be useful for mayors dealing with social and cultural phenomena related to migrant integration, refugee resettlement, the fight against violent radicalisation, and, more

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generally, intercultural and interreligious debate. However, in general terms, capacitybuilding actions led by RLAs lack sustainable financial support, since formal channels for cooperation or diplomacy are more often run by well-known national or international structures, which tend to impose their own priorities and a top-down approach to cooperation. As a consequence, several grass-roots micro initiatives led by RLAs have faced significant challenges after an initial political (often personal) commitment. In relation to this, a further problem arises when local and national politicians do not see eye to eye. Dedicated financial support for RLAs to help sustain their efforts in specific areas of geostrategic interest to international bodies (the UN) or supranational bodies (the EU) should therefore be proposed in a systematic way, as has been the case for civil society and NGOs, which are sometimes quite varied and not always transparent in countries where, on behalf of their respective governments, and they act in the context of decentralised cooperation under various labels. Economic, social and territorial development activities can also stabilise an area, as often happens in cross-border regions. The proactivity of RLAs is perceived not just as a political duty, but also as a way to open up opportunities for future investment in a given territorial area. The EU’s Committee of the Regions (CoR), for instance, provides the means for RLAs to interact through a portal on decentralised cooperation by facilitating the matching of requests and offers. Together with the European Commission, the CoR has also helped RLAs from acceding countries to obtain information and knowhow on the acquis communautaire through the Local Administration Facility, the Technical Assistance and Information Exchange Instrument, and the Twinning instrument, all programmes aimed at helping local public administrations to manage pre-accession funds. Similarly, the added value of people-to-people contact via this form of cooperation has proved extremely useful in assuring the endorsement of the accession when citizens finally vote to accede to the EU.

The territorial dimension of the European Neighbourhood Policy In carrying out diplomacy, cities and regions often use national channels (city-based associations, or international bodies such as United Cities and Local Governments), or act individually or in small groups. A different approach to CD is taken when RLAs work together through an institutional body that acts as a catalyst and political representative. An example is the CoR, an EU institution used by RLAs to reach out to non-EU partners. In this case, RLAs use the CoR’s platforms for political debate with counterparts from acceding countries through its joint consultative committees, and from neighbouring EU countries through its joint assemblies: the Conference of Regional and Local Authorities for the Eastern Partnership (within the Eastern Partnership), and the Euro-Mediterranean Regional and Local Assembly (ARLEM, within the Union for the Mediterranean). This development has been supported by Federica Mogherini, the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy and Vice-President of the European Commission, who sees city diplomacy as one layer within a wider system:

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You are players in our foreign policy. Global challenges call for global alliances, but also for local responses. We need to think to new architectures, where all levels— the international, the regional, the national, the local—have a place and play their part. An architecture harmonising the macro and the micro. Think big, act local. This is a goal we can only achieve together. (Mogherini 2015) Another pan-European institution that RLA actors use to promote dialogue and cooperation is the Congress of the Council of Europe, which has a strong tradition of promoting local democracy, the rule of law and respect for fundamental rights. The Congress uses the concept of multilevel governance to describe a wide spectrum of activities which would ordinarily be described as classical diplomacy if undertaken by central government: be it local election monitoring or ensuring implementation of the 1985 European Charter of Local Self-Government. Through the setting up of joint assemblies representing RLAs within the Eastern Partnership and the Union for the Mediterranean, the CoR has managed to ensure the voice of RLAs is heard in EU policymaking related to the European Neighbourhood Policy. RLAs have taken an active role in intergovernmental meetings, by ensuring a ‘territorial dimension’ to the EU and its partners’ policymaking. RLAs backed Ukraine during the Euromaidan and, since 2015, have continued to support the process of decentralisation through a dedicated Task Force established within the CoR (in this context the CoR adopted two political resolutions in January (CoR 2014a) and April (CoR 2014b) 2014). Political support from RLAs has also been given to Ukraine’s government during the process of amalgamating its counties in order to rationalise the regional system. In addition, the need to shape a special status for the Donbas region, as requested by the Minsk II Agreement, could lead Ukrainian actors to study how after the Second World War European countries resolved contentious border and regional statuses, which later led to the introduction of special rights and protection for minorities. Concerning Ukraine, the CoR and the Council of Europe have promoted cross-border cooperation with neighbouring countries, while the European Grouping of Territorial Cooperation has promoted a new form of cooperation between Hungary and Ukraine. In addition there have been peer-to-peer exercises to strengthen the capacity of local authorities to manage the new tools granted by decentralisation reforms and to develop the economy through smart specialisation in given territories, harbours, for instance. Concerning the Union for the Mediterranean, RLAs represented in the ARLEM are using capacitybuilding measures to promote, for instance, sustainable urban policies on the Mediterranean coast. Furthermore, European RLAs are joining forces to restore the capacity of Libyan municipalities as service providers by organising technical meetings on the management of solid waste, management and treatment of water, public administration and decentralised cooperation, and municipal centres for first aid (the Nicosia Initiative for Libyan Local Authorities, an ARLEM network set up to develop new partnerships with European local authorities). When the international community and donors were immobilised by instability in the country and a lack of defined channels for dialogue and cooperation, RLAs took the initiative to cooperate and share with the same objective: quite an achievement in political and practical terms, not only for the European side, where classical diplomacy had lost precious time, but also for the Libyans, where local authorities and the respective militias decided to end their conflicts and cooperate in

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partnership with their European counterparts. This experience is also particularly interesting as it offers an example of a bottom-up approach where the requests for help came before the offers. The cooperation guarantees a geographical balance among the Libyan local authorities by ensuring that all communities are eligible for this modest but enriching partnership. This is significant as currently Libya is only an observer of the Union for the Mediterranean’s instruments, and remains in the margins of the larger EU cooperation tools, including the Cross-Border Cooperation Med programme.

Conclusion The definition of diplomacy by RLAs covers a wide range of activities in the international arena. This includes direct action and working in conjunction with external partners, such as the EU institutions. Indeed, even their participation in the EU’s decision-making process could be considered part of their ‘external’ mission. For several decades CD has been achieving results in conflict or post-conflict regions. This has involved a variety of objectives: confidence- or peace-building, conflict prevention or resolution, post-conflict reconstruction and rehabilitation, the promotion of social cohesion, environmental sustainability, decentralised cooperation, preparation for accession to the EU and being good neighbours. If their external activity is self-evident in cross-border actions, it has also become justified due to the globalisation of challenges—from migration to climate change—which require better coordination between RLAs internationally. In addition, the new competences given to regional authorities by certain EU member states have made them fundamental to the ratification of international treaties, whether these be revisions of EU treaties or trade agreements such as the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement with Canada or the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership with the US. Finally, the achievement of a certain degree of territorial cohesion and stability is considered a civic duty and economically relevant to the citizens, civil society and local businesses represented by local authorities. The developments discussed above have moved local actors to be increasingly proactive and to take an international role, using their own budget or sharing their know-how, mostly in the provision of local services, public administration, and urban and regional planning. The direct participation of RLAs in international affairs could be considered a new tool for European external action, to be used as an informal channel for dialogue and pragmatic service delivery. Quick-win operations, mostly carried out by municipalities, are a prerequisite for building favourable conditions for broader political talks. These actions therefore deserve not just political support from national, international and European bodies, but also a dedicated budget to ensure the coherence, continuity and feasibility of RLA initiatives. The UN has shown its openness to working with RLAs when it comes to achieving goals for development. The UNDP and other agencies are working to promote local democracy and territorial development and are seeking partnerships at a local level to implement international agreements (e.g. Conference of the Parties 21 in Paris, the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction, and the UN’s Conference on Housing and Sustainable Urban Development). In this context RLAs are working towards recognition within the UN General Assembly—a special status which could

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allow them or their international associations to be linked with the policies that have a territorial impact or require a territorial partnership to fully be implemented. A truly bottom-up approach to defining the main lines of international cooperation is lacking. Years of favouring a top-down approach in internal or cooperation policies, where the financial support or political interests of the dominant sponsor dictated the priority, have taken their toll. As a consequence, projects too often go to where cooperation already exists, which is sometimes not where the need is greatest. Such a vicious circle tends to help a small number of actors. It excludes the systematic involvement of (new) actors on the ground and in particular risks sidelining decentralised processes based on real needs—City diplomacy sometimes being too atypical for a rigid and formal scheme of international cooperation. Thus, there is space for local actors to intervene in diplomacy, and to listen before acting so that measures can be better targeted. Proximity diplomacy could invert this tendency: recipient mayors could ensure that their requests are seen before offers are made, while the international community could help them to match demands and offers by keeping the system open to newcomers and new forms of funding. This model would assure sustainability by ensuring that financial support from international organisations responds to actual demands and delivers tailormade solutions. Open Access  This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits any use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author(s) and the source are credited.

References CoR. (2014a). Resolutions on Ukraine. Resolution, CoR 536/2014. CoR. (2014b). Resolutions on Ukraine. Resolution, CoR 1995/2014. Mogherini, F. (2015). ‘Regional and local authorities and the EU’s external action’. Speech made to the plenary session of the CoR, Brussels, 13 October 2015. http://cor. europa.eu/en/news/Documents/mogherini-speech.pdf. Accessed 13 October 2016. UN. (2015). The millennium development goals report 2015. New York: United Nations. Van der Pluijm, R. (2007). City diplomacy: The expanding role of cities in international policies. The Hague: Clingendael Netherlands Institute of International Relations. Filippo Terruso works for the European People’s Party Group in the European Committee of the Regions (CoR) and has served five presidents of the CoR, working on external relations, including the Eastern Partnership and the Union for the Mediterranean, as well as decentralised cooperation and the Enlargement process.

European View DOI 10.1007/s12290-016-0421-7

ARTICLE

Are there formulas for successful diplomatic agreements? Jorge Mestre‑Jorda 

© The Author(s) 2016. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com

Abstract  The existence of natural panaceas or silver bullets in diplomatic agreements is currently under examination. Diplomacy has evolved from the classical theories of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, which stressed the importance of objective factors, to modern ideas that highlight the human element as well. This explains why finding generalised models in diplomatic arrangements was easier in the old forms of diplomacy than in its more modern counterparts. Diplomatic agreements have become increasingly complex, covering many fields beyond conflict in the traditional sense. The Dayton Accords and Minsk Agreements are good examples of this. This complexity hampers our ability to find a universal formula which can work for all diplomatic situations and agreements. For some scholars a settlement must produce a set of arrangements that lasts for generations, demonstrating robustness and permanence, while for others, the measurement of success is based on the ability of the agreement to meet initial expectations.

J. Mestre‑Jorda (*)  Universidad Europea, Avenida de Aragón, 30, 46021 Valencia, Spain e-mail: [email protected]

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Keywords  Diplomacy | Successful diplomacy | Diplomatic agreement | Old diplomacy | New diplomacy | Ceasefire | Peace settlement | Negotiation

Introduction In light of contemporary diplomatic literature, it is quite difficult to define a ‘successful settlement’. This is because a settlement is a complex and multifaceted outcome of a process, and arises from particular circumstances. For some scholars, a settlement must produce a set of arrangements that lasts for generations, demonstrating robustness and permanence. For others, the concept of success is subject to the ability of the matter at hand to meet initial expectations. At the same time that the notion of success is being broadly contested, the existence of natural panaceas or silver bullets in diplomatic agreements has also come under scrutiny. Finding generalised models in diplomatic arrangements was easier in old forms of diplomacy than in its more contemporary counterparts. For example, during the medieval era, the Byzantinian emperors revived the art of diplomacy. They mainly employed three diplomatic strategies: causing rivalry among the barbarians, securing good terms with the frontier tribes via the use of money and flattery, and urging the conversion of pagans to Christianity. These fixed strategies helped Emperor Justinian to expand his empire. Currently, diplomatic practices have to deal with both the varying relations between states and the changing fabric of transnational ties. There is no way of telling if or when a problem can be ‘objectively’ accommodated by a formulated solution. Moreover, every scenario is different and has to be addressed carefully through various approaches. The progressive complexity of diplomatic agreements, which cover many fields beyond traditional conflicts, requires tailor-made solutions. Colombia’s peace accord and referendum were established to work like those of Northern Ireland. However, the situation has turned out to be more like that of Cyprus, where in 2004 voters refused the Annan Plan proposed by former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan. In Cyprus, the UN mediators conceived a plan to reunite the island and to reach an agreement on certain power-sharing forms of government. In the end, however, political leaders in some areas of the island rejected the agreement and campaigned against it. Like Colombia’s rejection of the peace accord, the rejection of the Annan Plan showed that expectations were very high for the agreement. Although some scholars have defended the presence of useful formulas in the various stages of reaching an agreement, this article argues that it is hard to find a comprehensive formula that will work for all diplomatic situations and agreements. The remainder of this article proceeds in four sections. First, the article reviews the concept of successful diplomacy. In the second section, it compares the formulas and methods of ‘old diplomacy’ with those of ‘new diplomacy’. Moving forward, it analyses some common elements necessary for a successful deal by contrasting the methods of

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old diplomacy with those of new diplomacy. The article concludes with a comprehensive discussion of the critical factors involved in a successful deal.

What constitutes success? Peace settlements do not follow the same pattern as those on trade or environmental issues. For example, the recent Paris climate change agreement is considered, by some, to have been the world’s greatest diplomatic success. In contrast, the previous global attempt to resolve the issues of climate change, held in Copenhagen in 2009, broke down into chaos and recriminations. Thus the settlement in Paris was an improvisation on the previous failure to achieve success. Conversely, peace accords have evolved historically from an old idea that attributes a military victory in substantial documents which are the result of a long negotiation process. Tanisha M. Fazal represents the views of some scholars when she states that the use of peace treaties to conclude interstate war has seen a dramatic decline since 1950. Approximately three-quarters of nineteenth-century interstate wars were accompanied by peace agreements. This number drops to about forty percent for the twentieth century as a whole, and to a mere fifteen percent for interstate wars after 1950. Like declarations of war that used to accompany the start of a conflict, peace treaties may be falling into desuetude. (Fazal 2013, 4) In 1994, Arthur M. Schlesinger observed that, ‘diplomacy is useful when the rules of the game have general agreement. However, the ideological wars of the twentieth century shattered the context of shared values’ (Schlesinger 1994, 150). According to Schlesinger, the disappearance of Communism had opened new doors for diplomacy; that is, at least until the conceivable revival of fascism, which would renew ideological warfare. If ideology were not the root of the conflicts that the world faces today, it would be easier to explain the assertions of Fazal and Schlesinger. However, the wars in Syria and Afghanistan have religious and ethnic components that hinder the negotiation process, which has led to delays in potential settlements. This fact is evident in the absence of a peace treaty in Iraq, which could conclude the war. Furthermore, the emergence of asymmetrical transnational threats, such as terrorism and organised crime, also exemplifies this phenomenon. Aiding the cause of this article, Mitchell (1989) describes the different ways of devising successful diplomacy. He explains that in a historical context, some processes have never managed to get the parties into a dialogue, let alone to agree on a ceasefire. The Georgia–Russia war of 2008 is a good example in this context. The author mentions other cases too in which there have been negotiations, but a deal has not been concluded. The course of the Middle East peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians serves as an excellent example of successful diplomacy in which an agreement has not been reached. Mitchell concludes that if the settlement breaks down during the implementation stage then it is bound to compromise trust between the involved parties. The Minsk peace

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process, the series of agreements intended to de-escalate tensions between Russia and Ukraine, is an excellent example that pertains to Mitchell’s last point.

Multidimensional approaches Many people adhere to the common belief that a good settlement is one in which ‘neither side is happy’. The Anglo-Irish Agreement of 1985 was one such compromise, in which neither side achieved complete victory. However, three and a half centuries before this event, the peace settlement of Prague in 1635 between the Holy Roman Empire and the majority of Protestant princes created a brutal situation. The settlement caused France, the Habsburg dynasty’s greatest enemy, to form an alliance with Sweden and the Dutch, against Spain and the Austrian Empire, which caused the Thirty Years’ War to run for another 13 years. Thus, over the years, it was concluded that the ‘neither side is happy’ axiom was not a useful approach for prolonged matters. The Peace of Westphalia, for example, did not ultimately restore order throughout Europe. As a consequence Spain did not acknowledge France’s territorial acquisitions and hence the battles continued until the Treaty of the Pyrenees in 1659. Cardinal Richelieu, who instigated the alliance against Spain, developed the sense of raison d’état (reason of state) more than anyone else in his time. The raison d’état demonstrated that the primary goal of a nation’s conduct was to ensure the protection of the strength of the state. The French cardinal wrote in his Political Testament that states always profit from uninterrupted international negotiations (Richelieu 1961). For Machiavelli (1988), the raison d’état meant that in the case of conflicting goals, the prince was not bound to fulfil promises made in the spirit of diplomacy. In fact, the diplomatic method exercised by sixteenth-century Italians cannot be regarded as exemplary. Their ambassadors were trained with two sets of instructions, the first ostensible and the second secretive. The raison d’état and the law of the strongest continued to arbitrate disputes in successive centuries until 1919. After that, the ‘new’ diplomacy came into being through the efforts of idealists and liberals such as Woodrow Wilson. At first, the ‘new diplomacy was bound to fail’ (Morgenthau 1946, 1080) to prevent the Second World War. However, by the end of 1944 when a series of international conferences was held on the initiative of the US, the new diplomacy was able to provide a new framework to facilitate understanding and to build bridges in international society.

New diplomacy The new diplomacy gave rise to an unknown phenomenon: the need for the interests of the parties to be clearly understood, and then shaped into a shared comprehension of the problem and its solution. Constructive engagement as an appropriate method of reaching

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agreements also entailed ‘open’ diplomacy, in contrast to the ‘secret’ diplomacy of previous periods. In the early 1950s, the European Coal and Steel Community began to unite European states economically and politically, to establish real peace. In 1957, the Treaty of Rome created the European Economic Community, or the ‘Common Market’. However, new diplomacy is not problem-free. Three main issues should be singled out: first of all, for tactical or cultural motives, the parties may use different approaches to negotiation (Zartman and Berman 1982, 143). Different scenarios also require different approaches. The scope of conflict resolution in today’s world is entirely different from what it entailed in the past. Current conflicts, such as those in Ukraine or Syria, for example, where an assertive Russia plays a crucial role, are entirely different from the ones following the collapse of the Soviet Union, when Russia was politically and militarily weak. Second, current problems have been rendered intricate and interrelated, making progress on negotiated solutions even more challenging. Third, the progressive complexity of diplomatic agreements that cover many fields (environmentalism, human migration, trade, etc.) beyond traditional conflict, represents an additional challenge to finding generalised formulas in diplomacy. Ultimately, both cognitive psychology and psychoanalysis have a lot to contribute to our understanding of how diplomatic decisions are made. Diplomacy is based on human instinct. Individuals who are working in a leadership capacity first address the foreign policy issue, then submit their judgements and finally process this information to come up with a useful course of action. Individual perceptions, the leader’s personality and the dynamics of group decision-making are vital psychological factors which have a significant role in shaping foreign policy. The intransigence of either one of the parties, or of both of them, also blocks progress in talks. Policymakers tend to operate based on subjective opinions, regardless of whether these are accurate or not. With the help of analogies, they unconsciously simplify a complex environment while risking oversimplification of the situation. When they look into the past to learn for the future, political leaders tend to draw simple direct comparisons without acknowledging the qualifying conditions. For instance, in 1991, US President George H. W. Bush called Saddam Hussein ‘another Hitler’ (Reston 1990), without paying any attention to the differences between the two men. In 1976, Robert Jervis carried out one of the most influential studies on the role of misperception in foreign policy decision-making. He believed that leaders make policies based upon their perceptions rather than on the actual ‘operational environment’, thus creating misperceptions (Jervis 1976).

Formula exploration Despite what has been mentioned so far, other scholars state that the turning point in the negotiation process may be reached ‘through the course of arriving at a formula’ (Zartman and Berman 1982, 88). They believe that establishing a method that has the

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capability to address the issues relevant to a solution, and can directly lead to drafting implementation details, is a good way to reduce the differences between parties. Berridge (2002) agrees with the concept of formula exploration, as it promises solutions to all the concerns of the parties involved. Lead negotiator and architect of the Bosnia Dayton Accords, Holbrooke (1998), finds similarities between this agreement and the Camp David talks held in September 1978. At the Camp David talks, US President Jimmy Carter made the historic agreement between Egypt and Israel possible, concluding 30 years of hostility between the states. The negotiating team in Dayton interviewed officials involved in Camp David about every detail, no matter how small, concerning the talks, including eating arrangements, telephone connections to the outside world, and the handling of the press. Of greatest interest to us was the question of personal relations between the leaders at Camp David. Had the Americans been able to create any personal rapport between Sadat and Begin? Could we do so at Dayton? Do people become more malleable after being cooped up for days? Will sheer fatigue make tempers flare? I phoned President Carter and listened in fascination as he described how he had tried without success to get Sadat and Begin to talk directly to each other. (Holbrooke 1998, 280) President Carter and Holbrooke both experimented with ‘proximity talks’, a diplomatic technique used in the 1940s at the UN, in which the mediator moves between the two parties, who rarely meet one another face-to-face. This was a form of ‘shuttle diplomacy’, which Kissinger successfully tested during the cessation of hostilities following the Yom Kippur War. The US secretary of state under President Nixon offers an example of the central role played by individual relationships in diplomatic negotiations. He contributed to restoring confidence among the affected countries. Finding a formula for an agreement is indeed reliant on the negotiator’s skill, but is also dependent on the development of the conflict itself. The pressure caused by frequent frictions is so powerful that it can take creativity away from the parties. A lack of creativity makes it difficult to overcome differences. At such times, a mediator is needed. This role can be assumed by effective negotiators or international organisations. Although there is no single silver bullet or panacea at a time of crisis, with only a few very specific exceptions (detailed above), there are independent variables that can have a critical impact, including providing a resolution and forestalling a crisis. The variables include dialogue, negotiation, outcome and commitment. The outcomes of the variables can prevent the situation from deteriorating.

Dialogue and negotiation In the old days, heads of state rarely met one another. On the rare occasions when they did, they expected trouble and even personal danger. In fact, they were often afraid of being kidnapped and therefore met in the middle of a bridge between their

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two territories and talked through a strong oaken barrier for safety. ‘Two great princes who wish to establish good personal relations, should never meet each other face to face, but ought to communicate through good and wise ambassadors’, said Philippe de Commynes, the fifteenth-century French historian and diplomat (de Commynes 1817, 72). He argued that these meetings were expensive, provoked rumours and hostility, aroused false expectations of progress, and, since they were verbal, led to misunderstandings, which eventually led to disillusionment and even hostility. Almost a century later, Cardinal Richelieu’s writings set the benchmark of continuous engagement and ongoing dialogue. Callières (1994) contended that real diplomacy is based on the creation of confidence, and that confidence can be inspired only by good faith. A dialogue leads to an understanding of reciprocal positions and helps in overcoming the lack of trust. Richelieu thought that negotiations should never be interrupted and proposed to carry out an orderly programme of action in an intelligent and ingenious way. The approach that claims that ‘today’s enemy could become tomorrow’s ally’ suggests that only a permanent diplomatic mission can ensure that enough time is spent on negotiation to gain knowledge and influence (Berridge et al. 2001, 23). Cardinal Richelieu’s influence on diplomacy is evident even now. One only needs to look at the changes that have occurred in the Russia–NATO relationship. The NATO– Russia Council was suspended in 2014 amid strained relations over the Ukrainian crisis. However, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg decided to return to the negotiating table with Russia in accordance with some of Richelieu’s advice from 400 years ago. In April 2016 Stoltenberg noted that keeping dialogue open is an important step: ‘When the tensions are high, the need for political dialogue is even more important’ (NATO 2016). In the early 1950s, Churchill’s view of the Communist menace had shifted away from that expressed in his ‘Iron Curtain’ speech of 1946. ‘He sought a more tolerable coexistence with the Soviet Union by way of near-permanent negotiations’ (Kissinger 1994, 505). Churchill advocated the idea of reopening talks with the Soviets, but the American leaders were not receptive to Churchill’s proposal. If dialogue had taken place in a constructive and consultative manner, there might well have been some positive changes in the development of the Cold War. The bargaining stage in conflict management has gained in relevance throughout history. Fortunately, unlike in the past, negotiators are no longer killed by their opponents as a show of power. Bilateral negotiations have achieved satisfactory results since the nineteenth century as an alternative to warfare. Richelieu was the first person to establish that negotiation is an ongoing art and not merely a hurried endeavour. Callières (1994) suggested that the secret of negotiation is to harmonise the real interests of the parties concerned. Unlike in the past, when an ambassador negotiating a treaty was not pressed for time, a lack of mutual understanding in today’s negotiation processes can jeopardise a region’s stability and security. Negotiators must be aware that if they are not

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able to achieve an agreement they must go back ‘to reformulate a framework that works’ (Zartman and Berman 1982, 147). In effect this is exactly what has happened recently in Yemen. More than three months of peace talks, in an attempt to end a war in which 6,500 people had been killed, came to a halt on 6 August 2016. This has left the future of the fragile ceasefire in doubt, which could potentially worsen one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises. The UN special envoy to Yemen said that the talks had been suspended in an attempt to find a lasting solution to the conflict, not a weak one. However, scholars do not agree on this subject. For some, the pressure of time could increase inventiveness and effectiveness, while for others the stress of time pressure reduces the accuracy of the judgements made (Pleydell-Bouverie 2013). Pinfari adds that the absence of time pressure is usually related to longer-lasting agreements (Pinfari 2010). Therefore, face-to-face meetings are a critical tool in creating a positive atmosphere among parties. Kissinger, as US secretary of state, was a practitioner of this approach through his ‘step-by-step’ diplomacy in the 1970s. ‘Throughout thousands of hours of negotiation in the Middle East and Washington… Kissinger summoned all the power of his prodigious intellect to prevent another war’, observes Sheehan (1976, 4). Winslade (2009, 562) remarks that the face-to-face meetings enabled the parties ‘to step out of the contest of perspectives and to appreciate the importance of taking the perspectival difference into account’. Moreover, peace talks that are open to broad social participation are the most successful at producing agreements that work. The two final stages that need to be completed for a successful settlement and to culminate in the signature of the parties are the setting of clear outcomes, which leave no scope for subsequent reinterpretation (Richelieu 1961), and the commitment to fully respecting the accord. The French cardinal argued that a signed treaty must be observed ‘religiously’ (Richelieu 1961, 99). However with the arrival of new diplomacy, other scholars have started to propose that states must not compromise their national interests (Morgenthau 1978). The Russians’ interest in retaining the political leadership of Syria amidst the civil war and the destabilisation in the Middle East causes us to question Russia’s commitment to peace in the region. Compliance makes compromise possible, but it does not assure its success. The Anglo-Irish Agreement of 1985 was initially frustrating as it did not bring peace to Northern Ireland, yet it was critical to bringing new hope of ending the violence to the region. The key to success was the commitment to set up a framework for regular meetings between British and Irish officials to discuss the most divisive matters.

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Conclusion Harold Nicolson claimed that ‘by such slow steps, through such various channels, has the great river of diplomacy changed its bed. The water is the same as formerly; the river is fed by the same tributaries and performs much the same functions. It is merely that it has shifted itself a mile or so in the sand’ (Nicolson 1969, 76). With this quote, the diplomat reminds us that the purpose of diplomacy has not changed at all. Likewise, the essential characteristics of diplomats that are required to achieve outstanding diplomatic success have not changed either. As explained above, there are a plethora of differences between the diplomacy of today and that which prevailed in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Diplomacy has evolved from the classical theories that stressed the importance of objective factors to modern ideas that highlight the human element as well. In statecraft, ‘success’ is generally about achieving an agreement, deal or compromise through dialogue. The requirements of all the parties involved in this dialogue must be accommodated. However, there is no consensus in academic and professional spheres regarding the method used to achieve this. The quest for a formula is practical according to some thinkers, who argue that it will provide a suitable basis ‘for proceeding to the next phase and creating specific agreements on details’ (Zartman and Berman 1982, 144). However, certain obstacles usually impede the process of applying formulas. One obstacle is the existence of unique elements in a successful deal. This makes it difficult to find a universal method or even two similar agreements. Another is the danger that different scenarios entail entirely different approaches to handling, managing and resolving the issues involved. Finally, the third danger is that there may be a situation in which human factors prevent the implementation of a universal method. This includes the presence of many influential actors with whom diplomats must engage, or simply the existence of a double standard: aliis si licet, tibi non licet (‘what is permitted to one side is not permitted to everyone’). The peace accord that put an end to the war between Russia and Georgia closely resembled the protocols signed by Ukraine, the pro-Russian rebels, Russia and the European mediators in Minsk in September 2014 and February 2015. Yet unlike the Minsk Agreements, the Georgian ceasefire has held. The formulaic process of a ceasefire, disarmament, creation of security and elections that worked to end the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina is not currently functioning in Eastern Ukraine as agreed in Minsk. To conclude, even if it is not always possible to standardise formulas in a diplomatic agreement, there are some independent variables which have a critical impact on success: dialogue, real negotiation, clear outcomes and compromise. All of these elements constitute a sound framework within which negotiators can pursue the end to a conflict in a cooperative manner and attain a viable agreement.

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European View

Open Access  This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits any use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author(s) and the source are credited.

References Berridge, G. R. (2002). Diplomacy: Theory and practice (2nd edn.). Basingstoke: Palgrave. Berridge, G. R., Keens-Soper, M., & Otte, T. G. (2001). Diplomatic theory from Machiavelli to Kissinger. Basingstoke: Palgrave. Callières, F. (1994). The art of diplomacy. Lanham, MD: University Press of America. de Commynes, P. (1817). The historical memoirs of Philip de Comines. London: W. McDowall. Fazal, T. M. (2013). The demise of peace treaties in interstate war. International Organization, 67(4), 695–724. Holbrooke, R. (1998). To end a war. New York: Random House. Jervis, R. (1976). Perception and misperception in international politics. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Kissinger, H. (1994). Diplomacy. New York: Simon and Schuster. Machiavelli, N. (1988). In Q. Skinner (ed.), The prince. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Mitchell, C. R. (1989). Conflict resolution and civil war: Reflections on the Sudanese settlement of 1972. Fairfax, Virginia: Center for Conflict Analysis and Resolution, George Mason University. Morgenthau, H. (1946). Diplomacy. The Yale Law Journal, 55(5), 1067–80. Morgenthau, H. (1978). Politics among nations: The struggle for power and peace (5th edn.). New York: Alfred A. Knopf. NATO. (2016). Press conference by NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg following the North Atlantic Council meeting at the level of NATO Defence Ministers. 14 June. http://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/opinions_132349.htm. Accessed 5 August 2016. Nicolson, H. (1969). Diplomacy. London: Oxford.

European View

Pinfari, M. (2010). Time to agree: Time pressure and ‘deadline diplomacy’ in peace negotiations. Doctoral dissertation, London School of Economics and Political Science (University of London). Pleydell-Bouverie, J. (2013). Using deadlines in peace negotiations: How time pressure can effectively bring negotiations to a close. Conflict Management Capstone Paper, Negotiation Practicum. Irvine, California. http://www.academia.edu. Accessed 5 July 2016. Reston, J. (1990). The president: Read his slips. The New York Times, 21 October. http://www.nytimes.com/1990/10/21/opinion/the-president-read-his-slips.html. Accessed 26 October 2016. Richelieu, A. J., & Cardinal et Duc de. (1961). The political testament of Cardinal Richelieu (selections), translated by Henry Bertram Hill. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press. Schlesinger, A. M., Jr. (1994). The measure of diplomacy. Foreign Affairs, 73(4), 150. Sheehan, E. (1976). Step by step in the Middle East. Journal of Palestine Studies, 5(3/4), 3–53. Winslade, J. (2009). The secret knowledge of peacemaking. Negotiation Journal, 25(4), 559–68. Zartman, I. W., & Berman, M. (1982). The practical negotiator. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. Jorge Mestre‑Jorda is a lecturer in international relations at Universidad Europea in Spain. He is also the senior political adviser to the president of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe. He specialises in the foreign and domestic politics of Russia and the post-Soviet states.

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European View DOI 10.1007/s12290-016-0411-9

SATIRICAL REVIEW

Joke theory Roland Freudenstein 

© The Author(s) 2016. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com

One of the universal components of jokes throughout the world is a form of cognitive dissonance, as communication scientists would call it: the confusion caused by talking at cross-purposes. It is usually the result of two people saying the same thing, but meaning something completely different. Take, for example, John Cleese’s unforgettable 1970s’ serial Fawlty Towers. Among German viewers the most popular episode is, unsurprisingly, ‘The Germans’ (YouTube 2009a). Briefly, Basil (Cleese), the manager of an eccentric hotel called Fawlty Towers, is expecting a group of German guests and exhorts his staff ‘not to mention the war’, no matter what. But after an unfortunate encounter between his head and a frying pan, he himself develops a maniacal tendency to bring up the subject so embarrassing to his politically correct post-war German guests. Hence, when he screams at the Germans not to mention the war, and they protest that they (the individuals) didn’t start ‘it’ (the subject), he shouts back, ‘Yes, you [meaning the country] did [start the war]—you invaded Poland!’ At which point the German men get angry and the women burst into tears (clichés can be funny too).

R. Freudenstein (*)  Wilfried Martens Centre for European Studies, Rue du Commerce 20, 1000 Brussels, Belgium e-mail: [email protected]

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European View

Looking at cross-Channel communication preceding the Brexit vote, one cannot help but think that some form of cognitive dissonance must have taken hold here a long time ago. To us Continentals, British Euroscepticism, which pre-dates the days of Margaret Thatcher, has acquired a laughable quaintness, alongside eccentric lordships, outdated social hierarchies, and the economic and technological backwardness that, in our view, is associated with a Britain stuck in the glorious past of Empire and the Second World War. What we constantly overlook at our peril, however, is that in the eyes of many of the Leave campaign’s leaders, things are entirely the other way around. From this point of view the Continent is seen as stuck in a twentieth-century welfare-state mentality, the EU is primarily seen as an instrument that protects citizens from global competition and Europeans still believe in replacing Europe’s nations with a Brussels-based super-state. In contrast, Britain is considered to be more in tune with the less-regulated emerging economies of other continents and the persistent reality of nation-states. Long-standing Eurosceptics such as Dan Hannan, Liam Fox and Boris Johnson offer good examples of this mentality. Of course, the Leave campaign also fed on conspiracy theories, antielite rejectionism, and fears of immigration and globalisation. But apparently these contradictions did not do the campaign any harm. While managing the Brexit negotiations, the remaining 27 EU member states should remember to keep an eye on the cognitive dissonance that has characterised the debate on Britain’s relations with them, pre- as well as post-Brexit. There is also confusion in the context of the Brexit debate which directly involves another timeless Cleese classic: the film The Life of Brian. In one of its most famous scenes, Cleese, as the leader of the People’s Front of Judea in Roman-occupied Palestine, theatrically asks his acolytes, ‘What have the Romans ever done for us?’ (YouTube 2009b)—implying that the obvious answer is ‘nothing’. However, one after the other, the rebels come up with a series of important societal, technological and infrastructural improvements which, taken together, depict the Roman Empire as a benign hegemon intent on bringing progress. This meme was used in spring 2016 in a brilliantly acted clip about the European Convention of Human Rights (ECHR) (YouTube 2016). Here the Eurosceptic refrain ‘What has the ECHR ever done for us?’ was answered by an ever-growing list of civic rights and freedoms which are guaranteed by the Convention. This, by the way, has nothing to do with the EU, but was particularly popular among Remain campaigners. The clip went viral a few weeks before the referendum. The problem is the obvious reply by a Eurosceptic: that of course, these rights and freedoms do represent indispensable elements of Western modernity—but for the ECHR to be able to guarantee them, it has to be backed up by nation-states with their constitutions, administrations, judiciaries and—ultimately—armies. So who is really guaranteeing civic rights? Sometimes the comical aspects of confusion are best enjoyed in full awareness of their everlasting presence in political debates.

European View

Open Access  This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons AttributionLicense which permits any use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the originalauthor(s) and the source are credited.

References YouTube. (2009a). Don’t mention the war!—Fawlty Towers—BBC. 15 October. https:// www.youtube.com/watch?v=yfl6Lu3xQW0. Accessed 4 October 2016. YouTube. (2009b). What have the Romans…—Monty Python’s Life of Brian. 14 January. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qc7HmhrgTuQ. Accessed 4 October 2016. YouTube. (2016). Patrick Stewart sketch: What has the ECHR ever done for us? The Guardian, 25 April. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ptfmAY6M6aA. Accessed 4 October 2016. Roland Freudenstein is policy director at the Wilfried Martens Centre for European Studies.

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 uropean View (2016) 15:351 E DOI 10.1007/s12290-016-0415-5

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

Germany and the Juncker Plan IN FOCUS: three steps to reconcile fiscal consolidation and investment Eoin Drea · Simon Conry  © The Author(s) 2016. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com

Unsurprisingly even within the ‘Brussels bubble’ economists cannot agree on the ultimate result of President Juncker’s European Fund for Strategic Investments (Juncker Plan). The mobilisation of additional funding mechanisms—over and above agreed national and EU frameworks—has caused unease with those who have prioritised budgetary consolidation as an immediate policy imperative. However, this note highlights that fiscal balance and increased investment are not mutually exclusive political actions, but rather form important elements of a sustainable economic policy framework. Open Access  This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits any use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author(s) and the source are credited. Eoin Drea,  Ph.D., is Research Officer at the Wilfried Martens Centre for European Studies. Simon Conry is an economist and public affairs consultant, working in public and private sectors in Ireland and Europe. 

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 uropean View (2016) 15:353 E DOI 10.1007/s12290-016-0418-2

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

No illusions, no regrets: the current struggle to reform Ukraine Maksym Popovych 

© The Author(s) 2016. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com

This paper argues that positive changes in Ukraine in its economy, political system and public institutions depend on a clear escape from the Soviet legacy, which provokes political populism and stalls reforms. Despite the immense challenges of the Russian military intervention and the declining economy, Ukraine has made progress with its ambitious reform agenda. This paper discusses the achievements and setbacks in four policy areas: decentralisation, energy, the civil service and anti-corruption. Open Access This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits any use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author(s) and the source are credited. Maksym Popovych  focuses on policy research in the areas of energy, the Euro-Atlantic integration of Ukraine and the European Neighbourhood Policy.

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 uropean View (2016) 15:355 E DOI 10.1007/s12290-016-0417-3

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

From disapproval to change? Russia’s population may surprise Putin at the next elections Vladimir Milov  © The Author(s) 2016. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com

Most of the recent commentary around Russian politics has been focused largely on one issue, the high personal approval ratings of Vladimir Putin. But the Russian political system is complicated, and even the ruling force consists of many elements: government, the ruling ‘United Russia’ party, Parliament, regional governors, and so forth. There are strong and growing signs that the Russian population is deeply unhappy with the current situation, and that discontent has a chance to spill over into the territory of political consequences. Despite the fact that Putin’s overall hold on the country remains largely unchallenged, authorities run a very serious risk of showing weak results at the upcoming Parliamentary elections in September 2016. Open Access  This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits any use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author(s) and the source are credited. Vladimir Milov  is Chairman of the Democratic Choice Party in Russia and Director of the Institute of Energy Policy. He is the former Deputy Minister of Energy of Russia.

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 uropean View (2016) 15:357 E DOI 10.1007/s12290-016-0414-6

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

The bear in sheep’s clothing: Russia’s government‑funded organisations in the EU Vladislava Vojtíšková · Vít Novotný · Hubertus Schmid‑Schmidsfelden · Kristina Potapova  © The Author(s) 2016. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com

This paper sheds light on organisations operating in Europe that are funded by the Russian government, whether officially or unofficially. Their goal is to shift European public opinion towards a positive view of Russian politics and policies, and towards respect for its great power ambitions. The paper recommends fostering the EU’s own narrative, which is based on human rights, freedom and equality; supporting pro-democratic civil society so that Europeans become more resistant to Russian propaganda. Vladislava Vojtíšková currently works for the Czech government and the European Values think tank. Vít Novotný is a senior research officer at the Martens Centre. Hubertus Schmid‑Schmidsfelden works for the Federation of Austrian Industries. Kristina Potapova focuses on research in the area of Russia’s information warfare at the Martens Centre.

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 uropean View (2016) 15:359 E DOI 10.1007/s12290-016-0413-7

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

What the EU can, may and should do to support Georgia Teona Lavrelashvili 

© The Author(s) 2016. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com

The paper considers current political challenges encountered by Georgia and the geopolitical framework in which the EU-Georgia relationship develops. Plagued by a multitude of problems and challenges, the West’s interest in the country has been diminishing, while Russia is intensifying its propaganda machine and other dangerous tools at its disposal. The EU can and should develop a more differentiated approach to the South Caucasus and the Eastern Neighbourhood based less on geography and more on democratic achievements and strategic importance. Open Access  This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits any use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author(s) and the source are credited. Teona Lavrelashvili has worked at the Wilfried Martens Centre for European Studies in 2016. She worked in the European Parliament as well as at the International School of Protocol and Diplomacy in Brussels.

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 uropean View (2016) 15:361 E DOI 10.1007/s12290-016-0416-4

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

The Tsar and his business serfs: Russian oligarchs and SMEs did not surprise Putin at the elections Ilya Zaslavskiy  © The Author(s) 2016. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com

Despite deteriorating economic conditions, the Russian business community has remained loyal to the Kremlin: the elites have not become divided over the relatively mild Western sanctions, as Putin has managed to keep the wealthiest power brokers at bay through a variety of carrot-and-stick policies. Large commercial entities continue to rely on state contracts and other government support, while the Kremlin’s business insiders have been finding innovative ways to circumvent Western sanctions. As the Kremlin has failed to help small and medium-sized businesses with predictable fiscal policy and relaxed regulation, the entrepreneurs have mostly reacted with more austerity and by moving into a shadow economy. Given the current level of relatively superficial sanctions, the US and the EU will probably have to play a long-term game before the Kremlin changes its aggressive domestic and foreign policies. Ilya Zaslavskiy is a Research Expert at the Free Russia Foundation and a Visiting Senior Fellow at the Legatum Institute and Academy Associate at Chatham House.

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