Framing The European Union

This accessible study explores the impact of political language and campaigning upon public opinion towards European integration.

This book provides a major empirical analysis of differing attitudes to European integration in three of Europe's most important countries: Germany, Spain, and the United Kingdom. From its beginnings, the European Union has resounded with debate over whether to move toward a federal or intergovernmental system. However, Juan Díez Medrano argues that empirical analyses of support for integration--by specialists in international relations, comparative politics, and survey research--have failed to explain why some countries lean toward federalism whereas others lean toward intergovernmentalism. By applying frame analysis to a unique set of primary sources (in-depth interviews, newspaper articles, novels, history texts, political speeches, and survey data), Díez Medrano demonstrates the role of major historical events in transforming national cultures and thus creating new opportunities for political transformation. Clearly written and rigorously argued, Framing Europe explains differences in support for European integration between the three countries studied in light of the degree to which each realized its particular "supranational project" outside Western Europe. Only the United Kingdom succeeded in consolidating an empire and retaining it after World War II, while Germany and Spain each abandoned their corresponding aspirations. These differences meant that these countries' populations developed different degrees of identification as Europeans and, partly in consequence, different degrees of support for the building of a federal Europe.

This book tells the story of the EU Global Strategy (EUGS). By reflecting back on the 2003 European Security Strategy, this book uncovers the background, the process, the content and the follow-up of the EUGS thirteen years later. By framing the EUGS in this broader context, this book is essential for anyone wishing to understand European foreign policy. The author, who drafted the EUGS on behalf of High Representative and Vice President of the Commission (HRVP) Federica Mogherini, uses the lens of the EUGS to provide a broader narrative of the EU and its functioning. Tocci’s hybrid role as a scholar and adviser has given her unique access to and knowledge of a wide range of complex structures and actors, all the while remaining sufficiently detached from official processes to retain an observer’s eye. This book reflects this hybrid nature: while written by and for scholars, it is not a classic scholarly work, but will appeal to anyone wishing to learn more about the EUGS and European foreign policy more broadly.

This book elucidates the link between the politics of a now seemingly permanent crisis in Europe and the politicisation of European integration. Looking at the epistemic dimension of crises, it suggests that the way in which a crisis is framed and contested determines its potential impact on the level of politicisation of European integration. Europe is more challenged and contested today than it has even been, facing crisis of an almost existential kind. Yet, political crises are manufactured and narrated, so Europe has the possibility to intervene and ‘bring about her recovery’, instead of letting these crises prove terminal. This book explores the political process in and through which certain events come to be framed as constitutive of a moment that requires a decisive intervention. It shows that crises require a double framing: a situation needs to be identified as one of crisis in the first place and, subsequently, the nature and character of the crisis need to be specified. By examining a wide range of policy areas, the book demonstrates that framing of crises, i.e., identifying one situation both as a crisis and a crisis of a particular kind, contributes to the politicisation (or depoliticisation) of the process of European integration. The chapters in this book were originally published as special issue of Journal of European Integration.

This timely book invites the reader to explore the lexicon of ‘subjects’ and ‘objects’ of EU law as a platform from which several dilemmas and omissions of EU law can be researched. It includes a number of case studies from different fields of law that deploy this lexicon, structuring the contributions around three principal elements of EU law: its transformations, crises, and external-internal dynamics.

The role of television news in the process of European integration is examined in this work. It includes assessment of the editorial policies of news organizations in Britain, Denmark, and The Netherlands, and investigation of how television news affects the formation of public opinion.

Explores how the framing of issues on the EU agenda affects policy-making. In a study that traces the highly contested developments in biotechnology policy over twenty years, the book introduces the conceptual and theoretical tenets of policy framing and shows how this analytical lens offers a unique perspective on issues in EU policy-making.

Studies in International Institutional Dynamics, 3(International Studies Library, 24)Public policymaking increasingly takes place on an international stage, drawing attention to how international bureaucracies set agendas and shape policy outcomes. This book focuses on the European Union and reveals a key strategy used to influence policymaking by one of its central institutions, the European Commission. While most scholarship on the Commission examines its formal means of influence, this book demonstrates how the Commission employs a more informal method of "strategic framing" to manipulate the ideational framework in which policymaking takes place. This method helps the Commission to privilege certain actors, institutional processes, and policy goals in pursuit of preferred outcomes. The effects of strategic framing are examined in four cases of policy change in the fields of agriculture and biotechnology.Mark Rhinard has produced a significant study of policymaking in the European Union. He points to the complex interactions of ideas and institutions in making policy. The work is especially important for linking ideas of social construction with theories of the policy process. This book deserves reading by all students of the EU and public policy. - B. Guy Peters, University of Pittsburgh - Table of ContentsAcknowledgementsList of TablesList of Frequently Used AcronymsChapter One: IntroductionPART ONE: EMPIRICAL AND THEORETICAL FOUNDATIONSChapter Two: The European Commission and the EU Policy ProcessChapter Three: Strategic FramingPART TWO: REFORMING THE COMMON AGRICULTURAL POLICY, 1988-2003Chapter Four: A Crack in the Armor: EU Agricultural Reform, 1988-1992Chapter Five: Building On Momentum: EU Agricultural Reform, 1993-2003PART THREE: MAKING BIOTECHNOLOGY POLICY IN THE EU, 1980-2001Chapter Six: "Hijacking In Progress": EU Biotechnology Laws, 1980-1990Chapter Seven: Backlash Towards EU Biotechnology Policy, 1991-2001PART FOUR: CONCLUSIONSChapter Eight: Conclusions: Framing As StrategyWorks CitedIndexAbout the Author(s)/Editor(s)Mark Rhinard (PhD, Cambridge) is Senior Research Fellow at the Swedish Institute of International Affairs where he leads the Europe Research Program. He has published extensively on the European Union in scholarly texts and journals.