Growing Disillusionment As Crisis Wears Down Support for EU: Study
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The European Union is the new “sick man of Europe” as public support for the European project falls and distrust between countries grows, according to a Pew study that surveyed the damaged caused by the region’s prolonged debt crisis.
Approval of the 27-nation European Union, which was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize last year, has sunk in five of the eight European Union countries surveyed by the Pew Research Centre in 2013.
The European Union is the new “sick man of Europe” as public support for the European project falls and distrust between countries grows, according to a Pew study that surveyed the damaged caused by the region’s prolonged debt crisis.
Approval of the 27-nation European Union, which was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize last year, has sunk in five of the eight European Union countries surveyed by the Pew Research Centre in 2013.
“The effort over the past half-century to create a more united Europe is now the principal casualty of the euro crisis,” said the report The New Sick Man of Europe: the European Union. “The European project now stands in disrepute across much of Europe.”
Only in Germany did a majority of respondents believe European integration has benefitted the economy. Across the eight countries, support for the EU fell to a median of 45 percent from 60 percent last year.
The polls were conducted during March in Germany, Britain, France, Italy, Spain, Greece, Poland and the Czech Republic, by telephone or in person, with between 700 and 1,100 adults in each country. Each poll has a margin of sampling error of either three or four percentage points.
Despite the region’s prolonged economic crisis, most people in the eurozone are unwilling to ditch the euro. Substantial majorities in each country said they wanted to keep it, ranging from 63 percent in France to 69 percent in Greece.
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More significantly, the Pew survey also captured the widening chasm between Germany in terms of support for greater integration.
Only 22 percent of French respondents said they wanted more centralised control of national budgets whereas 54 percent of Germans were favourable. Voters in Europe’s strongest economy are keen to take power away from leaders in southern European countries, which they deem less fiscally responsible, preferring stronger monitoring by technocrats in Brussels.
The stark division of views between Germans and the French over the EU, however, also reflects a divergence in the economic performance of the two countries during the crisis, the researchers concluded.
“France has historically been considered in the same economic and political league as Germany and Britain,” said the study. “Now, measured by a number of indicators, the French look less like Germans and a lot more like the Spanish, the Italians and the Greeks.”
Drawing particular attention to France, Pew described the eurozone’s second-largest economy as “dyspeptic”, “dispirited” and “disillusioned”. “No European country is becoming more dispirited and disillusioned faster than France. In just the past year, the public mood has soured dramatically across the board,” it said.
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One surprise in the Pew findings is that the German public might not be as opposed to providing financial aid to other European countries as the country’s policymakers often suggest.
Since the Greek debt crisis unravelled three years ago, lawmakers in creditor nations like Germany have warned that their own taxpayers will not accept the mounting costs of bailouts. But among the richer nations surveyed, the Germans were most likely to be willing to extend such aid, though it was with the support of only 52 percent of the Pew respondents.
Despite widespread socioeconomic suffering in peripheral eurozone economies, the Washington-based group also found that Europeans were in favour of austerity policies.
“Despite the vocal political debate about austerity, a clear majority in five of eight countries surveyed still think the best way to solve their country’s economic problems is to cut government spending, not spend more money,” Pew said.
The countries favouring spending cuts included Italy and Spain, which are both in the grip of prolonged recessions made worse by their efforts to bring down government borrowing. On average, 59 percent backed further austerity in the survey, against 29 percent in favour of more spending to stimulate the economy.
