IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ehl/lserod/39848.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Trade unions and “Europe”: are the members out of step?

Author

Listed:
  • Hyman, Richard

Abstract

The ‘no’ vote in the Irish referendum of June 2008 on the Lisbon Treaty – reversed in October 2009 – threw the European Union into crisis. Yet it reflected a familiar pattern of popular rejection of initiatives on European integration. This article provides an overview of such referendums in western Europe (unfortunately, the author lacks the linguistic competence to cover most post-2004 member states). It is evident that while mainstream trade unions (or at least their leaders) have usually endorsed the integration process, in most countries where referendums have been held their members have voted otherwise. Such rejection has often been based on ‘progressive’ rather than ‘reactionary’ grounds. Popular attitudes are malleable, but it requires a major strategic re-orientation if unions are to reconnect with their members in order to build a popular movement for a genuinely social Europe.

Suggested Citation

  • Hyman, Richard, 2009. "Trade unions and “Europe”: are the members out of step?," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 39848, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    • Handle: RePEc:ehl:lserod:39848
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/39848/
    File Function: Open access version.
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Karin Gilland, 2002. "Ireland’s (First) Referendum on the Treaty of Nice," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 40(3), pages 527-535, September.
    2. Ingrid Sogner & Clive Archer, 1995. "Norway and Europe: 1972 and Now," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 33(3), pages 389-410, September.
    3. repec:bla:jcmkts:v:44:y:2006:i::p:7-25 is not listed on IDEAS
    4. MARK FRANKLIN & MICHAEL MARSH & LAUREN McLAREN, 1994. "Uncorking the Bottle: Popular Opposition to European Unification in the Wake of Maastricht," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 32(4), pages 455-472, December.
    5. Marcel Lubbers, 2008. "Regarding the Dutch `Nee' to the European Constitution," European Union Politics, , vol. 9(1), pages 59-86, March.
    6. David Arter, 1995. "The EU Referendum in Finland on 16 October 1994: A Vote for the West, not for Maastricht," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 33(3), pages 361-387, September.
    7. Marco Dani, 2009. "Economic and social conflicts, integration and constitutionalism in contemporary Europe," Europe in Question Discussion Paper Series of the London School of Economics (LEQs) 3, London School of Economics / European Institute.
    8. Pascal Sciarini & Ola Listhaug, 1997. "Single Cases or a Unique Pair? The Swiss and Norwegian ‘No’ to Europe," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 35(3), pages 407-438, September.
    9. Wolfram Kaiser, 1995. "Austria in the European Union," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 33(3), pages 411-425, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Richard Hyman, 2010. "Trade Unions and ‘Europe’: Are the Members out of Step?," LEQS – LSE 'Europe in Question' Discussion Paper Series 14, European Institute, LSE.
    2. Richard Hyman, 2009. "Trade Unions and ‘Europe’: Are the Members out of Step?," Europe in Question Discussion Paper Series of the London School of Economics (LEQs) 4, London School of Economics / European Institute.
    3. Pierre-Guillaume Meon, 2009. "Voting and turning out for monetary integration: the case of the French referendum on the Maastricht treaty," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 41(18), pages 2369-2384.
    4. Catherine E. De Vries, 2017. "Benchmarking Brexit: How the British Decision to Leave Shapes EU Public Opinion," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 55, pages 38-53, September.
    5. Vassilis Tselios & Andrés Rodríguez-Pose, 2020. "Did Decentralisation Affect Citizens’ Perception of the European Union? The Impact during the Height of Decentralisation in Europe," Economies, MDPI, vol. 8(2), pages 1-26, May.
    6. Vassilis Monastiriotis & Sotirios Zartaloudis, 2010. "Beyond the crisis: EMU and labour market reform pressures in good and bad times," LEQS – LSE 'Europe in Question' Discussion Paper Series 23, European Institute, LSE.
    7. Johan A. Elkink & David M. Farrell & Theresa Reidy & Jane Suiter, 2015. "Understanding the 2015 Marriage Referendum in Ireland: Constitutional Convention, Campaign, and Conservative Ireland," Working Papers 201521, Geary Institute, University College Dublin.
    8. Noah Carl & James Dennison & Geoffrey Evans, 2019. "European but not European enough: An explanation for Brexit," European Union Politics, , vol. 20(2), pages 282-304, June.
    9. Bert N Bakker & Claes H de Vreese, 2016. "Personality and European Union attitudes: Relationships across European Union attitude dimensions," European Union Politics, , vol. 17(1), pages 25-45, March.
    10. Nicola Pensiero, 2020. "To leave or not to leave? Understanding the support for the United Kingdom membership in the European Union: Identity, attitudes towards the political system and socio-economic status," Rationality and Society, , vol. 32(3), pages 255-277, August.
    11. Tridimas, George, 2007. "Ratification through referendum or parliamentary vote: When to call a non-required referendum?," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 23(3), pages 674-692, September.
    12. John Curtice, 2017. "Why Leave Won the UK's EU Referendum," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 55, pages 19-37, September.
    13. Ece Özlem Atikcan, 2015. "The Puzzle of Double Referendums in the European Union," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 53(5), pages 937-956, September.
    14. Pascal Sciarini & Anke Tresch, 2009. "A Two-Level Analysis of the Determinants of Direct Democratic Choices in European, Immigration and Foreign Policy in Switzerland," European Union Politics, , vol. 10(4), pages 456-481, December.
    15. Christoph Mikulaschek, 2023. "The responsive public: How European Union decisions shape public opinion on salient policies," European Union Politics, , vol. 24(4), pages 645-665, December.
    16. Florian Stoeckel, 2013. "Ambivalent or indifferent? Reconsidering the structure of EU public opinion," European Union Politics, , vol. 14(1), pages 23-45, March.
    17. Netjes, Catherine E. & Edwards, Erica, 2005. "Taking Europe to its extremes: Examining cueing effects of right-wing populist parties on public opinion regarding European integration," Discussion Papers, Research Unit: Democracy and Democratization SP IV 2005-202, WZB Berlin Social Science Center.
    18. Campos, Nauro F. & Coricelli, Fabrizio & Franceschi, Emanuele, 2022. "Institutional integration and productivity growth: Evidence from the 1995 enlargement of the European Union," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 142(C).
    19. Julie Hassing Nielsen, 2016. "Personality and Euroscepticism: The Impact of Personality on Attitudes Towards the EU," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 54(5), pages 1175-1198, September.
    20. repec:bla:jcmkts:v:47:y:2009:i::p:601-623 is not listed on IDEAS
    21. Lisbet Hooghe & Gary Marks, 2005. "The Neofunctionalists Were (almost) Right: Politicization and European Integration," The Constitutionalism Web-Papers p0024, University of Hamburg, Faculty for Economics and Social Sciences, Department of Social Sciences, Institute of Political Science.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • R14 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - General Regional Economics - - - Land Use Patterns
    • J01 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - General - - - Labor Economics: General

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ehl:lserod:39848. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: LSERO Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/lsepsuk.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.