Assessing the electoral outcome in the 2019 European Parliament election : Substantially influenced by European issues, or still dominated by national issues?

This thesis compares two theories of voter behavior in the 2019 European Parliament election (EP election). The second-order national contest theory claims that the European Parliament elections are basically seen as unimportant and are predominantly about national issues. In contrast, the competing Europe matters theory (or EU matters) claims that voters to a significant degree are motivated by European issues. Research on earlier elections has presented evidence strongly in favor of the second-order national contests theory, however, the most recent elections show more ambiguous results. With Europe having gone through a refugee crisis since the last EP election, and with Brexit taking place in the run-up to the election in 2019 making the future of the Union uncertain, there are strong reasons to challenge the second-order theory, and examine if voters did care more about European affairs in the 2019 EP election to substantially make this election about Europe. This thesis will focus on political parties and the predictions the different theories make on the electoral outcome. The study will use a quantitative research design to investigate if changes in voter support for parties in the 2019 EP election compared to the preceding national general election (national election), are the result of national or European issues. The findings suggest that the EP elections are still primarily about national issues and the expectations from the second-order national contest theory can largely explain the outcome of the 2019 EP election. For instance, in the 2019 EP election, the popularity of governing parties in the national arena seems to significantly affect their electoral performance in the EP election. Furthermore, small parties overperform, suggesting voters do not vote strategically and have little interest in the EP election. At the same time party position on European integration only had minor effect on the outcome, which is expected to be substantial if the elections are about Europe. This study shows that it is too early to dismiss the long-held notion of European Parliament elections as being second-order national contests. More research is, however, needed to examine different aspect of the EP election and the different mechanisms at play for a more complete understanding of the nature of the EP elections