EUROPEAN UNION 4-7 Jun 2009 European Union citizens elect Parliament in 30th anniversary year of universal suffrage

Twenty-seven European Union countries hold elections for the European Parliament, 30 years after the assembly was directly elected by citizens of the bloc for the first time. Some 400 million Europeans will be eligible to elect now-736 Members of the European Parliament. The number of MEPs has been trimmed from 785-strong body after politically-charged negotiations.

The election is the only European institution where citizens have a direct vote. One question is whether 2009 will set the record for low voter turnout. EU figures show average voter participation has dropped steadily from 63 per cent in 1979 to a record-low of 45.6 per cent in 2004, the last election.

A related question is whether the result in 2009 will reflect less euroscepticism or more. Collectively, the 2009 result could be a protest vote.

The first elections with universal suffrage took place on 7 and 10 Jun 1979.

In the first discussion in the constitutional committee on 3 Sep 2007 there was a consensus on establishing clear mathematical rules for the distribution of seats to avoid trading and injustices. The total number of seats could fall even farther automatically if the negotiations fail.

This is because in case of failure, the present rules would be automatically modified in 2009 in such a way that the total number of deputies would fall to 736. Only Germany, Slovenia, Estonia, Cyprus, Luxembourg and Malta would maintain their current numbers. The rest of the member states would lose several seats.

Two political scientists at the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies in Germany, Philip Manow and Holger Doering, took a close look at the "pro-EU" and "contra-EU" positions of the European Parliament as well as national governments since 1979.

They observed in the institute's 2007-2008 yearbook that governments have gradually become slightly more "pro-EU" over the years. The EU parliament, by contrast, has become more "contra-EU" since the mid-1990s - which means citizens have been electing an increasing number of eurosceptic MEPs. The researchers interpret the data to mean that voters are increasingly using EU Parliament elections to express dissatisfaction with the bloc and the pro-European attitudes of their national governments.

Interviewed by the EU Observer, Manow said "voters have a diffuse feeling that Europe has gone too far and that their national governments have a tendency to accept too much of further European integration. ... We claim [voters] increasingly express their European preferences, which they - rightly - feel to be systematically misrepresented by their national governments." He predicted the trend is only likely to continue in the 2009 EU Parliament election and thereafter, and that the body will become more eurosceptic over time since a European protest vote will bring more and more eurosceptic parties into the parliament."

MEPs sit in political groups in the European Parliament, which are made up of likeminded parties from several member states. These groupings act like European political parties and enable alliances to be formed and compromises to be negotiated.

The largest of the present eight groups are: Group of the European People's Party (Christian Democrats) and European Democrats, the biggest, with 278 seats; followed by Socialist Group in the European Parliament 216. In fourth place is Group of the Greens / European Free Alliance, with 42 Members. With the present global focus on climate change, the group could expect to increase its percentage of seats.

RELATED READING:

European Parliament fact sheet
http://www.europarl.europa.eu/factsheets/default_en.htm

European Parliament political groups
http://www.europarl.europa.eu/groups/default_en.htm

European Parliament elections 2004 voter turnout (Euractiv 30 Jun 2004)
http://www.euractiv.com/en/elections/european-parliament-elections-2004-results/article-117482