Date: 2024
Type: Article
Unequal perspectives? : income inequality as a benchmark for support for European integration
European Union politics, 2023, OnlineFirst
ECK, Bjarn, SCHREURS, Sven, Unequal perspectives? : income inequality as a benchmark for support for European integration, European Union politics, 2023, OnlineFirst
- https://hdl.handle.net/1814/76505
Retrieved from Cadmus, EUI Research Repository
Despite growing attention to income inequality in debates about European integration, our understanding of its effect on European Union support remains limited. Using European Social Survey data from 2002 to 2020, we analyse how income inequality and pro-redistribution attitudes shape diffuse and specific forms of support for the European Union. We find no direct effect of country-level income inequality, while individual support for redistribution has a negative effect on both. In line with benchmarking theory, inequality emerges as a contextual moderator: in unequal national settings, egalitarian citizens are comparatively more supportive of further integration than in more equal countries. This effect persists when we control for income position, suggesting an ideological rather than utilitarian basis for benchmarking European Union attitudes. We discuss implications in light of debates about a social Europe.
Additional information:
Published online: 22 January 2024
Cadmus permanent link: https://hdl.handle.net/1814/76505
Full-text via DOI: 10.1177/14651165231226054
ISSN: 1465-1165; 1741-2757
Publisher: Sage
Files associated with this item
- Name:
- Unequal_perspectives_Art_2024.pdf
- Size:
- 769.1Kb
- Format:
- Description:
- Full text in Open Access, Published ...