Paper Titles & Abstracts

Since the outbreak of the current 'Eurocrisis', Euroscepticism has entered mainstream public discourse in virtually all EU Member States; so have anti-austerity protests and debates, in which Eurosceptic arguments or slogans often feature prominently. Nevertheless, precisely how Eurosceptic and anti-austerity discourse feed into each other, and the ways in which they are formulated and advanced in the public (media) sphere remains relatively unchartered. Unpacking the 'making-of' anti-austerity Euroscepticism is key for understanding how the current Eurocrisis is impacting on the logic of EU contestation, and thus on the EU legitimacy discourse. Although citizens' protest initiatives such as the Los Indignados in Spain, or their Greek equivalent Oi Aganaktismenoi do not define themselves as Eurosceptic nor is the EU their primary target, their manifestos encompass both the populist and nationalist discourse of right-wing Eurosceptics, as well as the anti-capitalist arguments of left-wing Eurosceptic parties and the anti-globalisation movement. This paper proposes the systematic mapping of crisis-fuelled EU contestation using a coding matrix that captures and analyses both positive and negative public statements concerning the EU polity and its role in the current crisis. Euroscepticism is not examined in isolation from but as a response to pro-EU discourse, while both are treated as only two of several possible types of EU-contestation claims. This matrix allows for a versatile and flexible coding of statements, making it possible to accurately capture anti-austerity EU contestation which challenges the legitimacy of the EU polity but which breaks away from more established manifestations of Euroscepticism.