IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/cdl/econwp/qt4gb278j5.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Dimensions of Politics in the European Parliament

Author

Listed:
  • Hix, Simon
  • Noury, Abdul
  • Roland, Gerard

Abstract

We investigate the dimensionality of political conflict in the European Parliament by applying scaling method techniques to all roll-call votes between 1979 and 2001 in the European Parliament. Contrary to most existing studies using scaling methods, we are able to interpret the substantive content of the observed dimensions using exogenous measures of national party policy positions. We find that the main dimension of politics in the EU’s only elected institution is the classic left-right dimension found in domestic politics. A second dimension is also present, although to a lesser extent, which is explained by conflicts between the parties in ‘government’ in the EU Council and Commission and the parties in ‘opposition’ in the Parliament.

Suggested Citation

  • Hix, Simon & Noury, Abdul & Roland, Gerard, 2005. "Dimensions of Politics in the European Parliament," Department of Economics, Working Paper Series qt4gb278j5, Department of Economics, Institute for Business and Economic Research, UC Berkeley.
    • Handle: RePEc:cdl:econwp:qt4gb278j5
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.escholarship.org/uc/item/4gb278j5.pdf;origin=repeccitec
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Schonhardt-Bailey, Cheryl, 2003. "Ideology, Party and Interests in the British Parliament of 1841–47," British Journal of Political Science, Cambridge University Press, vol. 33(4), pages 581-605, October.
    2. Abdul G. Noury, 2002. "Ideology, Nationality and Euro-Parliamentarians," European Union Politics, , vol. 3(1), pages 33-58, March.
    3. Voeten, Erik, 2000. "Clashes in the Assembly," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 54(2), pages 185-215, April.
    4. Tsebelis, George & Garrett, Geoffrey, 2001. "The Institutional Foundations of Intergovernmentalism and Supranationalism in the European Union," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 55(2), pages 357-390, April.
    5. Abdul Ghafar Noury & Gérard Roland, 2002. "More power to the European Parliament?," ULB Institutional Repository 2013/7760, ULB -- Universite Libre de Bruxelles.
    6. Poole, Keith T., 2000. "Nonparametric Unfolding of Binary Choice Data," Political Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 8(3), pages 211-237, March.
    7. Simon Hix, 2001. "Legislative Behaviour and Party Competition in the European Parliament: An Application of Nominate to the EU," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 39(4), pages 663-688, November.
    8. Abdul Ghafar Noury & Gérard Roland, 2002. "More power to the European Parliament? Should it have more power?," ULB Institutional Repository 2013/254195, ULB -- Universite Libre de Bruxelles.
    9. Diermeier, Daniel & Feddersen, Timothy J., 1998. "Cohesion in Legislatures and the Vote of Confidence Procedure," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 92(3), pages 611-621, September.
    10. Abdul G. Noury & Gérard Roland, 2002. "More power to the European Parliament? [‘Nice try: Should the Treaty of Nice be ratified’?]," Economic Policy, CEPR, CESifo, Sciences Po;CES;MSH, vol. 17(35), pages 279-319.
    11. Laver, Michael & Benoit, Kenneth & Garry, John, 2003. "Extracting Policy Positions from Political Texts Using Words as Data," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 97(2), pages 311-331, May.
    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. Simon Hix & Abdul Noury & Gerard Roland, 2018. "Is there a selection bias in roll call votes? Evidence from the European Parliament," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 176(1), pages 211-228, July.
    2. Simon Hix, Abdul Noury, Gérard Roland, 2003. "How to Choose the European Executive: A Counterfactual Analysis (1979-1999)," Les Cahiers européens de Sciences Po 1, Centre d'études européennes (CEE) at Sciences Po, Paris.
    3. Abdul Ghafar Noury & Simon Hix & Gérard Roland, 2003. "How to choose the European executive? A counterfactual analysis, 1979-2001," ULB Institutional Repository 2013/8516, ULB -- Universite Libre de Bruxelles.
    4. Vaubel, Roland, 2003. "Principal-Agent-Probleme in internationalen Organisationen," HWWA Discussion Papers 219, Hamburg Institute of International Economics (HWWA).
    5. Luis E. Mejía, 2021. "Judicial review of regulatory decisions: Decoding the contents of appeals against agencies in Spain and the United Kingdom," Regulation & Governance, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 15(3), pages 760-784, July.
    6. James Lo, 2018. "Dynamic ideal point estimation for the European Parliament, 1980–2009," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 176(1), pages 229-246, July.
    7. Abdul Noury, 2004. "Abstention in Daylight: Strategic Calculus of Voting in the European Parliament," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 121(1), pages 179-211, October.
    8. Roland, Gerard, 2003. "New governance of Europe: Parliamentary or presidential?, The," IESE Research Papers D/503, IESE Business School.
    9. Christina Zimmer & Gerald Schneider & Michael Dobbins, 2005. "The Contested Council: Conflict Dimensions of an Intergovernmental EU Institution," Political Studies, Political Studies Association, vol. 53(2), pages 403-422, June.
    10. Abdul Ghafar Noury & Gérard Roland, 2002. "More power to the European Parliament?," ULB Institutional Repository 2013/7760, ULB -- Universite Libre de Bruxelles.
    11. Bernhard Boockmann, 2003. "Mixed Motives: An Empirical Analysis of ILO Roll-Call Voting," Constitutional Political Economy, Springer, vol. 14(4), pages 263-285, December.
    12. Christophe Crombez & Simon Hix, 2011. "Treaty reform and the Commission’s appointment and policy-making role in the European Union," European Union Politics, , vol. 12(3), pages 291-314, September.
    13. Francisco Torres, 2003. "How efficient is joint decision-making in the EU?," Intereconomics: Review of European Economic Policy, Springer;ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics;Centre for European Policy Studies (CEPS), vol. 38(6), pages 312-322, November.
    14. Stefan Napel & Mika Widgrén, 2006. "The Inter-Institutional Distribution of Power in EU Codecision," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 27(1), pages 129-154, August.
    15. Widgren, Mika & Kauppi, Heikki, 2008. "Do Benevolent Aspects Have Room in Explaining EU Budget Receipts?," CEPR Discussion Papers 6778, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    16. Sara Hagemann & Bjørn Høyland, 2010. "Bicameral Politics in the European Union," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 48, pages 811-833, September.
    17. Jeong-Hun Han, 2007. "Analysing Roll Calls of the European Parliament," European Union Politics, , vol. 8(4), pages 479-507, December.
    18. Howard Rosenthal, 2018. "Introduction to the issue in honor of Keith T. Poole," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 176(1), pages 1-5, July.
    19. Daniel Finke & Andreas Fleig, 2013. "The merits of adding complexity: non-separable preferences in spatial models of European Union politics," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 25(4), pages 546-575, October.
    20. Max Albert, 2004. "The Voting Power Approach," European Union Politics, , vol. 5(1), pages 139-146, March.

    More about this item

    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:cdl:econwp:qt4gb278j5. 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: Lisa Schiff (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/ibbrkus.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.