Public Opinion and Policy Outputs in the European Union: A Lost Relationship

The European Union (EU) is assumed to suffer from a democratic deficit whereas there is only weak and indirect connection between public preferences and policy change. This paper investigates empirically whether any relationship exists between public support for European integration and EU policy output (1973-2008). Using a new indicator of policy output the volume of important legislation produced in a semester– we discover a surprising relationship between public support and legislative production. Employing a VAR approach we demonstrate that the levels of public support Granger-cause levels of legislative output but not vice versa, and that the relationship is strong up to the middle of the 1990s but non-existent afterwards. The effect is robust to the inclusion of indicators of the state of economy and government preferences. In addition, we discover that the average level of EU support in the Council of Ministers tracks with a 4-years delay unemployment levels.