Causes and consequences of Euroscepticism in EU regions

The rapid growth in votes for Eurosceptic parties over the past two decades has made it critical to understand both the causes and consequences of this trend. Previous studies have shown that low growth, low education, low density have all contributed to Eurosceptic voting. Cohesion Policy investments tend to reduce the Eurosceptic voting. Regions in a development trap, however, are more likely to vote Eurosceptic.

The first results of an ongoing study show that regions with a high vote share for hard Eurosceptic parties tend to experience slower economic and demographic growth in the following years.

Despite the success of Eurosceptic parties, trust in the EU is today at an all-time high, having fully recovered from its drop after the economic crisis. How do we reconcile this? More generally, how can parties respond to claims that a region is left-behind or that some policies will disproportionately affect some territories?