Join us in the next #SkytteTalks session with Dr. Thomas Däubler (University College Dublin, Ireland) on 13 May at 10:15 at the Johan Skytte Institute of Political Studies (Lossi 36-305). The lecture will be held in English.
Climate change mitigation policies impose concentrated and immediate costs in exchange for diffuse and future benefits, which may discourage elected representatives to promote them. The strong electoral performance of the populist radical right (PRR) and its politicization of environmental issues may reinforce this political challenge.
Between 2019 and 2024, the European Commission has proposed several far-reaching mitigation measures linked to the European Green Deal. However, since the 2024 European election, many of the flagship policies have been weakened or delayed. This makes the European Parliament (EP) an excellent setting for examining the legislative politics of de-carbonization. It allows us to track how MEPs from a large variety of national political backgrounds vote on the same set of diverse proposals. Statistical analysis of these roll-call votes is complemented with qualitative evidence from interviews with MEPs and parliamentary assistants. For the 2019-2024 period, we find that, beyond national party ideology and European party group influences, stronger national-level competition from the PRR is moderately associated with reduced support for green policies. In the current EP, support of the roll-back is notably also driven by economically liberal and Euroskeptic views. In both periods, we find evidence for country-level influences that vary across votes. The talk is based on an on-going joint project with Mihail Chiru (University of Oxford).
Dr. Thomas Däubler teaches comparative politics and research methods in the School of Politics and International Relations at University College Dublin. His research mainly covers electoral systems, parliamentary behaviour and political parties. He is currently working on several projects that examine the links between the Green Transition and political representation.
This lecture is moderated by Martin Mölder (Associate Professor of Political Science, Johan Skytte Institute of Political Studies).
Project "Cooperation between universities to promote doctoral studies" (2021-2027.4.04.24-0003) is co-funded by the European Union.
