Introduction

European integration has an important transnational partisan dimension, which is often overlooked as the prime ministers and presidents of the member states get most of the media coverage. The key institutions of the European Union (EU) are in turn mainly presented as unitary actors, even though they consist of politicians representing different party families. Indeed, Europarties are most likely unknown entities even among the majority of activists of their national member parties. In the end, this is not surprising. In European Parliament (EP) election campaigns the political groups of the Europarties remain firmly in the background, and Europarties and the EP groups seldom feature in national media. Europarties and their EP groups are officially independent of each other, but it is nonetheless more realistic to view them as part of the same Europarty organization. Political groups exist in the Parliament, while Europarties are extra-parliamentary organizations that bring together national parties across the EU to pursue shared political objectives and to field candidates for leading positions in EU institutions, not least the post of Commission president (the so-called Spitzenkandidaten mechanism).

Through their national heads of government, EP groups, and Commission portfolios, Europarties are in a powerful position to shape the laws and policies of the EU as well as the broader development of European integration. Europarties and their EP groups have also decades of experience from Treaty amendments and inter-institutional bargaining. In these constitutional processes the Europarties have successfully campaigned in favour of deeper integration, the empowerment of the Parliament, and also the consolidation of their own position in the EU’s political regime. But when scholars analyse Treaty reforms, they tend to either completely ignore Europarties or maybe just include occasional references to such party-political networks. Yet, the central argument of our book is that Europarties are ubiquitous but rarely noticed: they are present nearly everywhere and almost all the time, and while their influence is difficult to measure it is much stronger than previously recognized.

There are valid reasons why the party-political dimension of European integration has remained in the background. Member states are the key actors in bargaining about the future of Europe: their signatures are required for Treaty amendments and each country holds the power of veto. Thereby national governments and leaders, not least the German chancellor or the French president, are in the limelight and also get most of the scholarly attention in analyses of Intergovernmental Conferences (IGC). At the same time, there is a range of studies detailing how the main Europarties—those whose national member parties hold executive power in the member states—have shaped Treaty outcomes, particularly through coordinating positions ahead of and during the IGCs.

Heads of government or party leaders may also prefer not to talk about their transnational partisan networks. In IGCs or negotiations on the Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF), the bargaining is primarily framed in the media as a battleground of national interests, where governments are expected not to appear too soft vis-à-vis the other member states. In such an environment, leaders probably are not incentivized to reveal the true weight of partisan ties. The same applies also to European elections, where particularly national parties whose ideological profiles do not match those of their EP groups—with, for example, the EP group being considerably more pro-integrationist than the national party—might lose votes if they highlighted the policy positions of their European-level parties.

Scholars also face the simple problem of measurement. Europarties are ubiquitous, but how to capture their impact? While there are studies on individual Europarties and their role in various IGCs, this line of research typically employs cautious language when assessing the ‘success’ or influence of Europarties. A broadly shared view is that the impact of Europarties depends particularly on the numerical weight of Europarty politicians—as prime ministers or heads of state in the European Council, as Commissioners, or in the Parliament—and the internal cohesion of the Europarty. Furthermore, their influence is always relative and should be examined against the background of national preferences. Here we come to the circular nature of preference formation as the positions of national parties and governments are in turn shaped by the positions of EU institutions and the Europarties.

This book does not claim to solve the problem of how much power exactly Europarties have in Treaty reforms or in the broader process of European integration. In fact, we fully understand the cautiousness of our colleagues, and in many ways are own approach reflects such measurement problems—and also explains why we theoretically focus on the concepts of advocacy and agenda-setting. These concepts are interconnected and emphasize how Europarties are continuously and through a variety of channels engaged in debates about the ‘future of Europe’. The book therefore deliberately focuses on broader patterns and avenues of influence related to advocacy and agenda-setting rather than on specific issues or policy processes. For every issue where Europarties have directly shaped outcomes, there are other processes where such partisan influence is weak or indirect. However, the starting point of this book is that European integration cannot be understood without accounting for the impact of the Europarties. It identifies Europarties as transnational partisan actors that operate both at intergovernmental and supranational levels of EU decision-making. Europarties have consolidated their own organizational structures, and more importantly, have over the decades built their own networks and coalitions that enable them to wield influence in ways not captured by previous studies.

The next section of this chapter briefly summarizes existing knowledge and literature on Europarties.Footnote 1 Third section introduces our research questions, theoretical and conceptual choices, and explains how we contribute to both studies of EU governance and party politics. The final section outlines the structure of the volume.

Europarties: Organization and Influence

Europarties remain something of a black box in studies of both EU governance and political parties. There is an impressive amount of research on both the political groups in the European Parliament and on the EU policies of national parties, but the networks and influence of the Europarties deserve more serious scrutiny. While much of the previous research has explored the organization and even influence of the Europarties, our book is the first one to specifically focus on their role in the broader construction of European integration.

Research clearly shows that Europarties have become more important in the EU political system. Article 138a of the Maastricht Treaty (entered into force in 1993) assigned political parties a specific role to play in the political system of the EU: ‘Political parties at the European level are important as a factor for integration within the Union. They contribute to forming a European awareness and to expressing the political will of the citizens of the Union’. This ‘Party Article’ was subsequently included in the Lisbon Treaty (2009): ‘Political parties at European level contribute to forming European political awareness and to expressing the will of citizens of the Union’. This Treaty base provided the legal and political foundation for the decision to introduce since 2004 public funding of the Europarties from the annual EU budget (Johansson & Raunio, 2005; Wolfs, 2022)—which in turn has triggered the establishment of several new Europarties (some of which are now defunct). Table 1.1 lists the current ten registered Europarties and their corresponding EP political groups.

Table 1.1 Europarties, their EP political groups, and political families
Full size table

We concentrate in this book on the three largest and traditionally most influential European party families: the centre-right European People’s Party (EPP), the centre-left Party of the European Socialists (PES), and the centrist-liberal Alliance for Liberals and Democrats in Europe (ALDE). EPP was already established in 1976, while the pre-existing confederations of liberal and socialist parties, also founded in the mid-1970s, were turned into actual Europarties in the early 1990s in the context of the inclusion of the above-mentioned ‘party article’ in the Maastricht Treaty.

The EPP is a mix of Christian Democrats and conservatives, joining together parties from all EU member states (e.g., Hanley, 2008: 85–116; Jansen & Van Hecke, 2011). The largest national party has traditionally been the combined German Christian Democratic Union/Christian Social Union (CDU/CSU). The conservative wing of the party family has strengthened over the years, not least through the addition of more conservative member parties from the Central and Eastern European member states. More recently, the position of Fidesz, the Hungarian nationalist party led by Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, caused heated debates inside the EPP. Referring to Orbán’s government introducing measures that violate EU’s values and human rights, the EPP group changed its internal rules in March 2021 so that national parties, and not just individual members of the EP (MEP), can be expelled from the group. Fidesz responded by quitting the group immediately. Even in early 2019, the Europarty EPP had suspended Fidesz’s voting rights. Despite the numerical growth of conservative forces in the party family, the EPP has traditionally and consistently been in favour of closer European integration.

The Confederation of Socialist Parties of the European Community (CSP), founded in 1974, was transformed into PES in November 1992. PES brings together social democratic and socialist parties from across the Union. It supports further integration, primarily because, with monetary union and deeper economic integration, the defence of traditional goals of the left—such as social and environmental legislation and employment policies—requires European-level action to complement national measures. In the Parliament, the centre-left social democratic group was the biggest group from 1975 to 1999 elections (Hanley, 2008: 62–84; Külahci & Lightfoot, 2014; Ladrech, 2000; Lightfoot, 2005). The Federation of European Liberal, Democrat, and Reform Parties, founded in 1976, became the ELDR in December 1993, changing its name to ALDE in 2012. ALDE consists of various liberal and centrist parties, and in the Parliament has come to occupy a pivotal role between the groups of EPP and PES. ALDE is a firm advocate of deeper integration but includes a variety of centrist, social liberal, and more market liberal parties (Hanley, 2008: 117–137; Smith, 2014).

Existing research emphasizes the interaction between Europarties’ development, both in terms of organizational consolidation and policy influence, and the broader deepening of European integration. To put it simply: the more supranational the EU regime both in terms of competencies and its decision-making structure, the more incentives national parties have for investing resources into Europarties and their capacity to influence decisions taken in ‘Brussels’. In one of the first empirical contributions to the debate, Niedermayer (1983) concluded that the Europarties were organizationally quite weak and that their influence vis-à-vis the Commission was limited. Since then, successive Treaty reforms have transferred significant policymaking authority to the European level, and particularly the empowerment of the Parliament and the Commission has facilitated the increasing weight of party politics in EU governance.

Organizationally, the Europarties are quite similar. Their highest decision-making body is the congress. Other organs include the bureau (or council) and the presidency. Majority voting can be used, but Europarties essentially aim at unanimous decisions. The introduction of public funding of Europarties from the EU budget has reduced their financial dependence on national member parties. However, as ‘parties of parties’, Europarties primarily serve as arenas for their member parties and remain constrained in their efforts to be actors in their own right. As a result, it is still more realistic to describe Europarties as federations of national parties or as party networks, at least when comparing them with the often centralized and hierarchical parties found at the national level. At the same time, it is evident that Europarties are, in the early twenty-first century, much more institutionalized and mature organizations, both in terms of their identity and structures, than the looser transnational parties or confederations that emerged in Europe in the 1970s (e.g., Gagatek, 2008).

Importantly from our perspective, Europarties fulfil a coordinating function: they promote the sharing and exchange of information, knowledge, and experience, and they play an important role in facilitating and institutionalizing networks (Johansson & Raunio, 2019; Ladrech, 2000). The major Europarties are strongly present in EU institutions, notably the Parliament and the Commission, and have active links to interest groups. Europarties also negotiate, both internally and with each other, key EU appointments, such as the presidents of the Commission, the Parliament, and the European Council. Furthermore, they work out political or action programmes for their corresponding EP political groups and manifestos for European elections. They adopt common policies in a broad range of topics, often through regular or ad hoc working parties, that cover major policy areas as well as party-related activities like campaign management. Moreover, Europarties prepare the ground for future enlargements by integrating interests from the prospective member states (e.g., Ibenskas, 2020; Öhlén, 2023; Pridham, 2014). Through their membership in the Europarties, parties from the applicant countries engage in partisan cooperation that is important in nurturing wider, pan-European political allegiances. In this connection, Europarties serve as vehicles for the diffusion of democratic values.

However, existing research grapples with the question of impact. Do Europarties matter? What influence do Europarties really have? Most of the existing research has focused on IGCs negotiating Treaty reforms. Here the evidence is somewhat mixed, but points in the direction of Europarties and their EP groups wielding, under the right circumstances, even decisive influence in the IGCs and the European Council summits. Their influence is conditional, with the effectiveness of the Europarties largely depending on the capacity to mobilize ‘their’ heads of national governments for the party cause (Johansson, 2016, 2017; see also Van Hecke, 2010). Pre-European Council summit meetings among government/party leaders are a central aspect of this mobilization process, but, as shown in Chapter 4 of this volume, their significance appears to vary over time and across party families. Europarties have no formal powers to take decisions binding their heads of government, implying thus that successful ex ante policy coordination between national member parties is essential for Europarties to achieve their goals in the European Council. Obviously, the relative bargaining weight of individual Europarties is stronger when they are more strongly represented in the European Council (Drachenberg, 2022; Hix & Lord, 1997; Johansson, 1999, 2002a, 2002b, 2016, 2017; Lightfoot, 2005; Tallberg & Johansson, 2008; Van Hecke, 2004).

Interestingly, earlier research suggests that the format or institutional framework of the constitutional process matters, with the ‘convention’ model more likely to facilitate Europarty influence. Chapter 4 of this volume covers in more detail the 2002–2003 Convention on the Future of Europe, which resulted in the Draft Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe—that subsequently became the Lisbon Treaty. The partisan dimension arguably played an important role throughout the Convention, not least during the final stages, with the Europarty networks building bridges between MEPs and national parliamentarians (see Chapter 4). This applied particularly to the largest Europarty, the EPP, which managed to exert significant influence in the Convention through its members and delegation leaders (Johansson, 2020: 115–122; see also Van Hecke, 2012). Here an obvious parallel is the Conference on the Future of Europe—analysed in Chapter 5 of this volume—which was delayed by one year because of COVID-19 but took place in 2021–2022. Also organized in the ‘convention’ or ‘conference’ format, there is clear evidence that the Europarties and particularly their EP political groups managed to shape considerably both the proceedings and outcome of the Conference (Johansson & Raunio, 2022b).

Another theme to be explored in the empirical chapters is the difficulties involved in drawing a line between Europarties and their corresponding EP political groups and the balance of power between them (Ahrens & Miller, 2023). For instance, while the EPP Group has played an important role in successive rounds of Treaty reform since the 1980s and has benefited from the resources of the European Parliament, it is the Europarty that has brought national government leaders together to act effectively (Johansson, 2020). Those national leaders still dominate the playing field when it comes to issues decided in the European Council, the EU’s highest decision-making organ. Those leaders are expected to care for domestic constituencies. A lot is at stake, politically as well as personally. Nonetheless, Europarties and their EP political groups have proven to be significant players at this level, too. Decision outcomes may also reflect asymmetries of information and power. All these actors are not equal. Some national parties are more influential than others and power asymmetries inside the Europarties and political groups cannot be avoided, with some individual MEPs and national delegations carrying more political weight than others (Johansson & Raunio, 2022a).

Europarties have actually emerged from their EP groups. As stated in the introductory section, Europarties and their parliamentary groups are officially independent of each other, but, in reality, they should be viewed as operating within the same Europarty organization. This applies particularly to the three main Europarties analysed in this volume. There is substantial overlap in terms of national parties. Measuring the percentage of MEPs belonging to the EP groups that were also members of a national party belonging to the corresponding Europarty, in the 2009–2014, 2014–2019, and 2019–2024 legislative terms, the overlap was almost complete, above 95%, in EPP, while it was lower in PES and particularly in ALDE after the 2019 elections. EP political groups are also strongly present in the various decision-making bodies of the Europarties. While the central offices of the Europarties have grown in size over the decades, the EP groups have substantially stronger resources than the respective Europarties, both in terms of funding and staff (for details, see Ahrens & Miller, 2023; Calossi, 2014; Calossi & Cicchi, 2019).

The EP party system has throughout the history of the Parliament been in practice dominated by the ‘grand coalition’ of EPP and PES (the official group name has been Socialists & Democrats, S&D, after the 2009 elections), with the liberal group (called Renew Europe after the 2019 elections when it formed a pact with the La République En Marche!, the party established by French President Emmanuel Macron) also present in the chamber since the 1950s (Ahrens et al., 2022; Bressanelli, 2014; Hix et al., 2007). EPP has been the largest party group since the 1999 elections. In January 2024, EPP controlled 178 seats, the S&D 141, and Renew Europe 100 (out of a total of 705 seats). In fact, since the 2019 elections the two largest groups, for the first time, control less than half of the seats in the chamber—a situation that should increase the bargaining weight of the liberals and the smaller party groups.

While the primary decision rule in the Parliament is a simple majority, for certain issues (mainly budget amendments and second-reading legislative amendments adopted under the co-decision procedure), the Parliament needs absolute majorities (50% plus one MEP). This absolute majority requirement has facilitated cooperation between the EPP and S&D, which between them controlled around two-thirds of the seats until the 2014 elections. Cooperation between EPP and S&D is also influenced by inter-institutional considerations because the Parliament has needed to moderate its resolutions in order to get its amendments accepted by the Council and the Commission (Kreppel, 2002). When the two large groups have failed to agree, the numerically smaller liberal group, situated ideologically between the EPP and S&D, has often been in a pivotal position in forming winning coalitions in the chamber. Pragmatic cooperation between the centrist groups means that most issues are essentially precooked at the committee stage—thus paving the way for plenary votes adopted by ‘supermajorities’, or what Bowler and McElroy (2015) have called ‘hurrah votes’.

The main EP political groups are thus definitely institutionalized, mature organizations. They have decades of experience in building unitary group positions, bargaining with each other in order to form winning coalitions, and interacting with the Commission and other European-level actors. Equally important in terms of our study is the ‘underdog’ position of the Parliament itself. Initially, a purely consultative body with members seconded from national parliaments, the EP is today vested with significant legislative, control, and budgetary powers. In addition, MEPs have proven remarkably inventive in pushing for more powers between IGCs, adopting practices that have over time become the established course of action (Héritier et al., 2019). In these inter-institutional battles, the leading figures in the Parliament—notably political group chairs—have been strongly present, thereby signalling that the issue is important for the Parliament and that there is broad support in the chamber for the reform. This stands in contrast to normal legislative processes, where rapporteurs and MEPs with relevant policy expertise are influential within the political groups and in the Parliament as a whole.

The same party-political situation extends to the Commission, where EPP, PES, and ALDE have controlled most and occasionally even all portfolios since the 1950s. In the Commission appointed in late 2019 and led by Ursula von der Leyen (EPP), EPP has 10, PES 9, and ALDE 5 Commissioners (having thus 24 out of 27 positions). There is evidence of the pledges made by the Europarties ahead of the EP elections finding their way into the pre-legislative proposals of the Commission, with EPP particularly influential in this respect (Kostadinova & Giurcanu, 2020). Europarties’ programmatic priorities therefore influence the agenda of the Commission. Informal ties are also important, with for example both the EPP’s political group and its Europarty having regular dinners and other modes of contact with the Commission (Bardi, 2020). Moreover, Europarties can seek to influence agenda-setting more indirectly via interest groups, think tanks, and other actors close to them—and indeed, these same actors can in turn lobby the Europarties. Of specific interest are political foundations, organizations funded from the EU budget and affiliated with a Europarty that should contribute to debates about both public policy issues and the broader process of European integration. The political foundations mainly do this through organizing various events, such as seminars and conferences, their publications, and through maintaining active networks with their national member foundations, with each other, and of course with the Europarties and their EP groups. The respective foundations have very close links with their Europarties, helping them in drafting manifestos, resolutions, as well as more long-term strategies and programmes (Bardi et al., 2014; Dakowska, 2009; Gagatek & Van Hecke, 2014). As of January 2024, EPP has the Wilfried Martens Centre for European Studies (WMCES), PES the Foundation for European Progressive Studies (FEPS), and ALDE the European Liberal Forum (ELF). Given the quite limited resources of Europarties, even if their offices have grown considerably in recent decades, the political foundations should improve the policymaking capacity of Europarties, not least in terms of offering new ideas and perspectives.

Overall, Europarties are easily perceived as being part of the ‘Brussels bubble’ that should do more to reach out to civil society and citizens (Norman & Wolfs, 2022; Van Hecke et al., 2018). Europarties have introduced membership for individuals, but in her pioneering study, Hertner (2019) showed that the Europarties had only very small numbers of individual members, with national member parties often against giving individual members stronger participation rights. Hertner thus argued that Europarties should empower their grassroots activists by granting them real participatory opportunities. According to her study, ALDE and PES had granted individual members at least some say in decision-making and/or drafting of policies, whereas in EPP individual members enjoyed essentially no rights at all.

It becomes evident from the preceding discussion that the Europarties and their EP political groups can draw on decades of experience from constitutional reform and inter-institutional bargaining. They are used to building networks and coalitions and have a long-standing interest towards the future development of EU democracy and institutional questions, advocating a stronger role for the supranational institutions while arguing in favour of reforms that directly deal with Europarties themselves. Indeed, champions of the role of Europarties consistently emphasize the contribution Europarties make to the further democratization of the Union. Perhaps the best example is the introduction of the Spitzenkandidaten mechanism (see also Chapter 4).

In the 2014 EP elections, the Europarties and their EP political groups took a bold and controversial step in this direction by putting forward ‘lead candidates’ for the Commission president. Jean-Claude Juncker, the lead candidate of the largest political group, EPP, was eventually appointed as the new head of the Commission. The other lead candidates were Ska Keller and José Bové (EGP), Martin Schulz (PES), Alexis Tsipras (EL), and Guy Verhofstadt (ALDE). This Spitzenkandidaten initiative was criticized heavily by Eurosceptics, with the Parliament (again) accused of over-stepping its formal competences. For example, British Prime Minister David Cameron talked of ‘a power grab through the back door’ that was never agreed upon by member states and would both shift power from the European Council to the Parliament and politicize the Commission.Footnote 2 Cameron was certainly right in claiming that the Spitzenkandidaten process strengthens the role of party politics in the Commission, but again the change should not be exaggerated, as party politics had already before that influenced strongly the composition of the Commission. Because both the Commission and its president must be approved by the Parliament before they can take office, the EP had explicitly demanded that the voice of the voters must not be ignored in the make up of the Commission. Hence, the wording of the Treaty of Lisbon, according to which the European Council, acting by a qualified majority, shall propose to the Parliament a candidate for Commission president ‘taking into account’ the election results merely gave treaty status to a practice dating back to mid-1990s.

In the 2019 elections, the Europarties again put forward their own lead candidates: Manfred Weber (EPP), Frans Timmermans (PES), Jan Zahradil (ECR), Ska Keller and Bas Eickhout (EGP), Violeta Tomič and Nico Cué (EL), and Oriol Junqueras (EFA), while ALDE put forward seven candidates. Many of these candidates ran very active campaigns, touring across the EU and taking part in various public debates. Much to the disappointment of the Parliament and the Europarties, the European Council effectively ignored the Spitzenkandidaten mechanism and nominated Ursula von der Leyen—who was not the lead candidate of any Europarty—as the new Commission president. Here disagreements among the Europarties also contributed to the outcome, as Weber’s candidacy was not sufficiently supported by PES or ALDE (Crum, 2023; De Wilde, 2020; Heidbreder & Schade, 2020). While studies suggest that Europeans have remained largely unaware of the lead candidates, the Spitzenkandidaten procedure has, nonetheless, the potential to both increase the visibility of the EP elections and to develop a stronger link between voters and EU decision-making (e.g., Braun & Popa, 2018; Costa, 2022; Gattermann & de Vreese, 2020; Kotanidis, 2023).

From the perspective of our central argument, what matters more is the process leading up to the 2014 elections. Europarties and their EP groups had since the 1990s campaigned consistently for a stronger electoral link between the Parliament and the Commission, and the Spitzenkandidaten procedure started to take more concrete shape after the 2009 elections. It had initially been the PES that had put forward the idea during the run-up to the Amsterdam Treaty, but EPP was subsequently more active and nominated its own candidate for the Commission president ahead of the 2009 elections after which PES again turned more supportive. ALDE, in turn, was less positive throughout the process. Commission President José Manuel Barroso (EPP) called in 2012 for the Europarties to propose their candidates for the Commission presidency prior to the 2014 elections, with the Parliament adopting a similar resolution that was supported by the EPP, S&D, ALDE, and Greens/EFA (Ahrens & Miller, 2023; Hamřík & Kaniok, 2019; Héritier et al., 2019: 61–79). Furthermore, while both politicians and academics had previously put forward various proposals for injecting more democracy into EU governance,Footnote 3 since the 2014 EP elections the political and scholarly debate has very much focused on the Spitzenkandidaten mechanism.

Research Design: Transnational Partisan Networks and the Future of Europe

The process leading to the Spitzenkandidaten mechanism displayed features that are key elements of our argument—continuous advocacy, agenda-setting, and transnational partisan networks.

Theoretically we lean on the concepts of advocacy and agenda-setting, which in our approach are closely related (see Chapter 2). The Spitzenkandidaten initiative and the broader empowerment of the Parliament show the continuous nature of partisan advocacy, with various party-political actors from MEPs to Europarty leaders and national parties engaged in persistent campaign in support of their goals. Our approach therefore does not emphasize so much specific moments, ‘windows of opportunity’ (Kingdon, 1984). Obviously, they do matter, but such occasions should be seen in the context of advocacy spanning several years or even decades. Advocacy coalitions are people from various organizations, groups of like-minded actors, who share beliefs and engage in a degree of coordinated activity to decisively impact policy outputs and change (e.g., Jenkins-Smith et al., 2018; Sabatier, 1988).

For us, agenda-setting is therefore about continual advocacy and networking. In line with so-called ‘multiple streams framework’ (MSF) model (Ackrill et al., 2013; Béland & Howlett, 2016; Kingdon, 1984), policymaking processes consist of three streams: the problem stream consists of problem perceptions among policymakers; the solution stream consists of proposals for political decisions; and the politics stream consists of political activities and developments like lobby campaigns, or the political context in which decision-making occurs. The links between the three streams are made by issue entrepreneurs, individuals, or organizations that ‘are willing to invest their time and energy in promoting a particular issue’ (Elder & Cobb, 1984: 121). For us, the entrepreneurs are primarily the key individuals within Europarties and the partisan networks that have gradually evolved and consolidated in the course of European integration.

We also pay attention to the discourse and terminology employed by the Europarties; the way in which they frame their priorities and ‘talk’. In advocacy and agenda-setting issue framing can be of fundamental importance (Daviter, 2011). Advocacy can utilize broadly shared fundamental values and ‘big words’—e.g., democracy, legitimacy, or participation—or use an alternative strategy of ‘small steps’, whereby support is gradually built up through more low-key strategies, including behind-the-scenes processes and even depoliticization of issues (Princen, 2011). For example, MEPs continuously, and successfully, referred to concepts such as legitimacy and democracy in seeking more powers for the Parliament (Rittberger, 2005). The incremental, ‘small steps’ approach is highly relevant, and our empirical analysis also underlines the relevance of ‘talking to the right people’ in Brussels instead of building broader societal support or even reaching out to the grassroots party activists. Such choices have normative consequences that we explore in the concluding chapter of the volume.

The justification for the term transnational comes from the ‘across’ and ‘in-between’ nature of European-level parties. ‘Transnational’ or ‘transnationalism’ broadly refers to various ties and interactions linking citizens, actors, or institutions across the borders of individual countries (e.g., Kaiser & Starie, 2005). We conceive Europarties as transnational partisan actors that operate both at intergovernmental and supranational levels of EU decision-making. They are found in the supranational institutions, the Parliament, and the Commission, yet they also operate in more intergovernmental arenas such as the European Council.Footnote 4 We also believe that the concept of transnational is an accurate description of empirical reality: in line with earlier literature, Europarties are more like alliances, networks, or umbrella organizations of like-minded parties than the kinds of more centralized and hierarchical political parties found in national politics (e.g., Bell & Lord, 1998; Day, 2014; Dunphy & March, 2020; Hanley, 2008; Johansson, 1997; Ladrech, 2000; Van Hecke, 2010, 2012).

Yet, as we argue, this transnational nature of Europarties at the same time enables them to wield influence in multiple ways and through multiple channels—also together as coalitions of Europarties. Our approach focuses on the European level but argues and shows that often senior national politicians and member parties are the key actors in Europarty networks. Here is also an empirical challenge for students of Europarties: prime ministers and chairs of national parties are simultaneously holding important domestic offices while advancing the objectives of the Europarties. We do not claim that the Europarty ‘hat’ would override national obligations, but, as our analysis in the empirical chapters illustrates, under the right circumstances this dual role facilitates the policy success of Europarties. We readily acknowledge that our research design is biased in favour of the transnational partisan dimension. We deliberately prioritize the theoretical and empirical mapping of the mechanisms through which this partisan politics takes place, paying less attention to alternative, more intergovernmental explanations.

Therefore, our approach veers close to the multilevel governance model (Hooghe & Marks, 2001) and its applications to interest groups (Eising et al., 2018) or interparliamentary cooperation, where Crum and Fossum (2009) coined the concept of a multilevel parliamentary field to characterize various links between national parliaments and the EP (see also for example Lupo & Fasone, 2016; Meissner & Crum, 2023). In fact, such horizontal and vertical interparliamentary cooperation is also relevant in terms of Europarties, as it provides another meeting ground for like-minded national and European-level politicians. There is also a closely related, emerging strand of research on the vertical links inside the same parties or party families between national and European levels of decision-making (Groen, 2020; Kaiser & Revesz, 2022; Meissner & Rosén, 2023; Pittoors, 2023).Footnote 5

The decision to focus on the three largest and most institutionalized Europarties—EPP, PES, ALDE—is based on their longevity and centrality in EU governance. As discussed in the previous section, these party families are strongly present in EU institutions and national governments. Smaller Europarties simply do not have sufficient resources or presence in Brussels, and hence their organizations and networks are much less developed. This applies not only to the Greens but also to Eurosceptics or the radical left. The few existing studies of these party families provide evidence of how their weak presence at the European level limits their chances of influencing EU decisions vis-à-vis the more established Europarties analysed in this volume (e.g., Dunphy & March, 2020; Gómez-Reino, 2018; Hanley, 2008: 138–200).

Turning to our research questions, this book is by no means the first to discuss the nature, organization, or even influence of the Europarties. The literature referred to in this chapter has tackled these issues from different perspectives (e.g., Hanley, 2008; Hix & Lord, 1997; Ladrech, 2000; Lightfoot, 2005; Timus & Lightfoot, 2014; Wolfs, 2022), but no doubt because of the empirical challenges involved in measuring their impact, the existing studies have largely focused on IGCs, select policy domains, or have described the development of individual Europarties. Our study is therefore the first attempt at uncovering the broader influence of the Europarties on the construction or the ‘future’ of Europe. Focusing on the EPP, PES, and ALDE, the book is structured around three main research questions:

  1. 1.

    What strategies Europarties utilize for advancing their visions of Europe?

  2. 2.

    What is the relative influence of the actors in the networks of the Europarties?

  3. 3.

    How successful have the Europarties been in shaping the future of Europe?

These questions are intentionally broad in line with the main focus of our book. They are also questions that are practically impossible to answer precisely. Yet, they are important questions that deal with the very essence and fundamental characteristics of Europarties—their operation, organizational structure, and eventual policy influence. Empirically, the book analyses the networks and positions of the Europarties, constitutional reform processes, and the role of the Europarties and their EP political groups in the broader debates on the future of Europe. Our primary interest is in questions of institutional reform, although they cannot really be studied in isolation from policies. For example, the creation of the European Central Bank (ECB) and subsequent institutional development of the Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) are often defended with their positive impact on monetary and financial policies. The data consists of interviews, documents, observational data, and plenary records of the EP, with the analysis covering mainly developments from the early 1990s onwards. In addition to addressing the research questions, the analysis explores the positions of the three Europarties—how they have evolved over time and the extent to which EPP, PES, and ALDE agree or differ regarding the ‘future of Europe’.

Structure of the Volume

This introductory chapter has motivated and presented the research questions and argued that Europarties still remain the neglected dimension of European integration. This applies particularly to their networks and role in the debates on the future of Europe.

The second chapter contains the theoretical framework of the book. It is based on two interconnected approaches: advocacy and agenda-setting. The chapter discusses the main elements of both agenda-setting and advocacy coalition framework (ACF) literature, showing how the latter has not been applied to political parties. It argues that Europarties should be viewed primarily as transnational partisan actors that operate both at the intergovernmental (Treaty reforms) and supranational (European Parliament, EU policymaking) levels of EU politics, and discusses how the multilevel nature of the EU polity provides several channels for advancing policy objectives. The chapter further argues that the transnational character of the Europarties, often seen as their weakness, has enabled them to influence European politics in ways that are hidden from public view. Europarties are engaged in continual advocacy and agenda-setting about the future of Europe.

Europarties are fairly unknown even among EU scholars. Therefore, the third chapter focuses on the organizational structure of the Europarties: rules regarding decision-making, funding, the relationship between Europarties and EP political groups as well as national parties, and the links with political foundations attached to the Europarties. It traces the organizational development of the EPP, PES, and ALDE, showing that the integrationist logic of the EU system helps explain the development of Europarties and their growth of capacity.

The fourth chapter focuses primarily on the intergovernmental level of EU politics. It examines the role of the Europarties in successive rounds of Treaty reforms and in European Council decision-making. The analysed IGCs are those leading to the Single European Act (1987), the Maastricht Treaty (1993), the Treaty of Amsterdam (1999), the Treaty of Nice (2003), and the Lisbon Treaty (2009). It shows that under the right circumstances, Europarties have wielded even decisive influence, but their success depends on their numerical strength in the European Council and on their internal cohesion and capacity for mobilization. Particularly EPP and PES have left their mark on the Treaties. The chapter also shows how the networks of the Europarties and personal relations at the top-level facilitate influence. It further argues that the ‘conference format’ used in the European Convention of 2002–2003 benefits the Europarties, as in IGCs the national governments are the central actors. The data consists primarily of interviews and various documents as well as secondary literature.

Chapter 5 examines in detail the input of the Europarties before and during the Conference on the Future of Europe that was held in 2021–2022. Drawing on interviews, observational data, and position papers, it shows how the Europarties, both individually and together, utilized their networks for mobilizing support for their positions. We find significant convergence between the main Europarties and substantial cooperation between them, particularly inside the European Parliament. Organizationally, the ‘convention format’ again benefited the partisan actors and especially the EP political groups. The chapter shows also how the Europarties are in the early 2020s substantially more in favour of deeper integration, including Treaty change, than most national governments.

The concluding chapter reflects on the findings and returns to the research questions, arguing that the influence of Europarties is difficult to measure but observable and significant. European integration cannot be understood without paying sufficient attention to the continual advocacy and agenda-setting of these transnational partisan actors. It shows that over time most of the objectives of the Europarties have been met, both in terms of institutional reform and policy competence, and that there is substantial and increasing convergence between the main Europarties. The chapter also argues that without further changes to the EU’s system of government, Europarties are likely to remain unknown among European voters and even among activists inside national parties. It also identifies a dilemma or trade-off: insofar as Europarties become more relevant and influential, they are likely to be placed under stricter supervision by their member parties. In general, national parties are careful to maintain the greatest possible autonomy, and they are unwilling to subordinate themselves to their supranational counterparts. It is therefore difficult to achieve a full-fledged integration of political parties on a European scale, while vertical links with citizens and party activists are bound to remain weak. The book concludes by putting forward various proposals that could increase the visibility of Europarties in EU politics.