European Parliament elections 2009 (106): An anecdote from Prof. Andrew Moravcsik

Okay, I had read that Jan reported in his blog about a lecture of famous political scientist and EU specialist, Princeton professor Andrew Moravcsik, at the London School of Economics.

Yet another lecture...

But through Jan's tweet I learnt that the professor himself reacted to the blog post by Jan with a comment, which is remarkable indeed.

But even better: Moravscik shares an anecdote he experienced on his way back to Heathrow airport:

"Final anecdote: On my way back out to Heathrow I quizzed the cabby about the European elections. Exceptionally, he was not treating it as a “second-order election” on national politics but seemed really concerned about Europe. This meant–predictably–he was voting UKIP, consistent with the principle that extremists are disproportionately mobilized around Europe. Why UKIP? “We signed on for a free trade area,” he said, “and now Europe is taking over British politics, one issue at a time.” I asked him what issues concerned him most. “Not really sure,” he said. When I pressed him, he named human rights and criminal law (Council of Europe not the EU), and troops in Afghanistan (NATO), and third-country (Moslem) immigration (not a European competence at all). Only an anecdote, but multiply it by a million and you have the record of every West European EU election and referendum of which we have records. Need we say more about the prospects for meaningful deliberation on European politics?

I have the feeling that he's got more content in an anecdote than most press and blog articles (including mine) have during the whole pre-electoral period.

------------------------------
Under the category "European parliament elections 2009" I am following up national and European activities on the path to the European Parliament elections 2009.

For an overview over all articles in this category have a look at the overview article.

For the five newest post see also the sidebar.