Voting Behavior in the European Parliamentary Election

The Belgian Case in 1994

Abstract

This article examines the patterns of voting behavior in the European Parliamentary Election through the European Election Study surveys. It has been widely argued that the voting behavior in the “Euro Elections” is merely a reflection of national politics. However, the analyses based on the Belgian case in this article revealed that voting orientations in the 1994 European Parliamentary Election were composed of voting orientations towards ‘regionalist parties’, ‘anti-immigrant and anti-EU parties’, and ‘left parties’. Furthermore, it became clear that the voting orientation for regionalist parties had a ‘pro-European’ affinity, while the voting orientation for anti-immigrant parties is closely linked with an ‘anti-European’ message. These findings suggest that the voting behavior in the European Parliamentary Elections needs to be analyzed not only in the ‘national’ level, but also in the ‘regional’ and ‘European’ level.