Call for Contributions: The 2024 European Parliament Elections

Deutsch

By Michael Kaeding, Alex Hoppe and Manuel Müller

What is it like to run a transnational election campaign? How does the public perceive the European lead candidates? How does the European electoral system affect the distribution of seats in the European Parliament? Which electoral issues are important across the entire EU? What differences can be seen in the voting behaviour of different social groups? And what future is there for the European Parliament’s eternal grand coalition?

Edited volume

We invite proposals for contributions to an edited volume analysing various aspects of the 2024 European Parliament elections, to be published by Springer VS in spring 2025 in two language versions (English and German).

The volume is jointly edited by Prof. Michael Kaeding and Dr. Alex Hoppe (Jean Monnet Chair for European Integration and European Politics at the University of Duisburg-Essen) and Dr. Manuel Müller (Finnish Institute of International Affairs, editor of the blog “Der (europäische) Föderalist”). It is a follow-up to the German-language volumes “Die Europawahl 2014 – Spitzenkandidaten, Protestparteien, Nichtwähler” and “Die Europawahl 2019 – Ringen um die Zukunft Europas” (both Springer VS) and builds on their experience.

Timely analysis of the European elections

The main objective is the timely analysis of different facets of the European elections, such as electoral systems, electoral campaigns, public perception of the election, the role of European parties, determinants of voting behaviour, or the consequences of the electoral results for European governance. In addition to analyses from European studies, perspectives from other (sub)disciplines and research areas – such as election, party, communication or governance research – are explicitly welcome.

We particularly encourage contributions that study EU-wide issues and/or transnational patterns. For example, contributions may:

• focus on the European level, or
• compare several member states or groups of member states, or
• focus on interrelationships in the multi-level system.

Exemplary topics

See below exemplary topics and questions to be analysed. Contributions may well cover several of the aspects listed or include additional aspects:

European and national electoral systems

• Analysis of the different national electoral systems, reform of the European electoral law
• Representation in the European Parliament, vote share vs. seat share of the parties
• Voting behaviour, turnout, swing voters
• European elections as second-order elections

European and national parties

• Nomination of candidates and electoral lists, selection of the European lead candidates
• Development and formulation of electoral programmes, programmatic coherence of European parties
• (Re-)Formation of political groups in the European Parliament
• Relationship between European and national parties
• 2024 European Election from the perspective of individual European party families (EPP, PES etc.)

European public sphere

• Pan-European campaign issues (climate/energy, economy, migration, war in Ukraine, enlargement policy, etc.)
• Campaign organisation and strategy in the multilevel system
• Election posters, TV spots, campaigns websites (national vs. European content)
• Press and TV coverage, role and influence of new media; lead candidate debates

Governance in the political system of the EU

• Profiles of new MEPs, leadership structures, formation of political groups and committees in the European Parliament
• Majorities in the new European Parliament (future of the “informal grand coalition”, polarisation, “cordon sanitaire”)
• Influence of the European Parliament on the election of the Commission President and the composition of the Commission
• Democratic and legitimacy deficit

Interested?

Abstracts should briefly and concisely outline the proposed contribution and should not exceed 300 words. Abstracts should be sent to the editors by 1 December 2023 (contact details below).

The final contributions to the volume should not exceed 25,000 characters (approx. 8 pages) and can be written in German or English. After submission, the publisher will translate the contributions into the other language within the framework of a cooperation agreement with DeepL. The authors will then proofread and revise the translated version. (For authors who do not speak one of the languages, the editors will take care of the proofreading.)

A one-day authors’ conference is planned for 11 October 2024 at the University of Duisburg-Essen. At the conference, the authors will have the opportunity to present their contributions for discussion and receive feedback and suggestions by their fellows.

The timeline for the book project is as follows:

Submission of proposals	1 December 2023
Decision of the editors	1 February 2024
Submission of a first complete version of the contributions, with subsequent feedback from the editors	1 September 2024
Authors’ conference	11 October 2024
Submission of the final version of the contributions	1 November 2024
Translation by Springer VS, revision of the translated version by the authors	winter/spring 2025
Publication	spring/summer 2025

For any questions about the conception and editing process of the volume, please don’t hesitate to contact Dr. Alex Hoppe (alexander.hoppe <at> uni-due.de).

We are looking forward to receiving your submissions!

Please send your abstracts to:

michael.kaeding <at> uni-due.de
alexander.hoppe <at> uni-due.de
manuel.mueller <at> foederalist.eu

Picture: Manuel Müller, based on the cover of the previous volume on the 2019 election.