Understanding Euroscepticism: How British hostility to the EU contrasts with opposition elsewhere in Europe

The UK’s referendum on EU membership may well be one of the main stories of 2016, with the British Prime Minister, David Cameron, recently suggesting that it could be held as early as the summer. Montserrat Guibernau writes on how we can conceive of Euroscepticism in both the UK and other EU countries. She writes that understanding Euroscepticism requires an account of a range of different elements, including identity, attitudes toward globalisation, and responses to diversity within nation states.

To what extent is Euroscepticism a response to ‘too much’ diversity? Is it an attempt to fix identity at a time when globalisation and technological progress make that impossible? Alternatively, in what ways has EU membership transformed the UK’s view of the EU? Does the UK belong to the EU and, relatedly, what are the signs and the markers of belonging to the EU? These are questions which will be touched upon as part of a new research project, ‘Contrasting Euroscepticisms in the UK and the EU’.

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