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Three voting groups make up the numbers
Franklin believes that those who will vote will come from three groups which can always be relied upon to take part in elections. These groups vote out of loyalty, habit or just because they want a change of pace.
“We have the party loyalists who react to calls from their leaders to vote and save their party humiliation; then there are those who vote out of habit, who generally believe that voting is a good thing and that they should exercise that right to vote, and then there are the expressive voters who tend to vote for parties, such as the Greens, for whom they wouldn’t normally vote in national elections,” he said.
“These expressive votes usually come about because the voters know that it doesn’t matter who they vote for, because they think it won’t matter anyway, it just gives them a chance to support someone different.”
While Eurocrats may be worried about keeping their jobs, a more serious concern is that the expected low turn-out could have unpleasant consequences for the make-up of the future parliament and the political spectrum in Europe.
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A real race - but who would want to run?
“To make the European elections more attractive, the process could include a number of presidential candidates who are running against each other,” Franklin said. “Then there will be other politicians who will stand and say ‘I support such and such because of this and that’. We might then get a debate about what these people intend to do. It will be a real election with electable faces and personalities.”
However, Franklin believes that turning European elections into a sexy presidential race will probably not happen any time soon.
“Someone once said that electing a European president would relegate people, like the president of France, into a role no more important than the governor of Texas,” he said. “Real elections for a European president would make national leaders even less relevant, and which politician would want that?”
Author: Nick Amies
Editor: Susan Houlton
Full article published by Deutsche Welle