'This Time it’s Different'? Euroscepticism and the 2014 European Parliament Elections in the Dutch Press

The Maastricht Treaty is often seen as a turning point in European integration. Since then, Euroscepticism has been said to be on the rise, even in Member States that were originally seen as pro-integrationist. The Netherlands is a good example of a country where European integration seems to have become subject to increasingly critical debate. During the 1991 intergovernmental conference the Dutch government proposed a far-reaching blue print for a federal Europe. Yet, 14 years later, on 1 June 2005, Dutch citizens overwhelmingly voted against the Constitutional Treaty, partly due to increased dissatisfaction with the pace and extent of European integration. Based on a qualitative content analysis of major Dutch newspapers, this paper aims at exploring the idea of an increasingly Eurosceptic debate on EU affairs. It does so by looking into varieties of Euroscepticism and opposition to the EU as present in mediated debates in the context of the 2009 and 2014 European Parliament elections. A distinction will be made between four possible positions: support for the current state of European integration; support for the principal of European integration, but arguing for an alternative approach (‘Euroalternativism’); soft Euroscepticism, rejecting the current state of European integration for being too supranational; and hard Euroscepticism, entailing a rejection of European integration. To date, there has been relatively little attention for mass media in scholarly work on Euroscepticism. Yet, with the latter’s apparent spread, expanding our scope beyond public opinion and political parties is important. The European Parliament itself claimed that “this time it's different”. Can we also see a change when it comes to varieties of Euroscepticism and opposition to the EU?