Is there an alternative to consensus? The impact of the 2014 coalition deal on voting behaviour in the eighth European Parliament (2014-19)

After the 2014 European elections, a formal coalition, named ‘the block’, has emerged in the European Parliament (EP) between the EPP, S&D, and ALDE party groups. The cooperation between the two largest groups in the EP and the predominance of the grand coalition, has been the focus of many studies. The signature of the political deal in 2014 can be considered as the continuity of long-standing and consensual practices of cooperation and compromise-building between the centre-right and the centre-left political forces in the EP. This paper questions this claim and assesses whether the coalition agreement signed in 2014 actually impacted coalition-building dynamics in the European legislature. Since the 2014 political deal came to an end in January 2017, during the EP’s mid-term election, the eighth term (2014-2019) gives the opportunity to assess the extent to which the agreement impacted party groups’ behaviours. In other words, have coalition-building dynamics in the European Parliament evolved after the political agreement broke down in January 2017? This paper will focus on the EPP-S&D cooperation, which is expected to have fallen after the two groups broke their deal. The cooperation between the two EP largest groups will be measured based on their voting behaviour in plenary. Although the cooperation between the EPP and the S&D has remained high, especially for legislative reports, we found a dramatic decrease in cooperation during the second half of the 8th term, regardless of the procedure and of the type of the vote. This pattern is specific to the 8th term and could not be found in previous terms.