Farmers Protest in Europe and Climate Change

Since its establishment, the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) represented a significant challenge for the European Commission. In recent years, the criticisms related to the CAP have intensified as reforms to make the primary sector more environmentally sustainable have become a pivotal aspect of the EU Green Deal. The demand for swiping reforms left workers in the sector disgruntled. The recent surge of a protest wave opposing any reform to the CAP and the very role played by EU institutions in food production can be seen as an outcome of this process. This article provides a stepping stone, setting common theoretical and methodological grounding for future researchers that seek to engage with the topic in a critical way. Specifically, we provide a comparative analysis of the farmers’ protest movements that participated in protest events between 2020 and the first half of 2025. In order to achieve this aim, we conducted a Protest Event Analysis with articles from the major press agencies of each Country related to the protests in five EU Member States (Spain, France, Italy, Poland, and The Netherlands). Additionally, we looked at the Protest Events that unfolded in Brussels and involved farmers from the same Member States. The findings display that the protests in each Country were significantly shaped and influenced by contingent factors specific to each national context. Specifically, the framing of the issue provided by each movement can vary depending on the role of far-right forces on an institutional level.