Date of Award

2013

Degree Name

Geography

College

College of Liberal Arts

Type of Degree

M.S.

Document Type

Thesis

First Advisor

Joshua Hagen

Second Advisor

James Leonard

Third Advisor

Kevin Law

Abstract

Euroscepticism or opposition to the European Union has become a growing political philosophy among broad segments of Europe’s populace. This philosophy has manifested itself in some form throughout most of the European Union, but opinion polls and voter data indicate Euroscepticism is most acute within the United Kingdom and both among its general citizenry and elected officials. In the 2009 EU Parliament elections for the United Kingdom, the right wing United Kingdom Independence Party gained its most ever seats in the Parliament while the far-right British National Party gained its first ever seats in a national election. With overtly Eurosceptic political parties gaining unprecedented support, the UK is poised to enter a new chapter of Euroscepticism. This thesis examined the spatial variation of Euroscepticism in the three constituent nations of the Isle of Great Britain (England, Scotland and Wales). In this analysis, several key socio-economic variables such as lack of education, unemployment rates and low population density were found to strongly correlate with Eurosceptic voting behavior whereas geographically the region identified as the most Eurosceptic was the West Midlands and the least Eurosceptic was Scotland. This work focused mainly on the 2009 EU Parliament election at both regional and local scales in England, Scotland and Wales, as well as local council elections in England from 2007 to 2010.

Subject(s)

European Union.

European Union countries - Politics and government.

Political parties - European Union countries.

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