European National Elites and the Crisis (ENEC) is an international study, conducted in European countries during the year 2014. The study examines the attitudes of Members of National Parliaments (MPs) in ten EU Member-States and partly serves as a replication of the 'InTune' project. Exploring and tracing the views of national elites, their variety, stability and change, offers a crucial point of view for understanding the legitimacy of the integration process and the politics of the European Union in an age of greater politicization of these issues. In this respect, this project aims to shed greater light on the present and the future of the EU, by examining the attitudes of national political elites in this critical juncture. A survey to members of the national parliaments was carried out at each of the participant countries. More specifically, 472 face-to-face and 189 phone interviews were carried out using structured questionnaire. The questions were related to the working of the European Union and its future. The participant countries were Bulgaria, Croatia, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Lithuania, Portugal, Slovenia and Spain. The basic questions were aimed at identifying and mapping the views and attitudes of political elites towards the European Union (EU) as well as the factors that explain the configuration of those attitudes, their evaluation on the role played by EU institutions in the management of the crisis, and their perception on the future of European integration. Other questions were how the crisis has affected the mediating role of elites between EU and their fellow citizens and finally, if elites are influenced by a constraining dissensus towards the EU, leading to a conflictual politicization of EU issues in national arenas.

Non-probability: Quota

Face-to-face interview

Telephone interview