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Introduction
In the last decade or so we have witnessed a proliferation of research on European Union (EU) public opinion. The initial Danish rejection of the Maastricht Treaty appeared to signal the awakening of public interest in the EU, the demise of the 'permissive consensus' and its replacement with what Hooghe and Marks (2005) term a 'constraining dissensus.' Most work to date has focused at the individual level on the identification of those factors that explain attitudes towards the EU (e.g. Gabel, 1998; Sanchez-Cuenca, 2000; Rohrschneider, 2002; Marks and Hooghe, 2004). What has gone largely unexamined, however, is the distribution of those attitudes. In particular, few scholars have sought to systematically investigate whether the extent of public disagreement over the European project has grown over time. Yet this is an issue of importance not only for the future of the EU but also for the domestic politics of the member states.
There is widespread recognition that in the post-Maastricht period Euro-scepticism has become a more significant phenomenon than in earlier decades.1 This may simply reflect a decline in the average level of support for the EU. But, the rise in Euro-scepticism may also, or alternatively, be a function of a decline in consensus -- that is, an increase in the dispersion of attitudes, along with a flattening or even polarization of opinion distribution. If we are to meaningfully talk of a shift from a 'permissive consensus' to a 'constraining dissensus,' we need to identify which of these two has taken place -- that is, whether there has been a movement of the distribution in the issue space or a change in the shape of the distribution. In addition, given the centrality of Maastricht to the perception of a change in public attitudes, we need to establish whether the Treaty was indeed instrumental in moving or changing the shape of opinion distribution.
This question is doubly important because the shape of the distribution is also crucial to political contestation. While studies of public opinion typically focus on the central tendency of the distribution (e.g. Downs' (1957) 'median voter theorem'), the shape of the distribution can also tell us much about the likely nature of political competition. The more dispersed are attitudes, the more problematic it...