Perceptions of legitimacy and support for the European Union
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2025-10-24
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en
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The legitimacy of the European Union is under scrutiny. From an empirical perspective, this is visible through events like Brexit and the rise of Euroscepticism across Europe. From a normative perspective, scholars have critiqued the EU’s institutional arrangements and their lack of democratic legitimacy. In response to these developments, scholars have proposed to resolve the EU’s legitimacy issues through enhancing its input-, output- and throughput legitimacy. What remains unclear is how citizens perceive changes in legitimacy variables according to normative conceptions. This research attempt to fill in this gap by operationalising input-, output- and throughput legitimacy and applying them in an empirical setting. It does so by conducting a factorial survey experiment wherein respondents are shown vignettes containing treatments for each of the legitimacy variables, after which their support for the EU is measured. The results of the research are surprising: throughput legitimacy had the most significant positive effect on EU support, implying a revaluation of throughput legitimacy in shaping support for the EU is in order.
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Faculteit der Managementwetenschappen