ABSTRACT
Loud internal clashes in the Conservative Party Group of the European Parliament – the European People’s Party/European Democracy (EPP-ED) – about whether the German Elmar Brok or the Pole Jacek Saryusz-Wolski would chair the Foreign Affairs Committee 1 or the recent change to the statute of the European People’s Party in the European Parliament officially allowing the British Tories to have a differing view on the European Constitution, demonstrated that even the largest party groups may suffer from ideological disunity. 2 Their desire to become the largest party group in the European Parliament by including quite diverse parties from all EU countries probably came at the price of increasing ideological heterogeneity. 3 Critical voices such as the one from the French MEP Jean-Jacques Bourlanges about the increasing lack of cohesion within party groups in the European Parliament as well as controversial issues such as the federalist structures in the (former) EU ‘Constitution’ make one realise that party cohesion varies. These quoted episodes and comments stand in contrast with the very cohesive voting behaviour of the party groups in the European Parliament – a puzzle for which I suggest two possible explanations in this chapter.
