The salience of the EU in national election manifestos thereby varies across countries and time. For example, our data shows that the EU has become an increasingly more important topic in most countries, particularly in France and Italy, but also in the UK, Austria or Slovakia.

Generally, parties view the EU rather positive in most member states, but there also appears to be a negative trend. In crisis-hit Greece, Portugal and Spain, parties are now more negative towards the EU than 20 y. ago, and this is also true to a lesser extent in other countries.