The Influence Of UK’s Euroscepticism On Its European Policy During The Euro Crisis

The United Kingdom is always uncooperative with others onEuropean integration. As post-functionalist theory explains, the domesticpolitical process played an important role in the forming of Britishforeign policy. The most influential domestic issue on UK’s Europeanpolicy is Eroscepticism. UK’s Euroscepticism is special because of thedeep influence of history and the big size of the group, as well as thepoliticization of this issue. That makes UK’s Euroscepticism moreinfluential than what happened in other European countries.Euroscepticism including hard and soft Euroscepticism exists in theBritish public and political parties and is very influential.Party basedEuroscepticism influence UK’s European policy via incumbent party’spolicy, party competition and inside-party pressure, while the public’sEuroscepticism becoming influential because of the referendum andelection. It is difficult to change UK’s Eurosecptical tradition, thus UK’sEuropean policy would be hardly avoid from its negative influence.UK plays an uncooperative role again during the Euro-crisis. The expandednumber of people with Euroscepticism urges Cameron to take a kinds ofopposite attitude toward European issues. He is not only vetoed byEurosceptical parliamentary members but also pressured by Euroscepticsfrom both conservative party and labor party. What happened to Cameronindicates that Euroscepticism do have influence on UK’s European policy,and further, the relationship between UK and Europe could hardly beintimate.