European Culture Wars? Abortion and Human Embryonic Stem Cell Research (1998-2015)

European Culture Wars?

Abortion and Human Embryonic Stem Cell Research (1998-2015)

Emilie MONDO

Thèse présentée en vue de l’obtention du grade académique de Docteur en Sciences Politiques et sociales, sous la direction de Monsieur le Professeur François FORET.

Committee Members:

Amandine Crespy, Université libre de Bruxelles Brent F. Nelsen, Furman University

Lucian N. Leustean, Aston University

Ramona Coman, Université libre de Bruxelles (présidente)

Abstract

This research addresses the conflictualization dynamics induced by the politicization of religion at the supranational level. It tests the Union’s institutional capacity to routinize dissension, temper animosities, and reconcile divergences in the light of religiously-loaded, issue-specific controversies. So-called “morality issues” such as abortion or human embryonic stem cell research emerged onto the EU agenda at the end of the 1990s. The main sites of bioethical contention correspond to the European Parliament and Commission arenas, where political, social, and religious entrepreneurs have been pursuing ideological interests of either liberal or conservative nature. We developed an interpretative approach to their discourses and perceptions through the qualitative content analysis of semi-structured interviews and online documentary sources.

A key task consisted in determining whether one observes the routinization of bioethical conflicts by European institutions (“business-as-usual” scenario) or whether the said conflicts are remaining extrinsic to the Brussels political game (“culture wars” scenario). In other words, is the emergence of new stakes – morality issues – prompting the emergence of new divisions and repertoires of action? We put to the test the normal course of EU politics in the light of (1) the structuration of morality divides along religious, political, and national frontlines; and (2) the materialization of morality antagonisms through discursive, bureaucratic, and mobilization weapons.

Overall, the “polarization” and “political style” variables showed that the supranational debates on abortion and hESCR do not fully alter the logics of supranational governance; in return, the EU polity is not closed to the crystallization of politicized modes of dissent expression. The hypothesis of an intermediary scenario oscillating between policy-seeking and position-taking perspectives is thus confirmed. On the one hand, issue-specific alliances characterized by internal multifold diversities do play the institutional rules of the European political game in their quest for ideological influence on the decision-making process. On the other hand, limited supranational competences on religiously-loaded issues constrain conflicting factions’ leeway to a symbolic use of morality causes and beliefs as instrumental devices worth of credit-claiming and identity-posturing.

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Contents

Introduction ... 1

I. The Politicization Machinery into Motion: Back to the Origins of an Incremental Process ... 3

A. Spilling over the Normative Realm of the Union’s Raison d’Être ... 4

B. The Institutionalization of Religious Interest Representations ... 6

II. Religion and EU Morality Politics: An Emerging Research Field ... 8

A. Scaling Down the Thematic Focus: From a Transversal to an Issue-Specific Perspective ... 8

B. Scaling Up the Unit of Analysis: From National Policy Regimes to EU Politics ... 9

1. Competing Approaches to Morality Issue Definition ... 10

2. Multifold Measures of the Religious Factor ... 12

III. European Culture Wars? A Fourfold Scenario ... 13

IV. Outline of the Dissertation ... 15

PART I – ANALYZING EU MORALITY POLITICS: EMPIRICAL

APPROACH AND THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK ... 19

Chapter 1. A Qualitative Insight into EU Bioethics Politics: The Cases of

Abortion and Human Embryonic Stem Cell Research ... 21

I. Bioethics as Study Case ... 21

A. Abortion ... 22

1. Framing the Controversy ... 22

2. National Abortion Policy Regimes ... 23

3. EU Abortion Politics ... 24

B. Human Embryonic Stem Cell Research ... 26

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2. Framing the Controversy ... 27

3. National hESCR Policy Regimes ... 28

4. EU hESCR Politics ... 29

II. Tracking Morality Surges: Data and Methods of Inquiry ... 31

A. An Actor-Centered Approach to EU Bioethics Politics ... 31

1. Staging the Locus of Politicization: European Institutions as Reluctant Regulators? .. ... 32

2. Mapping the Field of Normative Entrepreneurs: The European Civil Society Landscape ... 35

B. A Diversified Dataset to Capture the Intimate ... 38

C. A Qualitative Content Analysis of Discourses ... 40

III. Conclusion ... 43

Chapter 2. A Theoretical Insight into American Culture Wars: History,

Concepts and Operationalization ... 45

I. Public Culture as Contested Object ... 47

A. Past and Current Seismic Phases in the History of Morality Conflicts ... 48

B. The Culture War Cycle ... 50

C. Collective Destiny at Stake ... 51

II. Ideological Polarization, or the Realignment of Historical Divides ... 54

A. The Religious Nature of Cultural Conflict ... 55

1. The Ethnoreligious Theory ... 56

2. The Religious Restructuring Theory ... 58

3. Religion in Secular Europe: A Remnant of the Past? ... 59

B. The Political Nature of Cultural Conflict ... 61

III. Animosity in Action: The Materialization of Intractable Dissensions ... 64

A. The Argumentative Turn of Cultural Conflict, or the Performative Effect of Discursive Absolutes ... 64

B. Irreconcilable Disagreements Impervious to Compromise: Which Perspectives for Democracy? ... 66

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PART II – CULTURE WARS AS POLARIZATION ... 71

Chapter 3. Religious Frontlines ... 75

I. Religion and (Bio)politics: False Frenemies? ... 75

II. The Religious Profile of European Liberals and Conservatives ... 80

A. Secular Pro-Choicers v. Religious Pro-Lifers ... 80

B. Interdenominational Variations ... 84

C. Intradenominational Variations ... 86

III. Conclusion ... 89

Chapter 4. Partisan Frontlines ... 91

I. Inter-Partisan Variations: The Distribution of EPGs along the Liberal/Conservative Spectrum ... 92

A. The Left/Right Cleavage ... 94

1. The Crystallization of Center-Left and Conservative-Right Coalitions ... 95

2. “Pro-Choice but…”? Focus on the Greens/EFA ... 99

3. A European Christian Right? Focus on the EPP ... 101

B. The Integration/Demarcation Cleavage ... 104

1. The Apparent Conservatism of Eurosceptic, Right-Wing Populist EPGs ... 104

2. Religion For, or Against Europe? Between Supranational Aspirations and Nationalist Assumptions ... 107

II. Intra-Partisan Variations: MEPs’ Individual Voting Behavior on Bioethics ... 109

A. EPGs’ Cohesion Scores and the Impact of Roll-Call Votes ... 110

B. MEPs’ Loyalty(-ies) under Pressure ... 113

1. Voting Instructions or Free Vote? ... 113

2. Personal Beliefs and Experience ... 115

III. Conclusion ... 118

Chapter 5. National Frontlines ... 121

I. Liberal v. Conservative Member States: Evolving Trends and Deviant Patterns ... 122

II. A Twofold Territorial Cleavage ... 127

A. North v. South: The Imprint of Confessional Cultures and State-Church Relation Regimes ... 127

B. West v. East: The Legacy of Communist Regimes and Religious Nationalisms ... 132

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IV. Conclusion ... 141

Part III – Culture Wars as Political Style ... 143

Chapter 6. Discursive Weapons ... 147

I. Defining the Eurospeak: A Qualitative Framing Approach to Discourse Analysis ... 148

II. Subsidiarity, or the Imperfect Nature of the EU’s Competence Regime ... 150

A. Territorial Subsidiarity, or the Vertical Distribution of Competences between the EU and Member States ... 151

1. Abiding by the Law: Conservatives’ Intergovernmentalist Reading of the Treaties .... ... 152

2. Rescaling Conflict: Liberals’ Counter-Framing Strategies ... 155

a. The Internal Market ... 156

b. Health ... 157

c. Development Aid ... 158

d. Human Rights and Gender Equality ... 158

3. Toward a European Remit on Bioethics? ... 159

4. Bringing Ideology Back In: Critical Assessments of an Instrumental Use of Subsidiarity ... 161

B. Functional Subsidiarity, or the Horizontal Integration of Intermediary Bodies into Political Life ... 163

III. Human Dignity: From Constitutional Theory to Ethical Practice ... 166

A. Human Dignity as Consensual Value? A Façade of Unity Lacking Empirical Anchorage ... 166

B. Human Dignity as Political Asset? The Strategic Appeal of Polysemy... 169

C. Bringing Values Back In: Amplification Framing Processes ... 171

D. Capturing Control over Labels: Liberals’ Discursive Counter-Offensive ... 172

IV. Conclusion ... 175

Chapter 7. Bureaucratic Weapons ... 177

I. The Symbolic Functions of Expertise in EU Technocratic Governance ... 178

A. Expertise as Legitimizing Device ... 178

B. Expertise as Substantiating Device ... 180

II. The Institutionalization of Bioethical Expertise as Policy-Broker ... 183

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B. The European Group on Ethics in Science and New Technologies ... 185

1. The Neutrality of EGE Members: Independence in Question ... 187

2. EGE Meetings and Roundtables: Between Opacity and Transparency ... 191

3. EGE Opinions: Dissenting by Consensus ... 192

III. Conclusion ... 193

Chapter 8. Mobilization Weapons ... 195

I. Grassroots Initiatives: The ECI as Agenda-Setting Tool ... 196

A. A New Cure for EU Democratic Deficit? ... 197

B. One of Us as Study Case ... 198

1. Participatory Democracy under Stress: The Commission’s Deaf Ear to Pro-Life Claims ... 199

2. The People v. The Elites: One of Us’ Populist Overtones ... 201

3. The Majority v. The Minority: Representative Democracy at Stake ... 203

II. Litigation Activism: Influencing Politics through the Courts ... 205

A. Fighting through Law: Motives, Barriers and Modalities of an American Import ... 206

B. Bioethics Politics at the CJEU and ECtHR: A Protective Approach to National Cultural Sensitivities ... 209

C. An Empirical Look at the Instrumentalization of the Judiciary ... 211

1. Oliver Brüstle v. Greenpeace ... 211

2. One of Us and Others v. Commission ... 213

III. Online Communication and the Inflammatory Effect of Media Coverage ... 216

A. Conservatives’ Multifaceted Online Activism: Focus on Agenda Europe ... 216

B. Sensationalist Rhetoric and Bipolar Mental Representations: Implications for the Culture War Prophecy ... 219

IV. Conclusion ... 220

Conclusion ... 223

I. Religion and EU Morality Politics: Research Puzzle, Theoretical Framework and Methodological Approach ... 223

II. Organizing Ideological Factions: Usual Alliances or Restructured Divisions? ... 225

III. Expressing Dissent and Mobilizing the Troops: Usual Repertoires or New Modi Operandi? ... 227

IV. European Culture Wars? Implications for the EU Polity ... 230

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Appendix ... 235

Appendix 1. Online Documentary Sources ... 235

Appendix 2. European Interviews ... 246

Appendix 3. Interview Guide ... 248

Appendix 4. Exploratory Field in the United States of America ... 250

References ... 253

Official Documents ... 270

Newspaper Articles ... 271