Why has the European issue been so divisive in British politics since the 1950s?

Stephen George has described the relationship between Britain and Europe as one of "semi-detatchment," basing this assessment on the failure of successive governments to co-operate effectively with their mainland counterparts. Nigel Ashford goes further, blaming the political parties for failing both to provide a clear and coherent sense of leadership and direction on this issue, and by refusing to develop a bi-partisan approach to European integration. While both of these views can certainly be supported by the historical evidence of indecisiveness, prevarication, and ineptitude in various Prime Ministers� approaches to the European question, there are, as both authors acknowledge, certain unique characteristics about the British political system that caused the European issue to arouse so many passions and lead to the intra- and inter-party divisions that have hindered Britain's progress to full participation in the EU. Three factors above all stand out in this area; firstly, the adversarial nature of British politics; secondly, the considerable intra-party divisions on the subject, and thirdly, the threat to the parties' ideological self-image posed by European integration. In examining these three issues we can evaluate whether it was inevitable that Europe would always be such a problematic policy area for British governments.
Firstly, there is the political convention that parties in opposition must oppose the policy of the government in order to provide an effective check on executive power, regardless of the fact that there may be a high degree of continuity between successive administrations, as seems to be the case in post-war British politics. This style of politics is almost unique among countries in Europe, as most of the other member states are used to coalition governments, and the attendant necessity for consensus and compromise in order to advance a legislative programme. Both France and Germany, the two countries that are normally described as being the most powerful "axis" of Europe, have coalition governments, as well as other states including Italy and Ireland. This has had several implications; firstly, British representatives often find themselves marginalised at negotiating sessions; even Major, perhaps the most flexible of Prime Ministers of recent years, found these tiresome. For the rest of Europe, however, they are a matter of routine, a necessary part of the respective domestic political systems that are naturally extended to EU business. The second result is the damage that this can cause to domestic political parties; those in government are reluctant to lead public opinion into acceptance of the constraints imposed on Britain by further integration, and this can be used as a weapon by the opposition with which to attack the government. Thus Labour opposed British entry in 1962, 1971, and 1980. Although in the former instance this was due to ideological reasons, the second attempt to enter the then EEC (in 1967) had been made under a Labour government, so it seemed illogical that simply because Labour was now in opposition it had to oppose the government's strategy. The commitment to withdrawal made after the election defeat in 1979 provides the best example of how the adversarial system prompted an inconsistancy in the signals the party was sending to the electorate; it adopted an anti-European strategy due to a resurgence of the left of the party, and in order to differentiate its position from that of the Conservatives. However, it can also be argued that the adversarial style also led to a rise in Labour's fortunes towards the end of the 1980s as it adopted a more positive outlook to Europe and as the Tories began to become increasingly divided over the issue. Yet it seems that this is only a contributing factor in the explanation at this time, as the various sections of the wider Labour Party, especially the unions, changed their approach - the unions in the light of marginalisation after the restrictive legislative programme of the Thatcher administrations. There was also the need to counter the electoral threat of the breakaway pro-European SDP. Thus the adversarial nature of domestic politics was only partly contributary to Labour�s change of direction in the late 1980s. Thirdly, there has been a marked failure of the British parties in the European Parliament to align themselves with their respective counterparts from other countries; this is explained not only by the fact that most of the other parties in the EP have experience of coalition government, but also because the centre-right on the continent is traditionally Christian or Liberal based, and the centre-left is too federal for the British Labour party. So we can conclude that the nature of British politics had a seriously negative impact on Britain's dealings with its partners, and was also responsible for the lack of a clear consensus among the parties at home.
Secondly, there have been persistent and marked divisions within the two parties on the question of Europe. These have endured as the nature of Europe has changed - the organisation itself is dynamic and fluid, and each new stage in its evolution has produced a new impact on British domestic politics. From the origins of the project in the 1950s until around the mid-1970s, the question that concerned politicians here was whether or not Britain should join the new community. Initially, there was little enthusiasm for the project from either party. The Conservatives still saw Britain's place in the world as embracing defence and security links with the United States and the trading relationship with the Commonwealth. Europe was simply another sphere of influence, and to join would undermine the links with the rest of the world. Instead, what would have been preferred was a free-trade area with inter-governmental co-operation as opposed to supra-national decision-making. However, the decision to attempt entry into the EEC was made for reasons of economic expediency: the Commonwealth had declined, and even the US had receded in importance (indeed, the US was supporting Britain's membership to create a strong and unified Europe as a counterweight to the Warsaw pact), thus meaning that Europe was the only way out of a period of long, slow economic decline. The political suspicions of the emergence of a federal system had not been confirmed, and to be an enthusiastic and major player in Europe would assure a retention of at least some of Britain's foreign policy influence that she was rapidly losing. All these reasons were not enough to placate a vocal minority of opposition from within the Tory party, who saw the new Commonwealth as a replacement for the imperial tradition of their party. They also expressed fears that would be salient throughout the entire period, of an infringement of sovereignty. In the end, it was largely due to Macmillan's eagerness that the initial application to join was made. Labour largely shared the belief that Britain could play an important world role as head of the Commonwealth, and in the immediate post-war years was also implacably opposed to membership on the grounds that, as Europe was mostly under the control of parties of the centre-right, to join would frustrate the domestic advance of socialism. However, the fact that Labour abstained in the Commons on the question of the initial application to join shows that they were somewhat unsure of their position, and this indecisiveness was to turn into outright splits both during Wilson's application and Heath's eventual entry in 1971. In the former case, whilst the Cabinet had become convinced of and accepted the case for membership, there was a core of rebels who voted against. This is to be contrasted with the 1971 vote, where 69 Labour MPs voted with the government in favour of entry. So clearly there were initial divisions in both parties on the question of whether Britain should become a member of the EEC. These reversals of policy by Labour further highlight the irresponsibility, inconsistency, and opportunism produced as a result of the antagonistic nature of domestic politics, and the party was severely criticised because of this by sections of the media.
Between the mid-1970s and the late-1980s, the emphasis shifted to how the EC's policies were affecting Britain, and what Britain's role in the organisation was to be. This was especially apparent in Mrs. Thatcher's demand for Britain to get "our money back" by reduced contributions to the EC's budget. When this was resolved, she called for cuts in EC expenditure, especially on agriculture. This approach was summarised in the Conservatives 1983 election manifesto: whole-hearted commitment to membership of, and the promotion of British interests within, the EC. This was re-emphasised in her Bruges speech of 1988, which stressed the importance of intergovernmentalism, reform of the CAP, deregulation of the European economy, free trade with the rest of the world, and a growing role in defence. Interpreted as a hardening of her sceptic stance, it contributed to the resignations of Nigel Lawson, Sir Geoffrey Howe, and eventually Thatcher herself. These damaging and high-profile disputes shattered the credibility of the Conservative party, and many would say it has not yet recovered. It is even possible that, as the tensions evidently remain despite Hague's attempts to quash them, this issue may join those of repeal of the Corn Laws and tariff reform in dividing the party to such an extent that it is out of power for a generation. Labour, too, experienced difficulties in this period as we have already noted; so bad were the splits produced by its adoption of a policy of withdrawal from the EC that several high-profile MPs lead by Roy Jenkins (who lead the vote in favour of entry in 1971) split to form the SDP. The hostility to Europe damaged Labour's credibility as a party of government, and undoubtedly contributed to the massive electoral defeat in 1983.
Finally, in recent years, there has emerged a unanimity on the irreversibility of Britain's membership (even the most ardent Euro-sceptics within the Conservative party do not advocate withdrawal from the EU), but new differences have emerged over the scope and nature of further integration. These divisions within the Conservative party were most apparent in the debate over the Maastricht treaty, which for long periods threatened to force the collapse of John Major's administration. Although the Bill eventually passed, the troubles with the sceptics did not, and these weaknesses were keenly exploited by New Labour. The difficulty that faces the Conservative leadership in reconciling the differences of opinion within the party lies in the fact that they do not fit neatly into the left/right cleavage that one would expect, but cut across these to draw upon a particular MPs attitude to the involvement of government in the economy and the degree to which they believe there should be sovereignty within Europe. This results in four groups into which MPs could pledge their allegiance. As the distinction between domestic and European policies has become more blurred, so has the difficulty in keeping the party united. On the other hand, although there do not appear to be overt differences of opinion in the Blair government in the same way as there were in his predecessor's (and still are in the opposition), this could be attributed to a tighter control of MPs by the Whips and party leadership; were the grip of the spin-doctors ever to be weakened, we could well see divisions start to arise among such a large parliamentary grouping as sits on the government benches at the moment. Lastly we turn to the impact Europe has had on the ideological self-images of the two parties, and how the challenge of Europe has forced them to re-examine how they portray themselves. It is true that in the 1960s and 1970s that Labour appeared to the electorate to be more divided on the issue than the Conservatives, who capitalised on this to present themselves as the natural "party of Europe." This situation has undoubtedly been reversed in recent years. The Conservatives, whose appeal to the mass electorate has always had at its heart the security, prosperity, and sovereignty of the British state, have had to adapt their image in order to convince the electorate that they can play a key role in Europe and still guarantee that they will retain control over these areas at the same time. This has proved increasingly difficult as more and more decision-making has been transferred to unelected and unaccountable bodes such as the Council of Ministers and ECJ, which the sceptics have seized on as being at odds with the principles of popular parliamentary democracy, and an example of how Europe is a threat to key Conservative values. Yet this rests on the definition of sovereignty as self-governance, whereas the europhiles would undoubtedly interpret sovereignty as meaning the ability to maximise influence on a world-wide scale, which they would argue could only be achieved through closer co-operation with, and further integration into, a more federal Europe. Given the apparent lack of enthusiasm among the electorate for any further integration into Europe, it seems that they regard the former definition as paramount. The challenge to Labour has been to reconcile membership of Europe with the ability to implement a domestic socialist agenda, which has been threatened by the increasing interdependency of European economies; hence the need for pan-European co-ordination of economic strategies. However, with New Labour's abandonment of socialism, it remains to be seen if there will be a noted change in policy direction towards Europe from this government; certainly it is more welcoming to ideas such as EMU and QMV, but given the length of time Labour has been out of power and the fact that there is now no socialist party in Britain, there is no control to test against.
The European issue has been around for centuries, as demonstrated by Shakespeare's lines in Richard II, referring to "the poison'd chalice" of Europe with Britain as "this scepter'd isle." It has only been in the latter half of this century with the creation of a European institution that Britain has been forced to decide where it stands in relation to the continent. Judged in these terms, it seems that it is rather harsh to complain that fifty years is more than enough time to make up one's mind, and given that the issues involved are not to be treated lightly, it was indeed always going to be the case that decisions on whether and how far to proceed with European integration would be highly emotive and divisive. Hugo Young, quoting the same passage, refers to British entry as "this blessed plot," implying that stealth and underhand techniques were involved. Whilst it certainly seems that the electorate has been sent conflicting signals from the parties, it was the politicians who decided to enter Europe (subsequently approved in the referendum) and the extent to which parliamentary and party divisions over the subject have been publicised indicates that British participation was in no way a conspiracy by the elite.