Lithuanian Political Parties’ Attitudes toward European Integration: an analysis of 2016 Parties’ Manifestos

Abstract

The paper introduced here focuses on the particularities of Lithuanian political parties’ discourse on European integration. The questions which this paper seeks to answer are: how much ‘Europe’ actually figures into parties’ national election manifestos and what parties says about the nature of the European polity and the policy objectives to be implemented by the EU? The results of the analysis show that, although in principle there is a support to the European integration, political parties follow the logic of instrumental rationality containing strategic actions and specific domestic interest implementation in the united Europe. These contradictions may lead to the inconsistencies of party politics toward European integration.

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5755/j01.ppaa.16.3.19344