Given this State's recent impressive performance in one international league table after another, some Irish people were probably mildly shocked to discover from a recently published Eurobarometer that, as of mid-October to mid-November 1997, this State was at the bottom of the pile when it came to awareness of the Amsterdam Treaty (the Eurobarometer findings were subsequently confirmed by research carried out for the Referendum Commission).
Mind you, we were in good company. The 25 per cent level of awareness of the treaty in this State was only nine percentage points less than the European average and was identical to the level of awareness (or lack of awareness) in Germany. However, the German citizen or, for that matter, the average European citizen, is not called upon to ratify the treaty in a referendum.
Denmark is the relevant point of comparison in this regard: 91 per cent of Danes had heard of the treaty in late 1997. Some commentators have argued that Irish people have a very low level of knowledge of EU affairs. This is not strictly accurate. On a general scale of knowledge of EU affairs, this State was ranked sixth in 1993 with a score that was just above the EU average. We were substantially ahead, not just of Britain and Italy, but also of Germany and the Netherlands.
But how, then, do we come last in awareness of the Amsterdam Treaty? And it is not just Amsterdam: other Eurobarometer research in late 1997 showed that, in the immediate aftermath of the Luxembourg Employment Summit, this State was also ranked last in terms of awareness of that important event and, in this instance, was 24 percentage points adrift of the EU average.
The point would seem to be that, while we are reasonably well informed about basic EU institutions, we do not follow current policy developments closely, not even developments with significant constitutional and long-term political implications.
This fits in with other aspects of the profile of Irish EU attitudes. As the accompanying charts illustrate quite dramatically, this State has the highest level of support for EU membership, by far the highest level of net trust in the European Union as an institution and, by an even larger margin, the highest level of satisfaction with "the way democracy works in the European Union". At the same time, it has a lower than average level of interest in European politics and, as noted at the outset, an abysmal level of awareness of EU policy developments.
In short, in regard to the EU, this State has what political scientists would call a "subject" rather than a "participant" political culture. Irish people tend to be satisfied subjects of the EU rather than participant citizens. This is reflected in low levels of turnout when the public is given the opportunity to participate, either directly or indirectly, in the process of EU policy making. Presumably, turnout in the Amsterdam referendum will not be a problem on May 22nd.
Although there is always the possibility of differential abstention in the two referendums, or even of a spoiled ballot response as a protest in the Amsterdam referendum, in general the expectation must be that the concurrent referendum on the Belfast Agreement will bring substantial numbers of voters to the polls and that most of them will vote in the Amsterdam referendum as well. Nonetheless, it is worth looking at turnout in EU contests as an indicator of the proportions of people who are likely to approach the Amsterdam vote with degree of enthusiasm and commitment. The basic level of participation in EU contests lies somewhere in the mid-40s. This is the level of participation in European Parliament elections in this State when these are not accompanied by a local or a general election and it was also the level achieved in the 1987 referendum on the Single European Act.
It is possible to get higher proportions of Irish people involved in the European electoral process: 71 per cent voted in the original EEC referendum in 1972 and, less impressively still above the baseline, 57 per cent voted in the Maastricht referendum.
Overall turnout on May 22nd should be substantially higher than this latter figure - if it is not, then the legitimacy of the Belfast Agreement will be more than a little tarnished. But to get all of those who turn out to vote on the Belfast Agreement to vote on a well informed basis in the Amsterdam Treaty is going to take a substantial process of political debate and voter mobilisation.
Research on the two recent EU referendums indicates that the decline in turnout in the SEA and Maastricht referendums relative to the preceding general election was most pronounced in more the rural and the more working class constituencies. This points to the kinds of target areas that the process of informing and mobilising voters needs to aim at.
The attempt to mobilise support for the treaty may need to focus in particular on rural constituencies and farming areas. This is because the evidence also suggests a significant decline in support for EU treaty changes between the SEA referendum and the Maastricht in constituencies with high proportions of farmers. The proportion of farmers in a constituency was quite a good predictor of a "yes" vote on the SEA but bore no relationship to the outcome in the case of Maastricht. The proportion of those with manual working class occupations was a predictor of a "no" vote on both occasions.
Given the different levels of turnout in the SEA and Maastricht referendums, it is remarkable that the "yes" percentage was virtually identical in both - 70 and 69 per cent respectively. With this as the starting point and with a high turnout more or guaranteed, supporters of the Amsterdam Treaty may feel quite secure as the referendum approaches. They may feel even more comfortable when they reflect on the 80 per cent who think that this State's membership of the EU is a good thing.
On the other hand, that 80 per cent figure is an assessment of EU membership as it is at present. Making a positive assessment of this sort could be quite compatible with having reservations about the pace or intensity of European integration. Some evidence on the latter is provided by an international study of attitudes carried out on behalf of the International Social Survey Programme (ISSP) in 1995-96.
Respondents were presented with two alternatives - "Ireland should do all it can to unite fully with the European Union" and "Ireland should do all it can to protect its independence from the European Union" asked which statement "comes closer to you own view?" Fifty-five percent chose the first option and 32 per cent the second (there were 13 per cent "don't knows"). This is not a direct measure of attitudes to the issues involved in the Amsterdam Treaty, particularly since the latter is generally regarded as a rather hesitant step forward in integration.
Nonetheless, compared to the "is membership a good thing" question, it is probably a better indicator of the attitudinal context in which the Amsterdam decision will be made. When this is put together with the need to overcome the public's lack of knowledge of the Amsterdam Treaty and their lack of involvement and sense of participation in the integration process, it suggests that the pro-Amsterdam campaigners should not be complacent.
Dr Richard Sinnott is Lecturer in Politics and director of the Centre for European Economic and Public Affairs at UCD. He is a co-author of People and Parliament in the European Union: Participation, Democracy and Legitimacy in the European Union which will be published by Oxford University Press in June 1998.