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EU membership has been for the greater part of the post-authoritarian period (1974–2010) an important element of the Greek national consensus. Europe was commonly associated in public discourse with geopolitical security, democratic institutions and economic prosperity. Moreover, accession to the European Monetary Union in 2001 was celebrated as proof of a successful national course and as promise for economic growth. Nevertheless, challenges to pro-Europeanism both from the left and from the extreme right have risen in the context of the economic crisis (2010–2015). While Euro-sceptical attitudes are still a minority within Greek society – but significantly increased in relation to past trends – the discursive negotiation of Europe in the Greek public debate is characterized by ambiguity and has acquired various negative connotations (e.g. austerity policies, authoritarianism, German hegemony, democratic deficit in decision-making). In the highly-polarized Greek political debate, a new cleavage has emerged based on the acceptance or rejection of the loan agreements and the austerity policies associated with them (the so-called pro- vs. anti-memorandum cleavage) which have also transformed traditional Left vs. Right cleavage thus allowing for political alliances between left-ward and right-ward parties. It remains to be seen whether the new cleavage will take the form of a clash between pro-Europeanists vs. Euroscepticists as it is often argued in the context of Grexit scenarios. While this new dichotomy can be misleading especially if it is unambiguously interpreted in cultural terms, it describes a newly formed social and political tension that is under process. A special chapter in this respect is the currency debate; the dilemma between the euro and the drachma represents distinct ideological paradigms and power structures. The present chapter explores the discursive negotiation of Europe in the context of the Greek public debate analysing discourses produced both by political elites and mass media with special focus on the 2015 referendum campaign and the implications of the July 2015 Greece-EU agreement.

This chapter focuses on the impact of national economic conditions and voters’ attitudes on the positioning of European national political parties with regard to the European Union (EU). We provide an empirical analysis based on data gathered through the Chapel Hill Expert Survey (CHES) covering parties from 14 European countries observed over the 1999–2010 time span. We perform a regression analysis where the dependent variable measures the position of political parties vis-à-vis EU integration and explanatory variables include a number of measures of national economic conditions, features of the national political and institutional framework and voters’ Euroscepticism. Fixed effect, ordered logit and fractional logit estimates provide the following main results. Compared with other parties, non-mainstream political parties and those acting in established economies are more prone to mirror citizens’ Eurosceptic sentiments. National economic conditions such as inflation as well as gross domestic product (GDP) growth affect mainstream party support for the EU. Smaller and ideologically extreme parties are, on average, less supportive of European integration.

Turkey has been an active member of the Bologna Process (BP) since 2001. This chapter focuses on the impact of the BP on higher education (HE) in Turkey by outlining the reforms that were carried out and the narratives surrounding the changes. The focus of the chapter will be on how the BP has been accommodated, negotiated debated or rejected in Turkey and the societal and political tensions surrounding the process. The chapter is based on the findings of semi-structured interviews conducted with the Bologna experts and the officials of universities in Turkey, who were responsible for the reforms between 2009 and 2016, as well as a review of updated data and the analysis of secondary literature and official texts, such as the National Reports of the BP and the relevant policy documents in Turkey. After a very intense reform process, the policy transfer in Turkey slowed down, and Turkey's discussions, specifically about the BP both at the policy and the university level, became close to non-existent. The chapter aims to analyse the reasons behind the loss of interest in the BP in Turkey by focusing on the critical voices and discussions surrounding the neoliberalisation of HE. The chapter will also refer to how Euroscepticism in Turkey impacted the reform process in HE.