A Representative European Parliament? Members of European Parliamentary Party Groups and the Representation of Citizens' Preferences
研究欧洲议会党团和议员在左右及欧盟一体化维度上如何代表选民偏好，发现中间派政党议员更贴近选民，而多数中间派党团的中间选民比中间议员更疑欧。
Abstract The link between citizens' and representatives' preferences is central to representative democracy. Research on representation of citizens' preferences in the European Parliament (EP) has primarily concentrated on national political parties and candidates. We ask how well transnational EP party groups and members of the EP (MEPs) represent their voters on the left–right and EU‐integration dimensions. We use data from four waves of the European Election Studies and surveys of MEPs. We show that MEPs in centrist parties tend to be closer to their voters on the left–right dimension than others, with EU positions making little difference to this. Our findings indicate the median voter tends to be more Eurosceptic than the median MEP across most centrist party groups whilst the opposite is true for the most Eurosceptic groups. These results have important implications for the study of representation and democracy in the EU.