ABSTRACT
Although the concept of Euroscepticism possesses a substantial history there has perhaps never been the confluence of events, both economic (e.g. Eurozone/sovereign debt crisis, austerity, secular stagnation, widening of core-periphery divergence) and political (e.g. threats to democracy in the Central and Eastern European countries, the challenge to security and energy from Russia, the refugee crisis), that have projected it to the forefront of debate across the European Union (EU). Crucially, this debate surfaced across those Member States without a previous track record of Euroscepticism, while in the United Kingdom (UK), long been seen as ‘awkward’ and ‘semi-detached’ (George 1988, 1992), this reached its zenith through a decision to leave the EU.
