The Politics of Differentiated Integration: What do Governments Want? Country Report - Slovenia

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70
Copyright @ 2021
Australian and New Zealand Journal of European Studies
https://esaanz.org.au/anzjes/
Vol13 (3)
ISSN 1837-2147 (Print)
ISSN 1836-1803 (On-line)
Slovenia: a case of a small, relatively new member
country
1
MAJA BUČAR
FACULTY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES, UNIVERSITY OF LJUBLJANA, SLOVENIA
maja.bucar@fdv.uni-lj.si
BOŠTJAN UDOVIČ
FACULTY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES, UNIVERSITY OF LJUBLJANA, SLOVENIA
bostjan.udovic@fdv.uni-lj.si
Abstract:
The concept of differentiated integration (DI) is practically invisible in Slovenian politics. The analysis
showed that the key words associated with DI are seldom used in parliamentary debates, coalition
programmes or prime ministerial speeches. This suggests that the issue of DI is more a topic of
academic discussion than of daily politics. While the low salience of DI in Slovenian political debates
makes it hard to establish governmental positions in detail, the common thread throughout Slovenian
foreign policy from independence in 1991 onwards has been that a strong and united EU is of key
importance for Slovenia. The few instances where wording related to DI models was used reflect a
concern about a multi-speed Europe, especially a fear that a multi-tier EU would mean fewer
opportunities for future Slovenian governments and in general, fewer opportunities for smaller
and/or less developed countries.
Keywords: differentiated integration; multi-speed EU; Slovenia
Introduction
2
The citizens of the Republic of Slovenia endorsed Slovenia’s path to European Union
(EU) membership by an overwhelming majority of votes (89.64 %) in a referendum on
23 March 2003. The country joined the EU in 2004, adopted the euro at the beginning
of 2007 and joined Schengen by the end of the same year. In 2008, Slovenia chaired
the EU Council, a role that it again held in the second half of 2021. This amply
demonstrates that the country is highly pro-EU regardless of the political party in the
government, as it is widely believed that EU membership is crucial for Slovenia's
development and security.
1
The research leading to this report was conducted within the InDivEU project. The project has received funding
from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No.
822304. The funders had no role in the study design, data collection or analysis. The article is also a result of the
research program “Slovenia and its Actors in International Relations and European Integration (P5-01777)”.
2
The authors wish to acknowledge with thanks the constructive comments of Stefan Telle and an anonymous
reviewer on the earlier draft of this paper.

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Almost all political parties in the National Assembly (except one: The Slovenian
National Party, SNS) support Slovenian membership of the European Union.
Nevertheless, there are differences in their perceptions of the European Union:
whereas the Slovenian Democratic Party (SDS) of the current Prime Minister Janša
argue that Slovenia should enhance its relations with the Visegrád Group (V4) and
other central European countries, the liberal trio (the Party of the Modern Centre,
SMC; the List of Marjan Šarec, LMŠ; and the Party of Alenka Bratušek, SAB) emphasise
that Slovenia is part of core Europe.
3
In geographical terms, the position of the Social
Democrats (SD) is not so clear, but together with New Slovenia–Christian Democrats
(NSi) they aim for Slovenia to be more proactive in the EU institutions.
Despite this general pro-European outlook, many of the more complex issues related
to the EU are not well publicised and therefore public awareness of how the EU
functions is relatively low. The ambition of this article is, first, to discover the extent to
which Slovenian governments talk about differentiated integration (DI). Secondly, we
want to determine what positions they take on DI. Does Slovenian politics support the
idea of a ‘Multi-Speed EU’ and if so, which are the national preferences? Which, if any,
are the differentiated integration mechanisms (enhanced co-operation, opt-out
mechanism) the Slovenian government might prefer? Are these mechanisms applied
in Slovenian EU politics?
In this article, we explore the presence of DI discussion in the Slovenian political space,
which issues generated the most attention, and especially how DI is understood by
Slovenian politicians, be they members of government or members of Parliament. The
research confirmed our initial expectation that in Slovenia a debate about
differentiated integration (DI) is barely present, and that the mechanisms of DI are not
well known. The fact that Slovenian public opinion as well as official politics are
committed to the European Union does not mean that today debate on EU issues is
common in government bodies or the general public. The article is structured as
follows. The next section discusses theory and methods. The article then presents the
main findings and observations and concludes with brief discussion of their policy
relevance.
Theory and methods
Partly as a consequence of enlargement, but also due to a number of other complex
issues which have needed to be addressed by the EU in recent years, theoretical
discussion on the concept of differentiated integration has been on the rise (among
others, see Stubb 1996, Leuffen et al. 2013, Rittberger at al. 2015, Schimmelfennig &
Winzen 2020). As pointed out by Holzinger and Schimmelfennig (2012), there are a
number of normative concepts and approaches, providing us with a systematic
overview of theorizing on differentiated integration.
The theoretical framework of this article follows that described in the introduction to
this issue (Telle et al. 2021), distinguishing between policy differentiation and polity
differentiation. The first one relates in particular to different preferences and
capacities of the member states as to the integration (demand-side) and offers option
to more reluctant members of not join in all policies, while not preventing others to
3
In Slovenia, this usually refers to the countries of Benelux, Germany and France.

Bučar and Udovič, ANZJES 13(3)
72
move ahead. In the case of polity differentiation, the categorization of differentiated
integration in terms of time, space, and matter (Stubb 1996) is followed.
We distinguished two different models of polity differentiation. On the one hand, the
‘multi-speed EU’ model depicts DI as a temporary phenomenon and implies that all
Member States (MSs) will ultimately reach the same level of integration. We started
with the assumption that the concept of differentiated integration, which enables
different dynamics of cooperation to member countries, is less acceptable to the so
called new Member States, which during the period of their accession already had to
prove that they are capable of adopting the full range of EU policies. Yet, the complexity
of EU rules has already had practical consequences for both older and newer members:
here we are thinking in particular of the monetary union and Schengen – while some
Member States decided against these policies and opted not to adopt the euro, others
simply have not met the criteria yet. As Slovene ambition from day one was to fully
embrace all EU policies as quickly as possible, ideas of deeper integration were
supported. This would suggest that the Slovenian stance would not favour DI in any
form.
On the other hand, the ‘multi-end EU’ model depicts DI as a potentially permanent
feature of European integration. In this model, the MSs do not necessarily strive to
reach similar levels of integration. Instead, each MS can ‘pick and choose’ policies to
adjust its own level of integration to national preferences and capacities, with the end
result being the co-existence of multiple overlapping regimes of integration. This so
called “multi-end” model may in principle be more acceptable from the integration
policy efficiency perspective, but the question remains as to whether membership or
lack thereof in a particular circle is a free choice of the Member State or a selective
policy of the “core” countries towards those presumably less capable.
For the analysis of the salience of DI, we counted keywords (Appendix 1) in repositories
of parliamentary debates. The suggested keywords were translated and adapted to the
Slovenian language and jargon that is usually employed when discussing European
affairs. Therefore, some Slovenian equivalents are not simply translated, but logically
adapted to the political discourse in the country.
4
A major source was provided by the
research group involved in the CLARIN project (European Research Infrastructure for
Language Resources and Technology), a part of the EU infrastructure ESFRI.
5
The
relevant data is in the siParl corpus, a database included in CLARIN
6
.
In addition, for the years in which we identified a peak in the salience of DI, the authors
looked at the original documents in the database. This way, the context in which a
particular DI model was addressed could be identified, and instances of a different use
of a specific term eliminated.
7
This proved to be fruitful since the mere counting of the
results in parliamentary debates only seldom included the keywords identified as
search variables. The authors did not focus only on key words/catchwords, but also on
4
Here, the authors wish to thank to Tomaž Erjavec, from the Slovenian CLARIN team, for his valuable assistance
and guidance.
5
European Strategy Forum on Research Infrastructures. See more at https://www.clarin.eu/content/clarin-in-a-
nutshell.
6
CLARIN corpus comprises over 10 thousand sessions of the National Assembly of the Republic of Slovenia in the
period from 1990 to 2918, which covers one million speeches or 200 million words. (Pančur et al. 2020).
7
For example, the term “differentiated integration” was used during the parliamentary debate on the principles of
involving children with special needs in the education system. This was then eliminated from our analysis.

ANZJES 13(3)
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the context that in some cases revealed the level of commitment and the attitude of
Slovenia (through its politicians) to EU integration.
For analysis of the government attitude towards DI, the authors identified and
analysed documents where EU issues were expected to be discussed. The selection
included the last three coalition agreements (period 2014–2022)
8
, the three speeches
of the Prime Ministers (PMs) after their election in the National Assembly (2014, 2018,
2020)
9
, the speech of the PM Janez Janša addressing the European Parliament during
the Slovenian Presidency of the European Council in 2008, and the transcript of the
public debate at the National Assembly dedicated to the presentation of the White
Paper on the future of the Europe
10
by the European Commission, held on 15 June
2017. Also, different sessions of the Parliamentary Committees, where debates
included some of the identified DI keywords, were analysed.
The timeframe of the analysis is 1992–2018, even though Slovenia joined the EU only
in 2004. This timeframe was selected as already during the political debates on
Slovenian independence, the fact that the country wanted to adhere to the EU (at the
time, the EEC) was very much present. It was therefore expected that Slovenia would
put much effort into presenting itself as a suitable potential EU member. Our
expectation was that some of the key words linked to the EU would be present even in
the pre-accession period.
Polity differentiation
The analysis of prime ministerial speeches in the national parliament on the occasion
of addressing the parliament after taking office, or in the European Parliament when
taking over the Presidency of the Council of the European Union, showed no use of DI-
related key words.
With Slovenia taking over the presidency of the EU Council in 2008, Prime Minister
Janez Janša addressed the European Parliament on 16 January 2008, presenting the
priorities of its EU Council presidency as the first new Member State to hold the office.
Yet, in his speech, the Prime Minister did not use any of the phrases associated with
DI.
Our qualitative analysis included also the three prime minister’s speeches delivered at
the inauguration of their mandates. Most of the addresses focused on domestic issues,
with the EU barely mentioned. Even though each of the prime ministers represented
8
Coalition Agreement Cerar et al., Koalicijski Sporazum o Sodelovanju v Vladi Republike Slovenje za Mandatno
Obdobje 2014–2018. September 2014. https://www.strankasmc.si/wp-
content/uploads/2014/09/KOALICIJSKI%20SPORAZUM_PARAFIRAN_201400903.pdf; Coalition Agreement
Šarec et al., Koalicijski Sporazum o Sodelovanju v Vladi Republike Slovenje za Mandatno Obdobje 2018-2022.
August 2018. https://www.strankalms.si/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Koalicijski-sporazum-o-sodelovanju-v-
Vladi-Republike-Slovenije-za-mandatno-obdobje-2018%E2%80%932022.pdf; Coalition Agreement Janša et al.
Koalicijsko Pogodbo o Sodelovanju v Vladi Republike Slovenje 2020-2022. https://siol.net/galleries/gallery-
231927/?image=1.
9
Speech by designated PM (prior to the election) Miro Cerar (2014). http://www.dz-
rs.si/wps/portal/Home/deloDZ/seje/evidenca?mandat=VII&type=sz&uid=21C8F2C86F5604FDC1257D43004A
87D0; Speech by designated PM (prior to the election) Marjan Šarec (2018) https://www.strankalms.si/nagovor-
kandidata-za-predsednika-vlade-rs-marjana-sarca-na-5-izredni-seji-dz/; Speech by the designated PM (prior to
the election) Janez Janša (2020). https://www.sds.si/novica/janez-jansa-slovenija-s-svojimi-potenciali-zmore-
bistveno-vec-od-tega-kar-se-trenutno.
10
See https://ec.europa.eu/info/future-europe/white-paper-future-europe/white-paper-future-europe-five-
scenarios_en.

Bučar and Udovič, ANZJES 13(3)
74
different political positions, the attitude to the EU did not differ much between them.
Once again, there was only a single reference to DI: a two-tier EU was commented on
by one of the PMs, and a belief that Slovenia should strive towards staying in the core
of the EU was stated.
Three coalition agreements were analysed: the government of Miro Cerar, which was
a coalition of three parties and was in office from 2014 to 2018; the government of
Marjan Šarec, a minority coalition of five parties, which stepped down at the beginning
of 2020; and the current government of Janez Janša, a coalition of four parties
expected to be in power until mid- 2022. The documents confirm speculation that DI
and even general discussion on the future of the EU and the role of Slovenia within it
attracted only limited attention from the government and political parties. What we
found is that in the analysed documents, discussions seldom moved beyond standard
phrases on the need to strengthen the EU and Slovenian active cooperation.
Moreover, differentiated integration was not a common topic in Slovenian
parliamentary debates. The analysis of sessions in the National Assembly did not result
in any entries for ‘differentiated integration.’
11
As such, there were just three moments
in the last 25 years in which conceptual key words related to DI were used more
frequently in parliamentary debates (Figure 1). These were the years 1993, 2004 and
2017. What can be seen from these debates is that the concept of different speeds in
the EU was always associated with the position of Slovenia. As such, speakers almost
never discussed the relevance of possible differentiation for the European future, but
mostly only the Slovenian position on these potential developments, urging the
country to try to stay with the most dynamic group of countries. In general, a
substantial debate about the future of Europe was non-existent. Speakers only referred
to the ‘future of Europe’ as something that should be debated and should evolve, but
in fact this was just a euphemism for positioning Slovenia in core Europe.
Figure 1 The salience of conceptual key words in parliamentary debates
11
This can be explained by the fact that in the Slovenian language politicians do not use the term ‘diferencirana
integracija/ diferencirano povezovanje’ but instead the term ‘level of integration.’ The search therefore included
this term as well. However, even so the results are quite scarce: only two instances were recorded.
0
5
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15
20
25
30
35
1990
1991
1992
1993
1994
1995
1996
1997
1998
1999
2000
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
Differentiated integration Coalition of the willing Two-speed Europe
Multi-speed Europe Variable Geometry Core Europe
Two-tier Europe Concentric circles A la carte

ANZJES 13(3)
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Looking at the distribution of the conceptual key words, we found that ‘core Europe,’
‘two-speed Europe’ and ‘multi-speed Europe’ were the key phrases most used in
parliamentary debates, with ‘core Europe’ and ‘two-speed Europe’ representing more
than 80% of all the key phrases.
The multi-speed Europe model
The terms ‘two-speed Europe’ and ‘multi-speed Europe’ were debated mostly in the 3rd
and 7th terms of the National Assembly. Whereas the 3rd term marked the last phase of
Slovenia’s accession to the EU, the 7th term followed the 2015 migration crisis and the
period when the five scenarios for the future of the EU were presented.
The analysis done using CLARIN showed that from 1992 to 2018 ‘two-speed Europe’
was used 63 times in debates in the National Assembly. Two more substantial peaks
were identified in the legislative terms 2000û2004 and 2014–2018. What is
interesting is that prior to Slovenian membership of the EU, and again a decade later,
Slovenian politicians and decision-makers used the term ‘two speed Europe’ for
differently intensified integration. However, in all the interventions Slovenia ‘wanted’
to be part of the countries in the “first-speed” or the core Europe. All the parties agreed
that Slovenia should avoid being a part of a ‘second-speed’ Europe. There was a
consensus in the National Assembly that Slovenia should accelerate its adoption of
various EU regulations and policies, so as to be an integral part of core Europe.
In the Slovenian case, ‘two-speed Europe’ is also used as a synonym for three-, four- or
multi-speed Europe. Therefore, the key phrase ‘multi-speed Europe’ was found in few
debates in the National Assembly. Of 19 entries, 17 were in the last legislative period
(2014–2018). This relatively high number of hits can be attributed to the fact that there
was a special session of the Parliamentary Committee on European Affairs discussing
the White Paper in June 2017.
12
In this session, ‘multi-speed Europe’ was mentioned
six times by a scholar from the Faculty of Social Sciences of the University of Ljubljana
in his speech, seven times by centre-right party members of parliament (MPs) and
three times by the Minister of Foreign Affairs. ‘Multi-speed Europe’ was mostly linked
to a negative perception, suggesting that development of the EU in this direction is not
to be supported.
In sum, with regard to two-speed or multi-speed EU, we can detect a negative
connotation associated with these developments, and particularly concern as to
whether the new Member States like Slovenia would be able to participate fully in what
was considered a more privileged first-tier group of countries.
The multi-end Europe model
On the other hand, debate on ‘core Europe’ was relevant mostly in the 1st term of the
National Assembly (1992–1996) when Slovenia started its path towards EU
integration, and during the 7th term (2014–2018) when the PM decided that Slovenia
should be part of the ‘core countries’ and personally relied on the three Benelux Prime
Ministers to support Slovenia in this attempt. This means that the Slovenian
12
This is presented in detail in the next section.

Bučar and Udovič, ANZJES 13(3)
76
government coordinated its activities at the EU level with the three Benelux
countries.
13
Maybe the most explicit reference to DI was found in the coalition agreement in August
2018, where it states:
“The strategic interest of Slovenia is to be in the core of the EU, which will
guarantee equal conditions for development. Slovenia will advocate for a further
deepening of the European Monetary Union, a strengthening of the Common
Foreign and Security Policy with its upgrading to a common defence policy,
along with respect for the Schengen system and the protection of the EU
external borders.”
The Prime Minister, Marjan Šarec, in his address on 17 August 2018 explicitly used the
term ‘two-tier Europe’:
“On top of this, we can observe in praxis a two-tier Europe already. The EU will
have to find the answers to the common questions as soon as possible, since
without them the future may be bleak. Slovenia needs to struggle towards
remaining within the so called ‘core countries.”
Recent developments: Future of Europe and Slovenia’s Council Presidency
We were also interested in whether debates on differentiated integration took place in
the context of wider debates on the ‘future of Europe’ (FoE). To this end, the frequency
of the conceptual key words was compared to the frequency of the key phrase ‘future
of Europe.’ In the Slovenian case, the period in which their co-occurrence was mostly
relevant was 2000–2004. This was the case first because Slovenia was joining the EU,
and second because the Convention on the future of Europe was ongoing. The debates
in that period were mostly linked to the ‘future (of Slovenia) in Europe.’ Speakers used
‘future of Europe’ to debate Slovenia’s accession rather than issues actually related to
the future of the EU. The period 2005–2008 is mostly linked to the ratification of the
Constitution of the EU (and later the Lisbon Treaty) and to the then forthcoming
(2008) Slovenian presidency of the Council of the EU. 2017 was the next peak of the
key phrase ‘future of Europe.’ This can be attributed mostly to the presentation of the
White Paper on the future of Europe in the Parliamentary Committee of European
Affairs (OZEU) and also to public discussion of the five scenarios. Even this dedicated
discussion showed that the terms identified as relating to DI were not commonly used.
In the discussion, only a few academics and politicians participated. Their positions
can be grouped into the following categories:
a) An overall position in many discussions related to the EU is that a strong and
united EU is in the interest of Slovenia;
b) Slovenia should try its best to remain in the ‘core,’ within the ‘first tier’ EU, and
strive towards strengthening the EU;
c) Any differentiated integration (even if not explicitly called such) can be harmful
for Slovenia as a small and less developed member country as it increases
13
‘Core Europe’ is untranslatable in Slovenian. This is why in Slovenian EU jargon the synonym ‘Benelux (+
Germany + France)’ is used.

ANZJES 13(3)
77
inequality among the member countries and gives an even stronger voice to the
larger members.
Much more critical towards the EU is the current Prime Minister Janez Janša. In his
inaugural address on 13 March 2020 he spoke in particular about the tasks facing
Slovenia with regard to the forthcoming presidency of the EU Council.
14
According to
his opinion, one cannot expect there to be equality in the EU:
“A country with 400 thousand people and a country of 90 million cannot have
the same weight anywhere in the world, and this is true of the EU too. We are
not equal, we have as much weight as can be expressed through GDP, population
size, etc. The impact may be more significant if you are more skilful and here we
are with the question of equality.”
Janša cited his experience during the Council presidency, recalling that if a proposal
came from a smaller country, the Council administration often found a number of legal
obstacles to its implementation. However, once one of the larger countries sponsored
the proposal, the legal counterarguments evaporated. He concluded “In this way we
were a witness of how equality works.”
We can conclude that the attitude towards DI by various Slovenian governments is
negative, since there is a feeling that such developments may leave smaller,
economically and politically weaker countries out of some important decision-making
processes. Yet, especially in academic circles, hardly anyone shares the belief that
Slovenian political ambition to belong to the core is realistic. The key reason for such
doubts is the lack of capacity to play an important role.
Policy differentiation and the mechanisms of differentiation
The analysis now moves from polity differentiation to a discussion of policy
differentiation and the two main instruments: enhanced cooperation and opt-outs.
Neither term was used much in parliamentary discussions: especially the term “opt-
out” was hardly ever used (see Figure 2).
Figure 2 Frequency of enhanced cooperation and opt-outs in parliamentary debates
The key DI mechanism phrases did not appear in parliamentary debates before the
year 2000. In 2007, opt-outs were mentioned 18 times, representing 70% of all
14
The first Slovenian presidency in the first semester of 2008 was during the period of his government as well.
91%
9%
1990-2018 (n=287)
Enhanced
cooperation
opt-out

Bučar and Udovič, ANZJES 13(3)
78
mentions of opt-outs over the last 25 years. The term ‘enhanced co-operation’ was by
far the most frequent in Slovenian parliamentary debates.
Looking at which policies with enhanced cooperation are discussed (Figure 3), we find
that the financial transaction tax
15
was an issue in 2012, 2013 and 2014, while the
situation reversed in 2017 when the issues of the European public prosecutor
16
and
PESCO
17
became more visible. For 2018, the high numbers can only be attributed to
PESCO. The Unitary Patent was mentioned for the first time in 2012 and reached a
peak in 2016. After that, there were no more entries in parliamentary debates.
Mentions of the Unitary Patent represented 4% of the total references to DI instances.
Finally, other instances of enhanced co-operation, such as Rome III, were not
mentioned in parliamentary debates. Overall, enhanced cooperation policies were
most frequently discussed between 2012 and 2014 and in 2017 and 2018 (Figure 3).
The first period was when Slovenia was dealing with a relatively harsh economic crisis.
At that time, debates were mostly linked to issues related to the crisis and especially to
its resolution. In 2017 and 2018, the debate on enhanced co-operation was linked to
Juncker’s five scenarios and to co-operation with ‘core Europe’ countries.
Figure 3 Breakdown of enhanced cooperation policies, 1990–2018 (n= 597)
International agreements among EU Member States are a third mechanism through
which differentiation takes place. Figure 4 shows that references to these so-called
inter-se agreements reached the highest frequency in 2017. This was mostly on account
of the debate on the Single Resolution Mechanism (SRM) in Slovenia. These debates
were mostly linked to the issue of the bailout of Slovenian banks in 2013. Due to the
economic and financial crisis, the Bratušek government made a commitment to the
European Commission that Slovenia would privatise all banks that were still state-
15
“The objective of the Financial Transaction Tax (FTT) is to ensure that the financial sector makes a fair
contribution to national tax revenues. It is also intended to discourage transactions that do not enhance the
efficient allocation of resources by the financial markets” (Karaboycheva 2021).
16
The European Public Prosecutor Office is an independent Union body competent to fight crimes against the
Union budget (see https://ec.europa.eu/info/law/cross-border-cases/judicial-cooperation/networks-and-bodies-
supporting-judicial-cooperation/european-public-prosecutors-office_en).
17
PESCO stays for a Permanent Structured Cooperation, part of the EU security and defence policy, formed in
2017. See more at https://pesco.europa.eu/.
0
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140
160
180
2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019
19% 0%
4%
0%
56%
21%
Pesco
Rome III

ANZJES 13(3)
79
owned by 2018. As the next Cerar’s government (2014–2018) accelerated the process
of bank privatisation in 2017, this was also reflected in parliamentary debates.
Therefore, the SRM was mentioned several times in the context of Slovenian bank
privatisation, and it de facto had little to do with the attitude towards inter-se
agreements. Thus, the debate was more related to its unfairness and conditionality
regarding Slovenian economic policy.
The other two inter-se agreements important in parliamentary debates were the
European Stability Mechanism (ESM) and the Unitary Patent Court. However, in
relative terms, the latter was more relevant for parliamentarians, with 102 entries
found for it and only 30 for the ESM. The Prüm Convention
18
was mentioned only once
(by the Minister of the Interior, who called it the Prüm Treaty). Similarly, the fiscal
compact was mentioned once by the Minister of Finance.
Figure 4 The salience inter se agreements in parliamentary debates
In sum, the key DI mechanism phrases did not appear in parliamentary debates before
the year 2000. Overall, opt-outs were barely mentioned, and where they were, the term
was mostly used in a general way (for instance, “there are some opt-outs”). The
exception is the year 2007, when opt-outs were mentioned 18 times, representing 70%
of all the mentions of opt-outs over the last 25 years. This can be attributed to the
debate on the Lisbon treaty and opt-outs that some of the other EU countries had. On
the other hand, the term ‘enhanced co-operation’ was by far the most present in
Slovenian parliamentary debates. The issue was mostly present between 2011 and 2014
and in 2017. The first period was when Slovenia was dealing with a relatively harsh
economic crisis. At that time, debates were mostly linked to issues related to the crisis
and especially to its resolution. In 2017, the debate on enhanced co-operation was
linked to Juncker’s five scenarios and to co-operation with ‘core Europe’ countries.
18
Prüm Convention deals with the “cross-border cooperation, particularly in combating terrorism, cross-border
crime and illegal migration” (see at https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-
content/EN/TXT/HTML/?uri=CELEX:32008D0615&rid=4).
0
50
100
150
200
250
300
2000
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
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2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
Prum Convention European Stability Mechnism
Fiscal Compact Single Resolution Mechanism
Unified Patent Court
0%
8%
0%
65%
27%
2000-2018
(n=378)

Bučar and Udovič, ANZJES 13(3)
80
Discussion and Conclusion
The analysis has shown that differentiated integration and the related instruments are
not a topic which receives much attention in Slovenia. In spite of the importance the
issue of differentiated integration bears for small, relatively less developed countries,
surprisingly little attention is being paid to the issue by the government or by the
citizens. At most, the discussion focuses on the position of Slovenia within the EU of
different “speeds”.
The government’s position on DI can barely be identified from the few references made
to DI. In fact, the analysis has shown that, overall, the government position on
European issues is not as clear and is surprisingly absent from Slovenian politics. If on
one hand we see concern about not belonging to the “core”, we are surprised by the
limited understanding of the DI and lack of engagement in the discussions on DI. One
would expect a more pro-active stance in the light of the fact that Slovenia has been a
full member of the European Union since 2004 and joined the Union with significant
public support. Discussion of the EU and the Slovenian position within it is absent in
government documents such as coalition agreements and inaugural speeches by prime
ministers. In each of these texts, we could identify a single, or at most two, paragraphs
related to the EU. In addition, the DI issue is only mentioned indirectly – at most, the
position identified in these documents is that Slovenia should maintain its stance in
favour of close integration of the Member States, strengthening the EU, and with active
participation by Slovenia in all EU policies.
The findings suggest that the complexity of the EU and its politics are not at the
forefront of domestic political discussion. One of the possible explanations might be
that Slovenia is still a relatively young state, and so much political attention is devoted
to the internal issues of building institutions, policies and government practice within
the country. The other reason may be that the voters have been satisfied with the fact
that Slovenia has successfully joined the EU, the euro and Schengen, and that all of
these make us feel sufficiently “European”. Developments beyond this may not be of
significant interest to the public and are often poorly understood even by those who
should know better, meaning the members of the national parliament. This is reflected
in our research where the debates have shown limited knowledge of the topics related
to specific DI mechanisms, which are therefore not discussed.
The question is who should be interested in raising the level of awareness on the topics
related to the future of the EU. It seems the political parties in Slovenia do not see
discussions on the EU as arenas where political points among the voters can be scored.
In a small member country, the primary focus is on domestic issues, and only on those
effects of DI which may relate to the national interest. This means that we cannot
expect the government to invest in popularisation of the EU, at least not beyond very
basic information. Could one expect the European Commission to play a more pro-
active role? The Commission is engaged in various forms of communications, from
elementary school to promotion of special events like the Conference on the Future of
Europe. The intricate dilemmas of DI, where any relevant discussion requires a
substantial amount of knowledge on the functioning of the EU, seem to be absent in
Slovenia.

ANZJES 13(3)
81
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Bučar and Udovič, ANZJES 13(3)
82
Appendix 1
Keywords of DI
Keyword
Slovenian translation
Notes
Differentiated
integration
Diferencirana integracija,
diferencirano povezovanje
Coalition of the willing
Koalicija voljnih
The keyword is in Slovenia
linked only to the Iraqi war.
Two-speed Europe
EU/Evropa dveh hitrosti
Multi-speed Europe
EU/Evropa več(ih) hitrosti
Variable geometry
Variabilna geometrija,
variabilno povezovanje
Core Europe
Države Beneluksa
(+Nemčija+Francija)
Usually core Europe in
Slovenian is “Benelux
countries” (države
Beneluksa) or expanded with
Germany and France
(+Nemčija+Francija)
Two-tier Europe
Dvotirna Evropa/EU
Concentric circles
Koncentrični krogi
In 2011 the Slovenian MFA
presented the strategy that
would base Slovenian FP on
concentric circles. These
entries were not taken into
consideration.
á la carte
á la carte
Future of Europe
Prihodnost Evrope/EU
Enhanced cooperation
Okrepljeno sodelovanje
opt-out
opt-out
Does not have an established
translation
Pesco
PESCO or PESKO
Rome III
Rome III
Unitary patent
Enotni patent
Matrimonial property
regimes
n.a.
Financial Transaction
Tax
Davek na finančne
transakcije
European Public
Prosecutor
Javni tožilec EU, Evropski
javni tožilec
Schengen
Schengen, Šengen
Economic and Monetary
Union
Ekonomska in monetarna
unija, EMU
Charter of Fundamental
Rights
Listina temeljnih pravic
Prüm Convention
Prumska pogodba
European Stability
Mechanism
ESM, Evropski stabilnostni
mehanizem
Fiscal Compact
Fiskalni pakt
Single Resolution
Mechanism
Enotni finančni mehanizem
Unified Patent Court
Enotni patent

ANZJES 13(3)
83
European Economic
Area
EGS, Evropsko
gospodarsko/ekonomsko
območje, EEA
Customs Union + Turkey
Carinska unija + Turčija
Eastern Partnership
Vzhodno partnerstvo
Euromed
Euromed