TOMORROWS BRITISH ELITE - STUDENT ATTITUDES TO SOME ASPECTS OF THE EUROPEAN-COMMUNITY

The experiences of the Maastricht ratification process and the widenin g of the European Community (EC) suggest that further integration will be problematic. This study is concerned to ascertain whether Britain' s traditional reputation as an 'awkward partner' will be sustained by the next generation of industrial, business, and public administrative elites. Using three designated academic disciplines: natural science, engineering, and social science, we sampled approximately one thousan d students in eleven British universities. We found that there were s ignificant and surprising differences between the three designated dis cipline groups and that partisan identification was less significant t han 'youth values' in determining attitudes towards Europe. Overall, h owever, British students strongly support the EC as an abstract entity but are largely ignorant of its institutional structures and rather s keptical when it comes to specific EC policies. We conclude that this cognitive dissonance reveals the fragile nature of British student sup port for the EC and that given the pressures towards further integrati on the next generation of elites might be only marginally less skeptic al than is the present.