BY JEF PRESS SUBCOM MEMBER AND UNIVERISTY OF OXFORD STUDENT JACOB GRECH
This Europe day, May 9th, a long-awaited component of a programme for European Union will begin: the Conference on the Future of Europe. Initially the brainchild of a number of national leaders, notably France’s Emmanuel Macron, COVID-19 has delayed the conference, which was due to start in mid-2020. Now, however, this is set to go ahead as a discussion form with the aim of encouraging EU citizens and residents to articulate their visions for the future trajectory of the European project over the next years and decades. The end date has been tentatively placed as the spring of 2022.
Last month, Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, together with Parliament President Sassoli and Portugal’s Socialist Prime Minister António Costa, whose country holds the rotating presidency of the Council, addressed the Parliament to lay out why the conference is necessary and how they envisage it working.
A ‘Post-Covid’ Europe
A common feature of their respective remarks was the argument that the COVID-19 pandemic offers both an opportunity and a challenge to instigate a different approach to pan-European politics. Sassoli spoke in terms of a need to effect a “renewal of the democratic pact” and forge a “new European social contract”. Costa declared the conference to be a “sign of hope” in the midst of multiple crises. He was unambiguous in illustrating the scope of these: from the thousands of companies facing bankruptcy due to uncertainty to climate change. Health, public indebtedness, youth unemployment, migration, terrorism: the issues that, according to Eurobarometer studies, Europeans most care about, are rightly to be front and centre.
Diversifying Europe
Secondly, there was a shared conviction that this project must entail a bottom-up approach that involves as many stakeholders across the breadth and diversity of the European Union as is possible. Von der Leyen frankly acknowledged the limitations of previous attempts to reach out to the hundreds of millions of Europeans alienated from the institutions, that the conference had to “go beyond Brussels” and reach “the silent majority.” These turns of phrase are employed so frequently – one could easily imagine someone like Marine le Pen using them in a speech – that it is often wise to remain wary of them. What von der Leyen seems to have in mind is a Europe that embraces the full “creativity and diversity” of its citizens. A Europe that leaves no one behind. Naturally easier said than done. How can a project achieve both coherence and dynamism, such as a grassroots-led project would entail?
What Will the Conference on the Future of Europe look like?
To launch this conference in 2021 offers one clear advantage: the recently-approved €1.8 trillion EU budget for the next six years presents a framework through which the debate may be structured. Indeed, as it stands, the plan is for eight categories – climate change, health, jobs and economy, EU in the world, freedom and rights, digital, EU democracy – with leeway for other topics proposed by citizens along the way. So, what will the Conference on the Future of Europe look like? The released joint statement outlined that there will be a “multitude of conference-events,” panels and debates on the range of issues mentioned above.
There is certainly reason for federalists to be optimistic. As Prime Minister Costa pointed out, surveys demonstrate that levels of support for EU membership amongst the populations of the 27 states are higher than ever. However, there are multiple sceptical voices out there, and the conference has not gone without criticism from any quarter.
A group of 12 member states, including Malta, have joined together to draft a position paper ahead of the conference’s commencement. They stress the common significance of topics such as the rule of law, the digital transition, the economic recovery, climate and migration. However, they make it clear that the conference “should not create legal obligations” for member-states above and beyond those of existing legislative processes.
How to Make it Work?
A lot rests on the commitment to a bottom-up, grassroots-led approach being translated into reality. The model of successful citizen’s assemblies as utilised in France and Ireland in the last few years to tackle a range of contentious policy questions has demonstrated that this is not a pipe dream in the 21st century. There are fora that may yet create the incentives that lead participants to appreciate their common interests and work to solve problems.
Beyond the structure of the debate, it is essential that there is clear and prompt follow-up from European institutions and national governments. If the Conference fails to deliver in this regard, it could just as easily contribute further to the erosion of citizen’s faith in institutionalised politics to deliver solutions.
Who Will be Leading the Conference?
The conference’s intended scope of combating hierarchies and inequalities between politicians and citizens is an admirable one. That is not to say that it will not require organisational leadership. So far, the plan is for a “joint presidency” consisting of von der Leyen, Sassoli and a representative of the incumbent Council presidency, together with an “Executive Board” with three representatives from each institution and additional observers. Disputes have arisen as to who should form part of this leadership team, exposing the fault lines between European parties and member-states.
Indeed, perhaps as significant a division as that between professional politicians and citizens is a perceived inequality of treatment between member-states. There have long been complaints that the EU possesses a tiered system and provides some countries undue advantages, whether in economic oversight or personnel allocation. The Greek financial crisis brought these arguments to fore in the last decade, and since, albeit for different reasons, the governing politicians of Poland and Hungary in particular have built their careers on resistance to domination and imposition by Brussels.
At a Crossroad…
The European project in 2021 finds itself at a crossroads. On the one hand, the first stage of Brexit has finally been concluded – although on questions ranging from Irish unity to the future trade relationship, much remains to be discussed – and support for membership across the remaining 27 countries is the highest it has ever been. On the other, the divisions between and within member-states are clear for all to see. From migration to taxation policies to vaccine procurement, national governments have rejected attempts to craft a common framework in recent times.
The challenge for federalists is to find a way to overcome the individualism and nationalism that has rendered politics at a European level more often than not a forum in which purely national-focused politicians are able to claim legitimacy or rile up their bases against globalists. On the face of it, the von der Leyen presidency itself did not begin on the brightest of notes – the spitzenkandidat system that brought Jean-Claude Juncker to the Berlaymont in 2014 was repudiated and the archetypal image of backroom deals between national leaders was reintroduced.
Since then, however, the COVID-19 pandemic has brought a fundamentally new character to politics in Europe, one fraught with dangers (increased state surveillance, the erosion of civil liberties, increasing economic inequality) but also marked by a broader awareness than before that structural change is required. Picking up, at least rhetorically, on the policy proposals of U.S. progressives such as Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, von der Leyen has committed to the development of a European Green Deal.
” Europe Must Democratise if it is to Survive”
Beyond the institutions, Pan-European politics is changing. From the left, former Greek finance minister Yanis Varoufakis and Croation philosopher Srećko Horvat have launched DiEM25, a pan-European political movement to push for a radical transformation of the EU institutions, with a particular focus on reform of the Eurozone and fiscal regulation. ‘Europe must democratise if it is to survive’ is their slogan. Just last month, the federalist Volt party entered its first national parliament in the Dutch general election, having won a seat in the European Parliament in 2019. Beyond the European Union, newly-reinstated Kosovar Prime Minister Albin Kurti has called for a ‘European Marshall Plan’ to redress historic inequalities and accelerate the integration of the Western Balkans.
A lot is at stake in the Conference on the Future of Europe. Many questions remain. Can the institutions demonstrate that they really are open-minded? Will citizens disenfranchised from European politics take any notice to the overtures made to them? Will proposals from the grassroots be taken seriously, and will at least some of them be implemented? Nevertheless, it remains an initiative that federalists should follow closely and engage with – the challenge is to render it not a conclusion, but a beginning.
What Lies Beyond the Pandemic for Europe? Find out here!
