A note on the political manifestos of the EU parties.
On the politics
I found this, EU elections campaign which parties have their act together at euractiv which collects intelligence about how the EU Parties are shaping up for the elections. This is not going to be pretty, the expectation is that the “ID & Democracy” will come third.
I also found a report on the S&D/PES manifesto construction and on the Green’s manifesto, Euractiv also report on Macron and the Liberals who seem more factional than I would expect, and as others have observed, less relevant.
- PES election congress to take place in Rome from the PES
- Euractiv reports on the Greens’ manifesto, and on the Liberals, Could Macrons conservative turn drag eu elections into a national only campaign
- Volt’s manifesto was posted, https://assets.volteuropa.org/2023-11/Volt_%20EUR%20Electoral%20Moonshot%20Program_v5%20Final.pdf
- And here is the Diem 25 Manifesto
I also found this which catalogues the national elections taking place this year, the results of which will impact the Commission nominations and Council representation.
On democracy
CB pointed us at Patberg’s article, “Farewell to constituent power? The Conference on the Future of Europe, citizens’ assemblies and the democratic minimum.”
The abstract includes the sentence, “Nevertheless, the idea should be viewed with caution, as permanent citizens’ assemblies could just as well become a democratic fig-leaf allowing EU institutions to reject calls for fundamental reforms.”
I say, that its real danger is that it could just become another bureaucracy with its members chosen by lot, not election. It’d why argue that turnover/task & finish are important.
Fake News and foreign interference
The general affairs council next week, will discuss the defence of democracy package. This ought to be relevant to CTOE but as is the case within the UK the politicians are solving their own problems and the package consists of a series of measures to attempt to constrain fake news and of course their concern is that lawyers have too much influence in elections. They say, “The aim of this package is to tackle the threat of foreign interference with more transparency, while at the same time encouraging civic engagement and citizens’ participation in our democracies.”
CB point us at, an open letter, documenting civil society objections to this package: Open letter: Universities and civil society express concerns about the European Commission’s Defence of Democracy Package (civilsocietyeurope.eu).
We call on EU member states and the European Parliament to leave aside the foreign interference law as part of the Defence of Democracy package, while maintaining other important elements such as the planned recommendation on participation of civil society and citizens in public policy making CSE Open letter.
The commission describe the process reforms as follows, “The proposal includes proportionate rules and safeguards to avoid registration requirements being misused to limit fundamental rights, such as the freedoms of expression or of association, or to unduly restrict the civic space, namely:
- Independent supervisory authorities will be empowered to request limited records in duly justified cases only and in a proportionate manner;
- Authorities need to ensure that no adverse consequences arise from registration;
- Possibility to derogate from the publicity of information in duly justified cases;
- The full harmonisation under the proposal prevents Member States from maintaining or introducing additional requirements and practices.”