No to the Europe of Walls: Building Together the European Democracy

We intend to act to make sure that on March 25, 2017 a public space on the future of the Union is opened, in the context of a broader constituent process, involving local and regional communities, social stakeholders and civil society organisations, together with the citizens’ representatives at the national and European level. Democratic Europe will survive if its citizens will foster its change. For all these reasons, we commit to involve citizens, territories, and movements in a resounding popular initiative on March 25, 2017.

Transeuropa 2013 – Building walls photo by Eurpean Alternatives

The idea of overcoming the division of Europe between sovereign States was born in the most dramatic moment of the “sleep of Reason”, when most of the continent was occupied by the Nazi Army. This idea was summarised in the “Ventotene Manifesto”, in which the thought of a Federal State is matched with the action for European democracy, peace, and fight against inequality.

The European integration process took shape and substance on March 25, 1957 through gradual common achievements. The latter have realised the original idea of European unity only in part, but have simultaneously extended to new policies and countries. For most Europeans, they represent an irreversible movement, and they have developed in an increasing number of citizens a European political conscience as guarantee of peace, rights, and progress.

This political conscience belongs to us all and we fully identify in the idea that the development of European society and the role of the Union as tool of peace and international cooperation in a globalised world can be guaranteed only through a democratically shared sovereignty. To this original idea are connected values such as human dignity, freedom, equality, solidarity and justice, recognised by the Charter of Fundamental Rights that bounds the Union and the Member States.

In the last ten years, the progressive lack of European solutions to problems such as social exclusion, unemployment – in particular of youth and women –, poverty, and citizens’ safety – together with economic policies that violated the values recognised in the Charter of fundamental rights – has created a concrete and shared dissent, a feeling of frustration towards the European Union project. The financial crisis management (of which mainly national governments have been in charge) and the wrongful economic policies of Member States slowed down the investments in the real economy that are necessary to achieve sustainable development and have exacerbated income inequality. The imposition of austerity measures has produced risks for and impoverishment of the European social model, while inclusive policies to foster the creation of a pluralist society have not been implemented.

National logics prevailed over the search for common interests and the intergovernmental decision making – the one in which governments alone are entrusted with decisions and that lacks substantial democratic legitimacy – had paralysing, unequal, and non-transparent effects. Walls have been built using national egoism as bricks; racism and reactionary movements grew in strength, while the dream of a common European home – that was so close in the night of November 9, 1989, when the Berlin Wall fell – risks now to disintegrate.

The realisation of political unity is the necessary condition to change European policies: to end austerity, to scrap the fiscal compact, to implement European initiatives in the fields of employment, environment and common goods as lever for development, to initiate long term social investments focused in particular on education, culture, training and research, to achieve a “no-carbon” economy together with a harsh fight against climate change, to introduce European loans and mortgages.  The realisation of political unity is the necessary condition for the creation of a basic income based on citizenship and a European Civil Service, to establish a European insurance scheme against unemployment, a common Asylum and immigration policy endowed with adequate resources and humanitarian channels allowing a safe arrival and the social integration of those escaping from war, hunger and environmental disasters, a unique voice on foreign policy that overcomes the intergovernmental decision-making, a serious plan on development cooperation and aid and a neighborhood policy to build a Mediterranean area of peace, democracy, co-existence, and free movement.

We are also convinced that it is necessary and urgent to act to allow European citizens to benefit from the value of interdependence and from a shared sovereignty by creating the constitutional conditions to grant them an active role in the decision-making process. We are convinced that it is necessary to take human rights as a starting point, and that the first right is the one to a European democracy where sovereignty belongs to citizens; this, in order to establish a community capable to provide them with those common goods that would otherwise be subjugated to the fight between contrasting national interests.

For all these reasons, we intend to act to make sure that on March 25, 2017 a public space on the future of the Union is opened, in the context of a broader constituent process, involving local and regional communities, social stakeholders and civil society organisations, together with the citizens’ representatives at the national and European level. Democratic Europe will survive if its citizens will foster its change. For all these reasons, we commit to involve citizens, territories, and movements in a resounding popular initiative on March 25, 2017.

LIST OF SIGNATORIES

1. MOVIMENTO EUROPEO-ITALIA
2. ALTERNATIVA EUROPEA
3. ASSOCIAZIONE DEI GIORNALISTI EUROPEI (AGE)
4. ASSOCIAZIONE DELLE AGENZIE DELLA DEMOCRAZIA LOCALE (ALDA)
5. ASSOCIAZIONE EUROPEA DEGLI INSEGNANTI (AEDE)
6. ASSOCIAZIONE INTERNAZIONALE EX-COMUNITARI EUROPEI (AIACE)
7. ASSOCIAZIONE ITALIANA DEL CONSIGLIO DEI COMUNI E DELLE REGIONI D’EUROPA (AICCRE)
8. ASSOCIAZIONE MONDIALE SCUOLA STRUMENTO DI PACE (E.I.P)
9. ASSOCIAZIONE NAZIONALE DONNE ELETTRICI (ANDE)
10. ASSOCIAZIONE PUBBLICI CITTADINI
11. ASSOCIAZIONE UNIVERSITARIA DI STUDI EUROPEI (AUSE)
12. ASSOCIAZIONI CRISTIANE LAVORATORI ITALIANI (ACLI)
13. CENTRO EINSTEIN DI STUDI INTERNAZIONALI (CESI)
14. CesUE
15. COLLEGIO NAZIONALE DEGLI AGROTECNICI E DEGLI AGROTE CNICI LAUREATI
16. CONFERENZA DEI PRESIDENTI DELLE ASSEMBLEE LEGISLATIVE DELLE REGIONI E DELLE PROVINCE AUTONOME
17. FEDERAZIONE ITALIANA DEGLI ENTI E SCUOLE DI ISTRUZIONE E FORMAZIONE (FIDEF)
18. FEDERAZIONE NAZIONALE DEGLI INSEGNANTI (FNISM)
19. FONDAZIONE ROMA EUROPEA
20. FORUM TUNISINO PER LA CITTADINANZA MEDITERRANEA
21. INTERCULTURAL COMMUNICATION AND LEADERSHIP SCHOOL (ICLS)
22. ISTITUTO DI STUDI SUL FEDERALISMO E L’UNITÀ EUROPEA PARIDE BACCARINI
23. MOVIMENTO DIFESA DEL CITTADINO (MDC)
24. SINDNOVA
25. SPES – ASSOCIAZIONE PROMOZIONE E SOLIDARIETÀ
26. ASSOCIAZIONE “PER L’EUROPA DI VENTOTENE”
27. ASSOCIAZIONE PER I DIRITTI UMANI
28. ASSOCIAZIONE RICREATIVA E CULTURALE ITALIANA (ARCI)
29. BIN ITALIA
30. CENTRO ITALIANO DI FORMAZIONE EUROPEA (CIFE)
31. CENTRO NAZIONALE PER IL VOLONTARIATO (CNV)
32. CITTADINANZATTIVA
33. COLLEGAMENTO ITALIANO LOTTA POVERTÀ (CILAP)
34. COMITATO newdeal4europe
35. CoNNGI – COORDINAMENTO NAZIONALE NUOVE GENERAZIONI ITALIANE
36. COORDINAMENTO DI INIZIATIVE POPOLARI DI SOLIDARIETÀ  INTERNAZIONALE (CIPSI)
37. COORDINAMENTO ITALIANO DELLA LOBBY EUROPEA DELLE DONNE/LEF Italia
38. ERASMUS STUDENT NETWORK (ESN)
39. EUROPA IN MOVIMENTO
40. EUROPEAN ALTERNATIVES
41. FEDERCULTURE
42. FONDAZIONE BRUNO VISENTINI
43. FONDAZIONE LELIO & LISLI BASSO
44. FORUM ITALIANO SULLA DISABILITÀ (FID)
45. FORUM NAZIONALE DEI GIOVANI
46. GIOVENTU’ FEDERALISTA EUROPEA (GFE)
47. LEGAMBIENTE
48. LIBERTA’ e GIUSTIZIA
49. MAISON DES ASSOCIATION EUROPEEN – BRUXELLES
50. RETE DELLA PACE
51. TAVOLA DELLA PACE
52. TERRE DES HOMMES
53. UEF – Belgio
54. UEF – Francia
55. UEF – Grecia
56. UEF – Repubblica Ceca
57. UEF – Spagna
58. UNIONE FORENSE PER LA TUTELA DEI DIRITTI UMANI