by Lorenzo Sparviero |
Dear federalist friends,
the time to achieve the objective of a federal Europe, which we all have hoped for and which we have been talking about for decades, is now more than ripe but … provided that we understand and we all agree on what a federation is and how we can create it. The creation of a European Federation can be properly accomplished only by avoiding to repeat the mistakes that have characterized the ” zigzagging ” history of European federalism since its origins till today.
You know the old saying ”do what we tell you but don’t do what we do”?
The main causes of European federalism movements failure is still a widespread ignorance about what federalism really means and how it works. Therefore it is quite impossible to create an “European unitary federal movement” at many levels: organisational, legal and political.
Only by avoiding a self-defeating attitude and bad practices characterizing all European federalism movements since the 40s we will be able to build up a Federal Europe that we wish to create.
It is the widespread ignorance of what the federalism is and how it really works and the incomprehensible incapability to create a “European unitary federal movement” at the organisational , legal and political levels.
A federal union that really work should be founded as follows :
– based on a Constitution “of the people and for the people” understood, shared and approved by a large majority. This constitution must be drafted by specialists in federal law making;
– organized on the basis of the vertical division of powers, so a federal body will take care of all common issues and interests of the federation, leaving full independence and autonomy to the member states for the pursuit of their legitimate interests and the protection of their cultures, traditions and peculiarities;
– and last but not least, it cannot be achieved through treaties between member states, as is the case in the past and today with the EU, because treaties are legal instruments that are not compatible with a federal system due to the fact that, with treaties, national interest always prevails over common interests.
Therefore – and I will finish here my open letter – I am glad to share with you a great achievement: we officially registered in The Hague our Federal Alliance of the European Federalists (F.A.E.F) a federal structure for all European organisations, associations and movements: an indispensable instrument to strengthen the organisational degree of movements that wish to federalise Europe.
We thus have a unique and historic opportunity, which is growing in strength of “federating the federalists”, for the very first time in European history .
We cannot further postpone the opportunity for EU to become a United States of Europe, but we need to act now!
Long live the Federal Europe!
Lorenzo Sparviero – Editor
Co-founder and member of the Board of FAEF
Very interesting. Similar argument in my book For a sovereign Europe (Peter Lang, Oxford, 2019)
Thank you Sophie! I will read your book with great interest. I suggest you too reading the book of Leo Klinkers – co founder and Presidente of F. A. E. F.-“Sovereignity, security and solidarity-when people have a say”, Lothian Foundation Press. 2019. There you will find a complete description of our project for Federalising the EU.
I hope we could cohoperate in building up the Federal Europe by “federalising the federalists”and by educating the europeans to federalism.