Abstract
The European integration project finds itself in an imaginatory stasis. Political elites display a general incapacity in dealing with the multiple crises threatening the European Union. Elites and institutions show a lack of imaginative creativity in proposing and seeking to implement novel and bold ways of moving the supranational project forward, a disposition which seems also to come through in the current initiative of the Conference on the Future of Europe. In stark contrast, various transnational civic initiatives—such as DiEM25, European Alternatives, AlterSummit, Volt Europa, and Citizens Take Over Europe—show imaginative capacity, aim at democratizing the EU from the bottom-up, and make political claims in favour of European solutions. The volume starts from the assumption that Europe needs a creative/imaginative solution to the multi-faceted crisis. This introduction, first, discusses European integration in relation to radical imagination, and the role of transnational movements in reimagining Europe. Second, the transnational movements that figure prominently in the volume are briefly introduced (in particular, European Alternatives and DiEM25). Third, transnational movements will be related to forms of populism and populist mobilization. Fourth, the ideas, discourses, and narratives of left-wing transnational populism will be situated in the wider context of narratives on Europe (such as federalism, Christian democracy, and right-wing populism). Fifth, the Conference on the Future of Europe is briefly discussed as a significant context in which a further politicization of European issues may develop and (new) ideas on European integration may emerge. Finally, the chapters of the volume are briefly introduced.
The author acknowledges financial support for the research project Transnational populism and European democracy (TRAPpED), of the Czech Science Foundation (Grantová agentura České republiky) (Standard Project 18-25924S).
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Notes
- 1.
- 2.
As becomes clear from the non-paper of 12 EU member states on the Conference on the Future of Europe, in which they argued against any legal obligations stemming from the Conference, see ‘EU’s dirty dozen pour cold water on Conference on Future of Europe’, 23 March, 2021, Financial Times.
- 3.
This is not to say that any social movement will engage in such critical narration. Clearly, civil society witnesses all kinds of form of mobilization, some of which rally around conservative or reactionary positions towards instituted reality.
- 4.
An interesting example not further discussed in this volume is the transnational or pan-European movement (now increasingly also party), Volt Europa, which was set up in March 2017 by the two founders Andrea Venzon and Colombe Cahen-Salvador, later joined by the current MEP Damian Boeselager. Volt shares some elements of the progressive politics and democratic goals of the (radical) left movements but is generally seen as more on the political centre, that is, left-liberal or social-liberal.
- 5.
- 6.
- 7.
The question remains if and why democratic populism should be called ‘populism’ at all, or, more specifically, when democratic populism might turn into other, potentially authoritarian forms.
- 8.
- 9.
The research project Transnational Populism and European Democracy (TRAPpED), which informs parts of this volume, is partly focussed on positioning the left transnational discourse.
- 10.
In the chapter by Kolja Möller in this volume, he discusses a very different manifestation of the idea of the right of peoples, that is, the case of the New International Economic Order in the 1970s. For right-wing (international) populism in the EU context, the Italian scholar Paolo Becchi’s Manifesto Sovranista provides an interesting elaboration.
- 11.
In the words of Hungarian prime minster Viktor Orbán: ‘Everyone feels that our voice in Europe has been weak when it comes to our opinions on the greatest issues of our age: that migrants should not come here; that we shouldn’t have multiculturalism; that we should respect Christian traditions; that national sovereignty exists, and that nations aren’t a thing of the past, but of the future. Our opinions aren’t being represented with the weight they deserve. Voters who share our views on these issues don’t have enough influence in European politics… What matters is that in Europe there should be a political home for people of our kind: people who want to protect their families, who want to protect their countries, and who prefer cooperation among nations rather than a European empire. They should not only have a political home in their own countries, because we – Fidesz and the Christian Democratic People’s Party – are fine here; but they should also have a home at a European level. We must work to create this. I think that this political current will be a major force in Europe’, see https://miniszterelnok.hu/prime-minister-viktor-orban-on-the-kossuth-radio-programme-good-morning-hungary-44/.
- 12.
See Alberto Alemanno, Pourquoi il faut suivre la Conférence sur l’avenir de l’Europe, Le Grand Continet, 10 May, 2021, available at: https://legrandcontinent.eu/fr/2021/05/10/pourquoi-il-faut-suivre-la-conference-sur-lavenir-de-leurope/.
- 13.
See Andras Baneth, Just cancel the Future of Europe Conference, EU Observer, 19 April, 2021, available at: https://euobserver.com/opinion/151540?utm_source=euobs&utm_medium=rss.
- 14.
Mary Kaldor and others recently argued that this seems to be changing and identify an ‘insurgent Europeanism’ (Cooper et al. 2021).
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Blokker, P. (2021). Introduction: Imagining Europe. Transnational Contestation and Civic Populism. In: Blokker, P. (eds) Imagining Europe . Palgrave Studies in European Political Sociology. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-81369-7_1
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