Although I fully support the campaign and the idea behind it I partly agree with Tony Barber who argues (among other things that are more debatable…)  that all these things come a bit late and indeed should have been done before the European elections as part of the campaigns:

Each (political party) should have rallied behind a candidate of their choice.  But they did not.  The socialists were too divided even to come up with a candidate of their own.  The opportunity was lost.  It was their own fault.

Francisco G. Basterra (El Pais)

Global Vote, local mindset.

Lykke Friis

The EU elections are like a European soccer championship played in each national league with aggregated results.

Evenimentul Zilei

Send in the Clowns.

NikOs

To the 57% of Europeans: Not voting and at the same time speaking about a democratic deficit in the EU is pure hypocrisy

Kainde Manji

Nick Griffin is now a migrant worker. I wonder if he appreciates the irony…

Senior Swedish diplomat (on enlargement)

…the EU integration process is a qualifying process not a negotiation

A diplomat

It is not a pretty sight to have prime ministers drafting texts

Jason O Mahony:

Could it be that it was impossible to negotiate such a document between such a diverse bunch of reformers, religious conservatives, and people who are, shall we say, a little too fond of the stiff right arm?

Martin Kotynek

Finde ein Problem, das nicht existiert. Mache einen Riesenwirbel darum. Gib vor, es gelöst zu haben. Lass Dich dafür feiern.

Christian Meier (kressreport)

Es gibt sehr, sehr wenig, sehr qualifizierte Berichterstattung über Europa.

Leonard Novy

All das ist nicht nur banal und inhaltsleer – das ist praktizierte Europaverachtung (…) es bleibt es im Wahlkampf bei pro-europäischen Lippenbekenntnissen, populistischer EU-Kritik oder nationalen Themen

Christiane Schulzki-Haddouti

Zu komplex, zu schwierig, nicht in zwei Sätzen zu erklären. (…) So lange die Relevanz von Europa nicht täglich deutlich wird, so lange nur die nationale Karte gespielt wird, so lange werden die Bürger sich auch nicht an die Urne bemühen.

… a critical look at the disappointing turnout figures and the reasons behind it.

… a sharp analysis of  the results in different countries preferably in a comparative manner. You know the typical post about whether the successful party is in government or not and whether a national election is on the horizon.

… criticising the national focus of the election. Trying to show that the EP elections should not be used as a  protest vote

… an analysis whether the left really lost and the right really won (+ mentioning the economic crisis) using some fancy tables with statistical figures

… an opinion about the eurosceptic parties and the right wing radicals. Maybe comparing the BNP with the various Freedom Parties and the Greater Romanian Party? ITS reloaded?

… something about the success of the Greens or whether the Pirate Party will have any impact in the Parliament.

… but also discussing strategies what should be done better next time, both at  European and National level, you know communicating the EU better bla bla bla

… reflecting on the campaigns and all the different online projects

… ranting about the ignorance of voters, the lack of political knowledge, or why the media fails to cover the EU with an example how different TV stations or newspapers covered the election night.

… writing something about the challenges of the next European Parliament.

… some general thoughts on Europe vs. the nation state. The typical article on European identity or the lack of it…

… I should mention the Lisbon Treaty and the proposed reforms and whether the election results make it more likely to get the treaty ratified:  Ireland, failure of Libertas, political survival possibilities of PM Brown in the UK and the referendum plans of Cameron. I should not forget Poland and Chech Republic.

… speculating about the political groups in the European Parliament and saying something about the new group led by Cameron

… I could also blame it on the weather, the economy, the Commission or the political elite.

I really should write something like that but somehow I cannot be bothered today. So I might postpone it  for a few days (or weeks…)!

In the meantime I will be reading blogs! But what are the blogs writing about the European Parliament elections and the results?

If you find any good analysis or a good rant about the European Parliament elections why not add it to the bloggingportal?  – It might give you bigger readership and, at the same time, you help generating an alternative source for EP election analysis from all over Europe covering as many languages as possible!

Feel free to add your own posts and/or posts you think are interesting to the list here! You can also add blogs that write about EU affairs on a regular basis!

Here is the link (there is also a fancy bookmarklet for your browser!): http://www.bloggingportal.eu/publish

The only advice I can give you,  is the following:  Do not use the elections to punish your national government. Base your decision on what the candidates actually want to achieve in the European Parliament. Evaluate the programmes of the parties and candidates baring in mind the competences of the  European Parliament as an institution in the EU system.

Now, just go out and vote! It’s your choice.

Sorry for the rather infrequent blogging lately. I am rather busy at the moment and unfortunatly that will not change until mid July.

A couple of weeks ago Elmine also did a great video on Th!nkaboutit.eu pondering about the question: “How much influence does the European Parliament actually have? And therefore does my vote have influence?”  Worth watching:

Here my comment about the video (which also can be found in the comment thread):

Don’t know whether I would put a direct arrow between the European Council and the Commission in one of your first graphs. There is usually no direct link in legislative issues. Agenda-setting in EU policy making is only the responsibility of the Commission.

The Lisbon Treaty would actually remove the compulsory/non compulsory budget distinctions completely and increase the involvement of the EP. Would be an interesting point for the next video!

In many countries you cannot vote on individual candidates but only on party lists, so it is debatable whether individual candidates or rather political groups/parties have a bigger influence in the EP.

However, some great examples how to explain political processes with online videos…

Poul Nyrup Rasmussen:

I would have preferred the PES to have a candidate for the President of the European Commission, but we do not, and we will not before the elections.

Andrew Moravcsik:

Final anecdote: On my way back out to Heathrow I quizzed the cabby about the European elections. Exceptionally, he was not treating it as a “second-order election” on national politics but seemed really concerned about Europe. This meant–predictably–he was voting UKIP, consistent with the principle that extremists are disproportionately mobilized around Europe. Why UKIP? “We signed on for a free trade area,” he said, “and now Europe is taking over British politics, one issue at a time.” I asked him what issues concerned him most. “Not really sure,” he said. When I pressed him, he named human rights and criminal law (Council of Europe not the EU), and troops in Afghanistan (NATO), and third-country (Moslem) immigration (not a European competence at all). Only an anecdote, but multiply it by a million and you have the record of every West European EU election and referendum of which we have records. Need we say more about the prospects for meaningful deliberation on European politics?

Jean Quatremer (via Julien Frish and Opinion Corner):

Our newspaper is convinced that [the European Parliament election] is an event that has to be covered – but in the same way a plane crash has to be covered. We don’t have a choice.

Fredrik Reinfeldt (Prime Minister of Sweden):

…the voters are rational, they realize that the EU election is not (as) decisive for their everyday life and for the future.” He continues to say that there is a “tremendous difference” between national parliamentary elections and elections to the EP since the EP “has no influence on formation of government or influence”

Libertas:

Libertas.eu, the website of the pan European people’s movement for more democracy, accountability and transparency in the EU, had more visitors mid-week than any other political party in the world. Figures from Alexa, the web tracking company, for Wednesday May 13th , show Libertas blazing ahead, leaving even the US Democratic party website trailing.

stefanhapper:

you can cheat with alexa stats, especially for smaller sites (as it depends on people having the alexa toolbar)

On David Cameron:

Former PR man is said to apply ‘Daily Mail test’, asking ask how a claim would look on front page of a brutal tabloid

Is it any good? Judge for yourself. If you like black humour give it a try! I think it is funny in a odd way but since it is quite annoying to listen to the screams I would not watch it again despite the rather funny ending. And of course somebody will start the debate whether there is a deeper meaning of “death” regarding the EU or how “scary” the EU really is…

The Teaser

Part 1/3

“Voting is for everyone. So if you’re running a polling station, just stay cool and make it happen.”

Update: The first remix video is already online. Watch it here.

Update: Part 2/3

Update: Part 3/3

The goal of the NGOs study is two-fold: on the one hand, to look into how the MEPs contributed, through their activity, to stimulating participative democracy, and, on the other hand, to consolidate people’s trust in the European Parliament by empowering them to take an informed decision when voting for their MEPs in June 2009. The study is based on activity reports (voluntarily submitted to the NGO by a part of the MEPs), personal pages on the EP website, personal websites and/or blogs as well as the presence at plenary debates and at committee meetings. The main criteria used throughout the study were the way the MEPs relate to the citizens they represent, the transparency of their activity, as well as the relevance of their actions for the overall EP output.

The study is mainly made up by short profiles of each Romanian MEP, containing both quantitative data (presence at debates, number of reports and amendments drafted, number of interventions in plenary, etc), and qualitative information about their work (main topics addressed, social groups represented, other activities in which they were involved, etc). Moreover, the communication with the citizens was also analysed, focusing on accessibility (email address and other contact details), the quality of the information posted on the website, as well as the openness to discuss with the people though a blog.

Taking into account all these various aspects, the MEPs activity ìs assessed as either: ” weak”, “medium”, “good” or “very good”. Overall the picture does not look too bad, and the fact that the study sheds light on the specific areas each MEP focused on turns out to be very useful and reduces the risk of generalisation. Moreover, the study (which you can read here) is written in a very clear and reader-friendly manner and can be a very good information tool in the upcoming elections campaign.

And, what is more important, it sets a good example of what more NGOs (and not necessarily think tanks!) from other member states could do in a drive towards more transparency and increasing people’s interst and trust in the MEPs they are electing.

So where are similar reports from other countries that assess the performance of MEPs? What happened to the MEP tracking website? Votewatch.eu is still not launched… and the EP elections are coming closer. In an ideal world this kind of data would have been used by political parties in the nomination process…

Think about it! – The (first!) European Blogging Competition 2009 is a new blogging competition (some nice gadgets up for grabs) organised by the European Journalism Centre! The competition will start in February and will last until the EP elections. The exciting thing is that there will be a training component for all participants (after all it is run by a professional journalism organisation;-) You do not necessarily be a journalist or blogger, however you should be interested in EU affairs and the EP elections and you should feel enthusiastic about tryinig out blogging for a few months! If that sounds like a good idea to you can join the official facebook group and you can sign up here:

A dynamic community of bloggers, journalists and journalism students, a forum alive with debate and discussion, a creative portal to inspire youth involvement with the 2009 Parliamentary Elections, brought to you by the European Journalism Centre (EJC).

The goal is to get Europeans to THINK ABOUT IT and to express their views on Europe through an online blogging competition. The invited bloggers will cover, report, critique and debate on campaign issues and candidates. EJC editors will give feedback on the journalistic standards of the blog posts.

The EJC invites three bloggers from each EU member state for a two-day THINK ABOUT IT launch event in Brussels 25-27.1.2009. At the kick-off invitees are briefed on the European blogsphere, European Parliament, elections and on understanding the EU from a journalist’s perspective. The event also launches the blog contest, which invitees participate in throughout the official campaign season.

For more information just click here. Some fancy banners for your website/blog in various sizes can be found here.

Disclaimer: The author of this blog has been involved in the development of the project.

The “Anyone but Barroso” – Campaign calls for a new Commission President in 2009:

We don’t care who but the Commission needs a new President in 2009

1) 3 countries have voted No in recent referendums about European matters.

2) The EU has a crisis of confidence, a crisis of identity

3) Under these circumstances, the head of the EU’s executive, Commission president Barroso, must NOT be reappointed.

And since it is a typical online campaign, you can get involved! You can sign the petition and join and invite others on facebook. And make sure to read the campaign blog. Although not much content is provided at the moment, this will surely change soon!

It is an interesting idea especially because there is a real possibility of a second term for José Manuel Barroso. He has been rather active to lobby member states about the necessity for his second term. And member states so far have been reluctant to actually make the case for another candidate. The danger is that there will be another four years “muddling through”… Obviously the campaign has to be seen as a first step towards a debate on who actually should become Commission President as pure negative campaigning is not always the way to go.

I think it is also important to get people to think about the performance of the present Commission as an act of politicizing EU affairs! Actually it is quite a good example for what’s wrong with the EU at the moment: Basically the most powerful position in EU politics is decided on the “Justus Lipsius carpet market” as Graham Watson (MEP) once said.  There is another campaign out there that calls for a democratic election of the Commission President: Who’s your candidate? wants to get the main European parties to nominate  their candidate for Commission President before the 2009 EP elections in order to give the position a greater democratic mandate!