EU: worth your vote?

Despite what you might think, the answer is ‘sure’: perhaps now more than ever before.

In a fair number of European countries, people put their hope on the EU for putting a brake on corruption in their own country, as well as on anti-democratic tendencies.

Their hope may be realistic:

today the EU is gradually showing more teeth than it did in the past.

But besides, one might also hope that the EU would learn a few lessons from its recent past.

The possibility exists, but real EU-reform is unlikely to come from the established parties; and it all depends on our commitment as the civilians of the European countries.

Two new parties appeared on the scene. Both with an agenda to redesign the EU, to make it a better fit for our future.

Both are also new in another aspect: they aim to be the first truly pan-European parties. Which would mean that there is less risk for watering down of their agenda’s, compared to the European alliances of traditional parties.

One of these new parties is Volt, which should by now be on the voting lists in all EU countries. They operate on the basis of their ‘Amsterdam Declaration’. In a separate document, they clearly explain HOW they hope to achieve their goal.

The other pan-European party is ‘European Spring’. So far, they have made it to the voting lists of six countries in the EU (see their flags in the figure to the right).

But how to determine your vote, without having to read through numerous party programs?

Just use one of the voting guides available on the internet, e.g. EUandI or YourVoteMatters. This should help you identify the parties that best fit your wishes (although drastic reforms are rarely among the statements in these voter’s guides).

If you consider voting for one of the established parties, you would be more interested in their deeds than in what they promise you in their programs. In that case, you can validate what they have actually been doing in the past period by checking this site.

In case you are a bit puzzled what is the actual position of the European Parliament in the confusing array of EU institutions, this brief video might be of help.

So, hopefully with this bit of guidance, you will be able to decide on your vote. We all want Europe to improve, don’t we? Then, as a voter, you don’t blindly leave that to vested interests, do you?

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