Cities for Europe Online Debate
Excerpts compiled by Bernhard Schneider
Last Update: 1st November 2019
A Vice President and Commissioner for citizen relations and civil society
Verena Ringler
Citizens get active for three reasons:
- They want to renegotiate the line between common and particular interests
- They aim to harnessing the ‘wisdom of the crowd’
- They intend to trigger large-scale transformation processes from below e.g. climate, economic transition
Why an EU Citizens Commissioner, and for what?
- Build trust.
Citizens’ trust is the greatest potential for a strong EU. A core strategy field. People need a long-term framework in which they can co-shape the course of European integration.
2. Citizen relations and civil society should lead the EU’s priority list.
Citizens are the EU’s best and cheapest early warning system, e.g. about climate, technology, social issues. The know-how needed lies in the minds of its 500 million citizens, best practices and proofs of concepts to build from. Hence, citizen relations should be seen as a strategy portfolio not as a communications task.
3. A ’non-profit Single Market’ in order to harness 500 million Europeans’ Know-How and commitment.
Professionalize the field of citizen relations, civil society and participation. Instead of short-term small, sequential initiatives (‘projectitis’) it needs systemic impact and interfaces to political and institutional Europe, institutional, long-term financing, academic research and proper didactics.
Europe on the Spot — that is our task
Hannah Neumann
The proposal of an EU Commissioner for citizens … falls short.
Bringing the EU to the people and the people to the EU should be a task for all of us and not be delegated to a single person or institution.
How else could it work?
- What if each Commissioner had once been in each Member State during his term of office?
- What if we MPs no longer have 36, but only 25 weeks of session … And eleven additional weeks to spend in our constituency?
- What if all cities and communities had European officers who could explain funding programs, do educational events in schools and promote exchanges?
- What if national politicians and media would no longer be discussing European decisions in the corset of nation-state debates?
People would realize that ‘Brussels’ is a democratic and transparent process for which everyone … is responsible.
It is not too late to appoint a EU Citizen Commissioner
Rupert Strachwitz
It would seem highly appropriate to appoint one of the 28 Commissioners to be responsible for the relationship between the Commission and the multitude of civil society organizations.
Civil society has an ever-increasing responsibility in setting the policy agenda at European as much as at national, regional and local level. … The signs that civil society is being harassed, crowded out, and subjected to undue restrictions and supervision mechanisms, are on the wall — in Hungary and in almost every member state. This is as dangerous as it is unwise. ..
The ‘active role’ of citizens — …. — hardly deserves special mention as such … is reduced to the dialogue events that have become so popular with politicians, when they deliver prefabricated addresses to citizens … Public events are a poor substitute to an ongoing organized dialogue with the … civil society.
200 European civil society organizations have co-signed an open letter to the members of the Parliament drawing their attention to the missing elements in President-elect von der Leyen’s mission letters and designated portfolios. ..
She would be well advised to heed the advice she has been offered.
The EU Commission and the question of culture: An utter failure or a new start for a shared ‘Europe of culture’?
Volker Hassemer
1. . … Should we not see the absence of the word culture in the portfolio of the forthcoming EU Commissioners as an honest admission and a welcome step? … Let us launch a process of creating an increased impact for culture within the EU and its multifaceted areas of political activity!
2. The Commissioner for European identity: would he … not be a partner to the multitude of cultural institutions — the most reliable engines of identity development in Europe?
The Commissioner for youth and innovation is unthinkable without responsibility for the development of art .. as a driving force behind the whole of society.
Wouldn’t be a Commissioner for civic responsibility an ideal partner for his colleague in the realm of ‘Democracy and Demography’? It is at the grass-roots level in cities and regions that the EU’s democratic affluence and demographic destiny are decided and take shape.
Isn’t a Vice-President for the ‘future prospects’ of Europe dependent on a partnership with culture, with arts and science?
Isn’t the EU’s High Representative for foreign policy directly dependent on culture, both in conceptual terms as well as with the task of showcasing Europe?
3. Enabling culture to influence all areas of the EU Commission is a more complicated and difficult concept. … The diversifying strategy has to have an impact on the European Parliament’s culture committee. The representatives of the European people (will have to) implement the ways in which Commissioners would concern themselves with culture. … The culture committee would provide Europe’s larger cultural community with the contacts they need for their initiatives.
The European Committee of the Regions CoR … would ideally develop its own partner function for the grass-roots groups of Europe, .. Especially in the realm of culture this is now more urgent than ever. The CoR could join forces with the European Economic and Social Committee to meet this challenge in terms of greater expertise, strength and efficiency.
Regions’ and cities’ contribution to Europe
Karl-Heinz Lambertz
Local and regional politicians need to be recognized as real partners in the forthcoming development of the European project. … More often than not, citizens are unaware of the impact of decisions made in Brussels, Strasbourg and Luxemburg. These missing links are often the cause of frustration, which then leads to political choices going against the values and spirit of the European project.
The CoR argues for a new way of working which allows local and regional authorities to play a greater role in the EU’s decision-making process. They need to have a proactive role in Europe’s legislative process from the very beginning on.
We need to establish a permanent and structured dialogue that feeds citizens’ views and visions into local, regional, national and European legislation.
I do not believe in institutional change; I believe in change which comes from people.
Marina Mantay
Politicians are always bound by party discipline …
We can obtain greater results by placing partnership over competitiveness …
Without a clear voice from ‘the bottom’ we risk creating the EU which is driven by policies that do not understand or acknowledge local intelligence. …. We as Europeans who are free from political chains should play a much more active role in building Europe from the bottom up.
Borders between social classes and people’s minds have become more pronounced …. Close an ever-increasing gap between the social, political and economic elites and the rest of the population.
Concrete actions every one of us can take:
1. Contribute
We need to identify an issue we care about and pursue it … Serving our communities
2. Improve
Let us be a change we want to see in the world
3. Appreciate
Let us be thankful for the achievements obtained by previous generations …. As European citizens we can travel, study, even settle down in every of al of 28 member states
4. Explore
Let us … seek out unlike-minded people …. trying to understand their beliefs, … let us embrace diversity, .. the complexity of the world might lead us to the conclusion that our worldview is not as different from our opponent as we might have thought.
Time for Culture, Time for Citizenship
Nicolas Bertrand
I have difficulties drawing a clear line between my free time and my constrained time. I am a cultural actor, whatever the time of day or week, and therefore feel active as a citizen.
1. In several European projects I advise. … Such European projects … drive the transformation of people and organizations, … our statutes and our conscience
2. A few months ago, several fellow administrators of independent groups and I began a … dialogue with representatives of the Lyon Metropolis, alongside the usual consultation methods …. These new exchanges enrich our vision, perhaps our hopefully will lead our colleagues to broaden their awareness of the environment in which they operate
3. The tango association which I belong to gathers about 700 members. The association’s cultuzral project is defined through the mobilization of an infinite number of interactions: from a few minutes to whole days of volunteering …
Each of our activities can be considered with a citizen’s consciousness. .. A performance, building a library or reading a book, running a ballroom or dancing tango are all opportunities to exercise our citizenship .. Let’s make time spent for culture a time for citizens to be active.
On our own doorstep: European ‘Remembrance Culture’
Hella Dunger-Löper
The EU as we know it primarily involves national governments cooperating in a realm many consider to be .. an elitist and bureaucratic construct …
In contrast to this top-down approach, ‘Cities for Europe’ works from the bottom up., calling on citizens to formulate their own perspective on a united Europe from their local communities.
‘History Workshops’ are already being organized by citizens throughout Europe… Althouzgh this volunteer-based structure guarantees proximity to active citizens, .. these groups have limited means to network effectively beyond their local regions … They rarely take on a European perspective beyond regional borders.
Our idea is to ‘uncover’ European connections and associations, to map out local and national perspectives and place them in a European context with the aid of institutional partners. … to initiate a pilot process and provide organizational support.
The dynamics of cities in Europe and worldwide: What role do cities play in European integration?
Rafał Dutkiewicz
It appears to me that the current challenges are not unique to European cities, but raher global in nature.
These challenges relate to three aspects, in particular:
- technological developments that are accelerating rapidly and changing our individual and social behavior
- migrations of people that impact the structure and cultural fabric of local and larger communities and that also influence our mental attitudes
- Ecology and climate changes.
We are also seeing the emergence of … ‘restrictions’ relating to climate change as well as with attempts to mitigate these restrictions. These are indeed questions facing European cities, but also .. the entire world. .. To distinguish European civilization — … — is the fact that people in these areas are more likely to openly discuss such questions and issues.
In order to grow and develop, every human being needs a community, a family, a neighborhood, school and work life, and a local and national community …. Ntional sentiments now go hand-in-hand with a supranational outlook. .. The European Union is considered … simply international.
Cities and European integration — one area and one process — are becoming more and more important every day.
It’s the cities! Towards the citizens’ Europe
Bernhard Schneider
1. Nowadays, local politicians and administrations can rely on their citizens’ ever-expanding European spirit. It is all about the bottom-up Europe of citizens as opposed to the institutions’ top-down Europe for citizens.
It is also in local and regional communities where Europe’s cultural diversity is rooted. The Bulgarian Europe looks different than the Europe of the Netherlands. They can tell each other a lot about their respective Europe. In order to become one complete whole, the EU has to embrace every single one of these versions of Europe.
2. Implementing the citizens’ Europe in different fields of municipal policy
Mayors play the essential role as European ambassadors to their community and in turn as ambassadors of their communities to Europe
Fields of implementation:
- Culture of democracy: shared civic responsibility
- Architecture and urban planning: Urban renewal, conversion
- Cross-border relationships: peripheries in the focus
- Cultural potential: Infrastructures, festivals (see Kathrin Deventer), people
- Lieux de Mémoire: Europe’s memory
- Cultural diversity and social cohesion
- European cultural heritage: sediments of cultural diversity
Festivals, Cities, Europe: How to strengthen the alliance?!
Kathrin Deventer
Community building has many ingredients: Access to knowledge, awareness of your community, citizenship, forms of interaction, …
This discussion results in an alliance: an alliance … between festival makers, cities, countries, continents. The ‘Europe impulse’ is used by festivals, and festivals’ spirit is used by Europe.
The European Festival Association EFA advocates this alliance that contributes to the construction ‘Europe’. The EFFE project — Europe for Festivals, Festivals for Europe — he website FestivalFinder.eu brings the arts at the permanent attention of the audience worldwide.
Europe’s governance should be informed by the needs … at the local level. Dialogue on a European level can only happen in an organized way … when 500 million citizens need to be governed. Civil society and cultural players have an important say on the direction of Europe’s journey.
- The EU is more than a sum of individual countries, more than a citizens’ project. Europe is also a community.
- The local urban context is always present at the daily level of each festival.
- Globality though is part of the local roots. The ‘roots from above’. We see Europe as an important stage for global collaboration. … based on the principle of diversity beyond national borders.
EFA follows two tracks: Europe as a challenge to embrace the roots from above; the arts as the building stones from below.
The European Soul of Aveiro
José Ribau Esteves
- The candidacy of Aveiro to become the European Capital of Culture reflects, first, the desire to reinforce its commitment to the implementation of public policies that favor the qualification of cultural offer, the increase of cultural practices and consumptions, the anchoring of new artistic and creative agentes and players, therefore the reinforcement of Aveiro’s position in the national and European context.
- At the same time, and because we believe that culture can be a factor of social transformation, we understand that this candidacy can also be an instrument for promoting active citizenship, social inclusion and intercultural dialogue, a driver for economic development, job creation and improving the quality of life of citizens.
BREXIT — EXIT European Capital of Culture?
Ulrich Fuchs
The pro-BREXIT referendum: June 2016. In December 2016 the UK’s Digital, Culture, Media & Sport Committee (DCMS) published an open call for bids for the 2023 European Capital of Culture (ECoC) title. Brussels watched in silence as the cities of Belfast, Dundee, Leeds, Milton Keynes and Nottingham went ahead with preparing their bids.
The invitation to the European jury in September 2017, the publication of the bid books, the preparations by British cities for their presentations in the last week of November 2017 — all these activities were known to the EU circles, but the Commission went on to ‘pull the plug’ only four days before the jury meeting. The European Commission announced in a letter to the DCMS that the UK would no longer be eligible for the ECoC title after 2019, citing BREXIT.
As long as the future relationship between the UK and the EU has not been re-negotiated, there will be no short-term solution to the 2023 ECoC title. … We will probably have only one European Capital of Culture in 2023; and the city carrying that title will most likely be found in the anti-European Hungary of Victor Orban.
Cluj Cultural Centre A collaborative city-platform for culture and urban development
Rarita Zbranca
The initiative implements the entire programme developed for the city’s candidacy for the European Capital of Culture 2021 title, as a model for cities engaged in the ECoC bidding process but not being awarded the title. — Mediating collaboration between different sectors; Mobilizing culture for social transformation and urban development.
95 members: The Cluj-Napoca municipality, the Cluj County Council, cultural institutions and organizations, all the universities in Cluj-Napoca, business clubs and clusters, civil society organizations
Strategic urban themes: Well-being, future of work, social inclusion, urban regeneration, social and structural innovation. The programme developed over 6 years.
Results generated since the beginning of implementation in 2017:
- Cultural Vouchers (free tickets)
- Culture and well-being Think Tank of experts in cultural health, psychology, urban design a.o.
- Urban Innovation Unit: interdisciplinary teams of urban planners, data scientists, artists, business developers, local authorities
- Task Force Strategy for Culture 2014–2020 and 2021–2028, including a Cultural Observatory, a research unit on cultural impacts
- Culture Next platform — Candidate Cities Network of 12 cities committed to culture-led urban development
Lessons learned:
- Interdisciplinary cooperation in complex urban issues
- Culture as a fertile ground for social transformation
- Empowerment and participation in order to ensure inclusion, sustainability, wellbeing
What Do We Protect by Protecting the European Way of Life?
Péter Techet
The term of ‘our European way of life’ seems to be empty. We are protecting us against foreign powers and right-wing populists without knowing the positive content we try to preserve.
If the new portfolio is only about .. security, there is no reason to establish it. We still have institutions that are dealing with these challenges. And if it is about defining an essentialized European identity, we don’t take away but back the ethno-nationalistic language. …. Europe is still quite focused on essentializing national identities. … Exclusion …The ’European way of life’ is the everyday ethnonationalism — the question of origins in order to highlight the differences among us.
But there is a model we can offer and an objective we have to protect and distribute — the welfare state: tax-financed health care, public transport, education, pension, and so on. … To protect it, we should establish a social Europe, too. … But I am afraid Ms von der Leyen does not mean the same. Not (only) foreign powers or right-wing parties are threatening our ‘European way of life’ but also Conservatives or Liberals promoting more free market and less social security — like many behind the new Commission President.
Tbilisi’s aspiration
Sopio Khuntsaria
Tbilisi, the capital and the biggest city in the country, is the flag-carrier in Georgia’s aspiration to become a member of the EU.
For Tbilisi Europe is the set of values which the city shares and the civilization of which the city has always been a part.
The European institutions’ effectiveness in enforcing these values and ensuring harmonious and sustainable development is what makes Europe what it is today.
A Citizens key to Europe?
Steen Gade
Europe is — as we all know — facing difficult challenges these years. Many people wonder whether the close cooperation between our countries is to the benefit of ordinary people. … and the large, shared problems — migration, climate, inequality — are hardly handled properly.
But there is also another, parallel reality. There is a new movement among young people. All over Europe, the youth is mobilizing for climate, environmental and social justice issues, and many in the young generation in the UK did not vote for Brexit feel betrayed. To a significant part of the youth, Europe is an arena and a possibility for real change.
