Les séances plénières
Every month, the European Parliament packs its heavy-duty metal crates (one per policy advisor or assistant), and works late on a particular Friday, gathering notes and compiling voting lists.Everyone then trudges home, exhausted from the stresses of work, and perhaps also from the weekly festivities on Thursday nights in Place Luxembourg.
On Monday, the Parliament arrives in Strasbourg, France, where the Members will vote in plenary session. By train, by carpool, and sometimes by plane, the Members, their assistants and policy advisors, and even some interns arrive in a constant stream from about 11:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. They greet their colleagues, settle into different office arrangements, and reacclimate to a set of buildings that feel alien and homely at the same time.
In the Winston Churchill building, twisting hallways, with islands of inner offices and banks of offices with windows, form a labyrinth where one cannot help but get lost. The same models of computers sit at the same types of desks, with the same, strange video-capable corded telephones sitting on them. The brick walls seem nonsensical, especially when they flank high-tech elevators or give way to meeting rooms with translators’ booths. Some meeting rooms in this building stick out from the pack: One, in particular, is painted bright green, and is covered in geometric wall decorations that could only be from the ’70s. I was in that room for a meeting of the PANA committee, which was created specifically to deal with issues pertaining to the Panama Papers. Commissioner Věra Jourová, whom I met in her offices in the Commission’s building in Brussels, was presenting findings to PANA and receiving feedback from the Members on the committee.

In Louise Weiss, open spaces with hanging plants, brightly lit offices filled with angular furniture, and a pervading royal blue color scheme that evoke the ’90s all give day-to-day affairs a sense of importance. In Louise Weiss, where the Hemicycle, clad in wood planks on the outside, is visible from most hallways, and where activity slows during votes, Parliament’s purpose in Strasbourg is clear. The Hemicycle hosted not only important votes on a range of issues, but also a memorial for Simone Veil, Parliament’s first President, and a review of the Maltese Presidency of the Council of the European Union, which shares the responsibility of “colegislation” with Parliament. The massive space, which I entered at the ring-like observer’s gallery at the top, cannot help but feel like an arena. Members from different countries and different political groups speak alone or act in unison, as the proposals we worked so hard to finalize in Brussels are presented, defended, accepted, or rejected. If Parliament releases a resolution, accepts or modifies the Commission’s legislative proposal, or makes any other large decision, it is likely that it happened in that chamber.

Over the course of that frantic week in July, I was able to sit in on more meetings than ever, and more important meetings than I had before. The work of the policy advisors did not stop or even slow. They were busy preparing documents for the next session, in September, even while supporting their MEPs (Members of the European Parliament) on issues that were coming up for votes. Through it all, ALDE (our political group, the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe remembered to keep its cohesion, with daily meetings, where the ALDE position on the day’s votes would be reviewed and debated, and with a barbecue to celebrate another year of Parliamentary policymaking. If there were ever any doubt about the priorities of the Parliament, the plenary sessions should quash those thoughts in any observer. Legislation began and ended every day. Even when a kerfuffle between President of the Commission Jean-Claude Juncker and President of the Parliament Antonio Tajani over attendance at the review of the Maltese Council Presidency erupted, it was buried quickly. Most MEPs and policy advisors did not seem angry or flustered, but rather peeved at the distraction from their meetings, which had been the reason they could not attend the review of the Maltese Council Presidency in the first place.

My week in Strasbourg is enough to have made this internship worthwhile. It proved that the European institutions are not tied to Brussels, but rather the culmination of individuals’ efforts, and that they are more robust than the beautiful buildings that house them.
Written by Michael Rover ’19, Political Science major at Stanford University. He is interning for The Europe Center at the Alliance of Liberals & Democrats in Europe in Brussels, Belgium.
