The Spinelli Group is an initiative founded with a view to reinvigorate the endeavour for federalisation of the

European Union The European Union (EU) is a supranational union, supranational political union, political and economic union of Member state of the European Union, member states that are located primarily in Europe, Europe. The union has a total area of ...

(EU), by creating a network of citizens, think tanks, NGOs, academics, writers and politicians who support the idea of a federal and united Europe. Among other goals, the Group aims to ''"find a federal majority'' mong_members_of_the_European_Parliament.html" ;"title="members_of_the_European_Parliament.html" ;"title="mong members of the European Parliament">mong members of the European Parliament">members_of_the_European_Parliament.html" ;"title="mong members of the European Parliament">mong members of the European Parliament''on important subjects."'' Founded on 15 September 2010 in the European Parliament (EP) in Brussels, the group is named after Altiero Spinelli (1907–1986), founder of the

Union of European Federalists The Union of European Federalists (UEF) is a European non-governmental organisation, campaigning for a Federal Europe. It consists of 20 constituent organisations and it has been active at the European, national and local levels since 1946. H ...

(UEF) and a Founding fathers of the European Union, founding father of the European integration. The group was founded by

Guy Verhofstadt Guy Maurice Marie Louise Verhofstadt (; ; born 11 April 1953) is a Belgian politician who was the leader of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe from 2009 to 2019, and has been a member of the European Parliament (MEP) from Belgium ...

, former head of the liberal

Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe The Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe (ALDE; french: Alliance des Démocrates et des Libéraux pour l'Europe, ADLE) is a transnational alliance between two European political parties, the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europ ...

(ALDE) group in the Parliament and honorary president of the

(UEF) in Belgium, former co-chair of the

Greens–European Free Alliance The Greens/European Free Alliance (Greens/EFA) is a political group of the European Parliament composed primarily of green and regionalist political parties. Formed following the 1999 European elections for the 5th European Parliament, th ...

(Greens/EFA) group Daniel Cohn-Bendit, French MEP

Sylvie Goulard Sylvie Goulard (born 6 December 1964) is a French politician and civil servant who served as Deputy Governor of the Banque de France from 2018 to 2022. Prior to this, Goulard briefly served as Minister of the Armed Forces from 17 May to 21 Jun ...

(ALDE) and former EP Vice President

Isabelle Durant Isabelle Annie J. Durant (born 4 September 1954) is a Belgian politician of the Ecolo party who served as Deputy Secretary-General of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) from 2017 to 2021 and as acting Secretary-General ...

(Greens/EFA), with the support of the Union of European Federalists.

Federalists' movements

The Spinelli Group is not the first initiative launched in the European Parliament, gathering together followers of European federalism ideas. On 9 July 1980, the

Crocodile Club The Crocodile Club was an informal group of members of the European Parliament (MEP) that favoured greater European integration, to the extent of a European federation, and greater powers to the European Parliament. The group was founded on 9 Jul ...

a group of MEPs was founded by Altiero Spinelli himself. For more than 60 years, Union of European Federalists (UEF) and its youth organisation Young European Federalists (JEF) with a "belief that only a European Federation, based on the idea of unity in diversity, could overcome the division of the European continent" have been actively working to promote the idea of European federalism. MEP

Andrew Duff Andrew Nicholas Duff, OBE (born 25 December 1950) is a British politician who presided over the Union of European Federalists (UEF) from 2008 to 2013. A member of the Liberal Democrats, he served as a Member of the European Parliament (MEP) for ...

and president of UEF has welcomed the launching of the Spinelli Group saying, that "existing federalist forces and organisations, such as the UEF and the Intergroup, welcome this new initiative".

Manifesto

With a manifesto online, recalling the

Ventotene Manifesto The Ventotene Manifesto ( it, Manifesto di Ventotene), officially entitled ''For a Free and United Europe. A Draft Manifesto'' (''Per un'Europa libera e unita. Progetto d'un manifesto''), is a political statement written by Altiero Spinelli while ...

written by Altiero Spinelli, Group activists call members of the European Parliament and Europe's citizens to sign it and add their names to the list of those fighting against nationalism and

intergovernmentalism In international relations, intergovernmentalism treats states (and national governments in particular) as the primary actors in the integration process. Intergovernmentalist approaches claim to be able to explain both periods of radical change ...

. By supporting the aims and principles laid out in the manifesto, Spinelli group followers try to speed up the process of

European integration European integration is the process of industrial, economic, political, legal, social, and cultural integration of states wholly or partially in Europe or nearby. European integration has primarily come about through the European Union and its ...

and promote a federal Europe.

Members

The Spinelli Group is organised in three sections. * The Steering Group gathers the 33 founding members and newcomers—politicians and thinkers dedicated to building a federal Europe. * The MEP Spinelli Group gathers 108

MEPs A Member of the European Parliament (MEP) is a person who has been elected to serve as a popular representative in the European Parliament. When the European Parliament (then known as the Common Assembly of the ECSC) first met in 1952, it ...

who signed the manifesto. They look for strategies and majorities in the European Parliament to push the pro-European, federal, and post-national agenda. * The Spinelli Network Group is made of every citizen who signed the manifesto of the Spinelli Group. As of 8 May 2017, they are 7,327. They participate in debates and fora. This pro-European initiative is supported by prominent political leaders such as former Commission President

Jacques Delors Jacques Lucien Jean Delors (born 20 July 1925) is a French politician who served as the 8th President of the European Commission from 1985 to 1995. He served as Minister of Finance of France from 1981 to 1984. He was a Member of the European P ...

, former German Foreign Minister

Joschka Fischer Joseph Martin "Joschka" Fischer (born 12 April 1948) is a German retired politician of the Alliance 90/The Greens. He served as the foreign minister and as the vice-chancellor of Germany in the cabinet of Gerhard Schröder from 1998 to 2005. Fi ...

, former competition commissioner

Mario Monti Mario Monti, (born 19 March 1943) is an Italian economist and academic who served as the Prime Minister of Italy from 2011 to 2013, leading a technocratic government in the wake of the Italian debt crisis. Monti served as a European Commi ...

and MEP

, President of the Union of European Federalists (UEF), and other well known public bodies. It is also enthusiastically supported by such European Union promoters as former European Parliament President

Pat Cox Patrick Cox (born 28 November 1952) is a former Irish Fine Gael politician, journalist and television current affairs presenter who served as President of the European Parliament from 2002 to 2004 and Leader of the European Liberal Democrat a ...

and current Parliament Vice-President

(Greens/EFA; Belgium). The 35 members of the Steering Group in 2010 were: *

* Róża Thun * Kalypso Nicolaïdis *

Danuta Hübner Danuta Maria Hübner, née Młynarska ( or ; born 8 April 1948) is a Polish politician and Diplomat and Economist and Member of the European Parliament. She has served as European Commissioner for Regional Policy from 22 November 2004 until 4 Jul ...

Gesine Schwan Gesine Schwan (née ''Schneider'', 22 May 1943) is a German political science professor and member of the Social Democratic Party of Germany. The party has nominated her twice as a candidate for the federal presidential elections. On 23 May 2004, ...

Tommaso Padoa-Schioppa Tommaso Padoa-Schioppa, OMRI (; 23 July 1940 – 18 December 2010) was an Italian banker and economist who served as Italy's Minister of Economy and Finance from 2006 to 2008. He previously served as a member of the Executive Board of the Europ ...

* Élie Barnavi * Jean-Marc Ferry *

Ulrich Beck Ulrich Beck (15 May 1944 – 1 January 2015) was a German sociologist, and one of the most cited social scientists in the world during his lifetime. His work focused on questions of uncontrollability, ignorance and uncertainty in the modern ag ...

Amartya Sen Amartya Kumar Sen (; born 3 November 1933) is an Indian economist and philosopher, who since 1972 has taught and worked in the United Kingdom and the United States. Sen has made contributions to welfare economics, social choice theory, economi ...

Elmar Brok Elmar Peter Brok (born 14 May 1946) is a German politician who served as Member of the European Parliament (MEP) from 1980 until 2019, who is best known for his role as chairman of the European Parliament Committee on Foreign Affairs. He is a mem ...

*Tibor Dessewfy *

Sandro Gozi Sandro Gozi () (born 25 March 1968 in Sogliano al Rubicone) is an Italian politician formerly of the Democratic Party who has been a Member of the European Parliament since 2020. He was a member of the Italian Chamber of Deputies from 2006 to 201 ...

*Pawel Swieboda *Kurt Vandenberghe *Gaëtane Ricard-Nihoul *Anna Triandafyllidou * Diogo Pinto * Heather Grabbe *Imola Streho *Alina-Roxana Girbea *

Daniel Cohn Bendit Daniel Marc Cohn-Bendit (; ; born 4 April 1945) is a French-German politician of Jewish descent. He was a student leader during the unrest of May 1968 in France and was also known during that time as ''Dany le Rouge'' (French for "Danny the Red" ...

*Koert Debeuf *Edouard Gaudot *Guillaume McLaughlin *Mychelle Rieu *

Monica Frassoni Monica Frassoni (born 10 September 1963) is an Italian politician who served as a Member of the European Parliament from 1999 to 2009 and as co-chair of the European Green Party from 2009 to 2019. In 2018, she was elected at the local Council o ...

*Pier-Virgilio Dastoli

References

External links

*
Union of European Federalists website
{{Europarl European Parliament Eurofederalism Federalism by country

Federalists' movements

Manifesto

Members

See also

References

External links