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Notre Europe, The European Parliament elections

Maria Pallares, mpallares@notre-europe.eu

1/ Could you present us the work of your think tank Notre Europe?


Founded in 1996 by Jacques Delors, Notre Europe is an independent laboratory for analysis and policy proposal devoted to \\

Notre Europe has a team of researchers for the production of studies and notes but it does not prevent it from resorting to outside intellectuals. All the analysis and proposals of Notre Europe are available on its website, in English and French,




Did Notre Europe receive funding from the European Commission? In which context?



The budget of Notre Europe today comes mostly from the European Commission under the \\\'Europe for Citizens \\\" fund, which supports the active entities at an European level in the field of active European citizenship.




3/ Which critical analysis could you briefly make concerning the European elections in 2009?



European election result in 2009 confirmed a high rate of abstention, in Europe and France, which was predicted throughout the campaign. In fact, only 43.24% of European voters turned out to vote, they were 40.48% in France (45.47% against EU-25 and 42.76% for France in 2004).

One reason for this low participation is due probably to the difficulty for citizens to grasp the real issues of this election. The European Parliament, or the work of Deputies, or the debates that take place in this institution are not well known about the real impact of our vote and the different policy options are not clear. The small discussion that accompanied the campaign and the fact that the main themes have focus on national issues have clouded the issue.

So who is responsible? The media, who have not relay the work of the EP and the EU during the legislature? The political parties and national leaders, who do not often assumed the decisions they themselves made in Brussels?

This is no time to search for the guilty, but to seek solutions, because without the support of citizens, the project of European construction seems at best; blocked, at worst, compromised.






4/ In your opinion, what is the correlation among the many factors in the rate of abstention for European elections and the lack of knowledge concerning the opportunities offered by the programs of the European Commission?



I do not think that we can establish a direct correlation between these two elements. Thus, if there is a lack of knowledge about the opportunities offered by the Commission\\\'s programs, it must be understood in a broader failure of the European Union and its functioning