Jacqueline Cremers Secretary General, European Green Party

new French Green Future: Europe Ecology – Les Verts

Politics of ecology for an ethical society

Bright and sunny day in Lyon! Your secretary general listens to Eva Joly who addresses  a crowd of more than 2000 ! enthusiast people. For Joly the politics of ecology does not only mean an ecological sound Future, but moreover to define and guard what it means to live in an ethical society: an ethical society  fights against poverty and defends the right to a decent and social just life and combats for the eradication of discrimination and inequality. That is what drives Eva Joly, une grande dame de politique ecology!

New movement on the way

We are near the heart of the city, in a huge Congress center. The screen is bright green, no new name visible yet, it is to be voted today. Green flags waving, people applauding, people united for this historic day. I see the faces of famous French Green politicians, I see many young people. I see many interested people listening to what representatives of civil society have to tell about the lost ethics in politics.

Populism is the opposite of ecological politics says Dany Cohn-Bendit

The politics of ecology is the opposite of the politics of populism states Dany Cohn-Bendit. It is neither left nor right and recognises that we are united in diversity. Ecological politics is a transformative and autonome force that can change our society. He calls for a unification of the left front in France to beat the right wing politics of Sarkozy that is exclusive and discriminative. Greens must appeal to all layers in society, to all the people that are suffer under the decisions that right wing politics make .

Reform project for 2012

Dany calls for a ‘grenelle’ on pensions, a true public enquete together with civil society, the trade unions and all the people concerned,  for a project that will formulate a policy for reform before 2012. 

Fight against nationalism

Europe is ill, nationalism is the name of the disease. The politics of ecology does not ask where you come from, it asks what you want to do with us. Those who want to change, are welcome to the club. For Dany the fight against the illness of an exclusive kind of politics, the fight against the illness of nationalism is pivotal for his work as Co-president of the Green Group in the European Parliament and he pledges his ongoing commitment towards this fight.

Now of for a coffee while dusks set in, recharge laptop and then hop hop hop back to this wonderful afternoon and evening in Lyon.

Jacqueline Cremers

Lost archive…

When I entered the office in January our basement was filled with papers and boxes and loose files. They have to go I said to Ann and soon! We need this room for office space.To Ann's great reassurance I did not mean to throw them away, but archive the material, as should have been done long before. Johan Hamels suggested E-topia and I was really happy that I could hand over the archive to them. They carefully packed the material, made a list of what they took and have made plans to categorise it and make it available to the public. It will take a few years, but then we are up to date with that! For this relatively small institute it is special to have our European Greens archive, it is a true asset for their collection and it is centrally located close to the office in the heart of Europe. So far so good.

But there is more, Ann told, in England, a few boxes stacked somewhere in the buildings of the University of T-side in the UK. And she told me the story of the English delegate, Dick Richardson, who took, in 1996, some old material from the European Green Coordination (1984-1993) away to archive.  In 1999 or thereabouts we received the message that Dick had died.  The boxes with the material ended up in a shack we heard. Then the story ends, nobody knew why, how or what...

This year Johan offered to collect the material by car.  Our archive would be in one place. Since Johan wanted to know when he could go, I contacted some person at the T-side University. Oeps, the message that I would like to make an appointment to collect our boxes with EGP material, created some ice-cold wind and I knew something was wrong.

A visit to this months' UK Greens Conference seemed a good opportunity to have an appointment with the person who guarded these boxes during the last years. These boxes stacked in an old shack, appeared to be a full 25 meters material stored in one of the most sophisticated archives I have ever seen. Climatised room, special archived boxes and everything! Dick Richardson, former lecturer at the University, thought that our material should be saved from destruction and hoped to have the archive of the European Greens at his University.

I am most grateful to him and all the university staff, because the material in there is of our very first steps that we made to organise ourselves on a European level as European Greens. Furthermore there is lots of information on national green parties and some very interesting correspondence. Some of that very similar to that of today when it comes to applications and request to maintain voting rights despite not being able to pay membership fees (the answer is still the same: no!)

So there I am with one archive split in two locations with two institutions who are very keen and eager to archive the material and have it as a jewel in their archive crown. I will try to work out a solution to this problem and plan to have our archive in one place and electronically available with good cooperation between the two institutions.

And I think we may be for ever grateful to Dick Richardson for having the awareness that is is important to archive!

French Summer Study Days

Last weekend I arrived in Nantes for the French Green Summer Study Days. I was invited to speak in a workshop about the Future of the EGP and to assist in a plenary debate concerning the future of Global ecology. Nantes surprised me, for more than one reason.

The city is clean, the public transport is clean, fast and has priority all over the city! At Saturday evening we had a party at the Island in the Loire and had a chance to watch an exhibition on http://www.lesmachines-nantes.fr/. A reference to Jules Verne, a makeable future and a good way to start a festive evening.

The atmosphere at the Nantes University itself was great and I felt at home with more than 2000 French Greens. I was  deeply impressed by the  support and respect for the non European Green representatives and moreover of the real activism that radiated from the French greens. Huge media attention! This is a party you want to be part of! I confess I have thought different on this in the past!

And no problem whatsoever for more than 1000 people to stay 4,5 hours, 2 hours longer than expected, in a very hot auditorium to watch the debates. Coming from the GroenLinks culture where everything is timed carefully and to finish at 5 PM means finish at 5PM and no later, this was a culture shock!

Up for discussion many issues, easy, nice, non controversial ones, but also the more difficult ones, on social security on migration, on unemployment benefits. It is the French Greens who dare to say that there are more creative ways to think on pensions than a lower pension age for all! Courageous, when you take the French system into account.

The hot issue on the table was the future of the French Greens. How they are to continue after the big electoral successes of the European and regional elections. And I am happy to report back that there is a large majority who supports the future cooperation in a more formal and structured way between the ecologist and the old French Green party members.

A survey among the  participants revealed that most people saw this process as a challenge to think of new ways to organise party  democracy and  asked the leadership to come up with experiments for  new and attractive ways of more direct involvement and democrac.y The respondents asked for  recognition within the new structure of the activist nature of green politics and people.

The French Summer days inspired me  and I have learned a lot. I will use my experience at our coming Council meetings and for our common future project. For now Chapeau for the French Greens who seem to be able to manage a very difficult process and come out stronger and more creative and inventive in the end.

You want to know more? http://www.journeesdete.fr/3935-les-journees-d-ete/

After Malmo