We’ll vote in Italy. But thinking about Europe

Participate is not just a right, it is a duty. Participate with an informed choice is even more useful. Next Sunday, May 25, not to vote – or, voting without a proper consideration – will be a true self-destructive (non)action.

The European Parliament, together with the Commission and the Council (the assembly of the EU28 Heads of State or Government) is not ‘something there’, which does not affect us and our lives. It is an entity that lives thanks to our contributions too – if it gets sick, we get sick too. There are a lot of wrong aspects in the way in which Italy (and other Member States too) looks at Europe. Starting from newspapers, where the Brussels news are into the ‘Foreign Affairs’ section – are we Buenos Aries? Pretoria? Beijing? The thing several persons did not (want to) understand is that we are part of this project (we are among its founding fathers, by the way) because we think there are positive effects coming from it. And, broadly speaking, these effects are generated. We are the ones contributing to them being positive: first, we need to participate, we need to vote and express our opinion thorough the vote; then, we need to choose someone who, pragmatically, wants and is able to do something about the management of this complex European ‘circus’.

Forza Italia, Pd, Green Italia, Fratelli d’Italia, L’Altra Europa, Lega, M5S, Ncd and all the others: better to vote for one of them instead of staying at home and let someone else decide on our behalf. Because you know, this is what happens when you do not vote, when you do not participate: you let someone else’s choice decide the MEP representing you.

On the other side – and this is a conscientious warning – voting for someone who promised you the unattainable is making a mistake that is just slightly less severe than avoiding to vote. When in the ballot, we need to take into consideration that the newly elected MEPs will act together with representatives of other 27 Member States – where majorities are composed of, let’s say, Italian, Polish, German, Portuguese members of the ‘A’ Party, together with Slovenian, Czech, Spanish and Estonian members of the ‘B’ Party. If there is a party with no European projection, without a European ‘parent party’ (EPP, S&D, Greens, Liberals, Left), then that party will count very, very little – let’s say nothing. This is what makes these elections different from the national ones: in Italy, you can say ‘OK, I’m voting this party, it’s little but it could grow up and count something at the Parliament’. In Europe, you cannot. For instance, nationalist parties: it is impossible for them to share a common European programme – it’s because of their own nature of ‘nationalism’. Well, they can share the idea of ‘dismantling Europe’ or ‘cancelling the single currency’. One little thing: these issues cannot be decided by the European Parliament…

Each of these parties has a single priority: they will tell their voters they did something (usually, inefficiently) in their favour, at the expense of someone else.

Have you ever seen a world map? Better, a world map with economic areas? Let’s have a look at that – and bear in mind, the European Union will be the only zone of the world which is not going to grow in the next years. You’ll see how little we are, considering the entire world. You’ll see we need to be together to survive, not to mention to count something on the international stage. We are an old, good, strong battleship, we need some maintenance works for sure – but we need to perform them together, not to take our lifeboats and face the hostile ocean. Maybe it would be possible to have some hours of quiet navigation, but it takes very little to shipwreck.