The article presented here is part of the Open Platform, an initiative of The New Federalist, allowing candidates in the Young European Federalists (JEF) elections to share their ideas for the network ahead of the Strasbourg Congress, which will take place from 14 to 16 November 2025. In this article, Cyprien BETTINI and Konsti PETRY, candidates for the Federal Committee, express their views.
Our observation starts with a concern: we are witnessing an increasing brutalization of the public space. While this phenomenon first took hold in the United States, particularly under Donald Trump’s presidency, it is now finding alarming resonance within the European Union and across a majority of its member states.
The most striking sign of this trend can be seen in the ballot box. In the 2024 European elections, ultra-conservative and far-right forces made a major breakthrough: three right-wing and far-right parliamentary groups (ECR, ENS, PfE) now represent nearly one-third of the European Parliament. Their influence is now such that some traditional groups are actively seeking alignment with them.
This phenomenon is no accident. It is the result of over a decade of “normalizing” the far-right, a strategy from which many national governments have benefitted: Belgium, Italy, Finland, the Czech Republic, Sweden, Slovakia, Hungary. And even where these parties are not in power, they still represent a major parliamentary force: in France, Germany, Romania, Bulgaria or the Netherlands, or Portugal. In some candidate countries, pro-European activists face increasing repression or manipulation attempts from the Kremlin or their Kremlin-sponsored government.
But let’s not be fooled: the “normalized” appearance of these parties has not made them any less brutal. Whether in national governments or within European institutions, radical right and far-right groups are conducting an increasingly aggressive offensive against the rule of law, fundamental rights, and the actors who defend them: independent media, organized civil society, and the academic world.
It’s a fact: the radical right and far-right do not like us. And they are making it very clear. This is evident in: The ECR group amendment that explicitly targets JEF and other youth organizations, Giorgia Meloni, who openly attacks the Ventotene Manifesto and its defenders, while expressing nostalgia for the Mussolini regime, The Young Europeans of Toulouse, who were denied the opportunity to give an educational talk by the Perpignan City Hall (Patriots for Europe), the former JEF Lithuania interest group, which spread hate speech and targeted several of our volunteers before leaving the network. Or the recent hassle of JEF Munich members by the newly created Ave Europa organization, that under the federalist cover spread a xenophobic and islamophobic discourse.
Today, these attacks may seem harmless. But must we wait until one of our members is physically assaulted, we lose our funding, or we are completely erased from the public space before we react? Certainly not. We can no longer afford to merely react. We must now ask ourselves what action toolkit we have at our disposal — but more importantly, what values we must defend today. In 1941, Altiero Spinelli laid out the founding values of our movement from Ventotene. Three of these values continue to drive our actions: An open society, welcoming to all, regardless of gender, beliefs, or skin color — which can only be embodied in a federal Europe; Dialogue with all political forces that share this ambition — the basis for our transpartisan approach; A clear and firm rejection of those who oppose it — at the time, Mussolini’s fascist regime.
Today’s state of public debate and our institutions forces us to rethink the relationship between these last two values.
Contrary to what is sometimes said, transpartisanship is not a categorical refusal to interact with political parties and groups. It is actually about integrating our ideas into their programs, particularly through an ideological framework, the political platform. Conversely, any party whose ideas and values are opposed to ours does not deserve and should not be the target of our advocacy in any way.
The far right is a universal danger, and it first and foremost threatens our movement. To face it, we must structure our political action around four pillars: Analyze the evolution of far-right parties and movements to understand their rhetoric and methods; Counter their narratives by occupying more space in the media and on social networks; Anticipate their rise in our institutions by developing concrete resistance tools, already tested by some sections; Rethink our advocacy, building a narrative that responds to the legitimate expectations of citizens disappointed by our institutions. Reflecting on the rise of the far right means reflecting more generally on our position vis-à-vis our decision-making system. Until now, our governance has relied on academic output to justify a political narrative as ‘legitimate’ by virtue of its “factual” or even ‘scientific’ nature.
While this approach brings a necessary rational dimension to public debate, it also deprives citizens of their capacity for critical thinking. It is this alienation that fuels virulent criticism of “European technocracy” and the growing emergence of “fake news” and “alternative facts” about the European Union. These phenomena are in fact a clumsy attempt by citizens to understand the issues at stake based on their own system of knowledge and values, in the face of institutions that struggle to take their views into account.
Rather than imposing facts, which are perceived as opinions by those who reject them, we must turn to a conception of rationality as a practice of solidarity, which translates into a search ‘among shared values and beliefs with a view to finding sufficient resources to enable agreement on how to coexist without violence’, as American philosopher Richard Rorty has defined it.
In other words, faced with the brutalisation of our societies, driven by governments and far-right groups, we must introduce the empathy needed to rebuild the social fabric. This means not presenting federalism as THE solution, but as an efficient solution among the many currently on offer in the political arena.
This work is not only necessary but also a moral imperative for the JEF. At such a turbulent time in our history, we must redefine our values so that we never compromise on them. Antifascism is one of them.
And when the far right will become a minority force again, when we have shown citizens, through dialogue, that it is not the solution, then we will have shown that we are truly a generation ahead.
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