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Europe Calling ‘Too inconvenient? How a powerful campaign aims to weaken European civil society’
10.February 19:00 - 20:30

Recording:
Dear friends and supporters,
Unbeknownst to most of Europe’s citizens, a campaign against European civil society is currently underway. In the European Parliament, the centre-right European People’s Party (EPP) is joining forces with right-wing and far-right factions to massively weaken civil society.
Their goal is to prevent NGOs that work for environmental and climate protection from using EU funding to represent their interests to EU institutions and even to make them repay funds already received. Environmental NGOs need support to stand up to the financially strong swarms of industry and business lobbyists.
If the EPP and its far-right allies have their way, NGOs will have even fewer opportunities to fight for the common good.
We ask: Does the EPP want to get rid of unwelcome NGOs that have successfully fought for the EU Green Deal, limits on pollution and a clean environment despite their small budget? What does this mean for civil society in Europe and citizens’ influence on European democracy? What happens next?
We want to discuss this with the following guests and you in the next Europe Calling:
- Patrizia Heidegger, Deputy Secretary General of the European Environmental Bureau, the European umbrella organisation of over 185 environmental and climate NGOs
- Nina Katzemich, campaigner on the topics of lobby regulation and lobbying in the EU at Lobbycontrol and Europe Calling board member
- Dr. Raphael Weyland, head of the EU office of the Nature and Biodiversity Conservation Union (NABU), one of the oldest German environmental NGOs with over 900,000 members
- Prof. Dr. René Repasi, German Member of the European Parliament for the SPD in the S&D Group, Speaker of the SPD European Parliamentary Group
- Daniel Freund, German Member of the European Parliament for Bündnis90/Die Grünen (Greens/EFA) and former anti-corruption expert at Transparency International
- Moderation: Maximilian Fries, Managing Director of Europe Calling e.V.
Date: Monday, 10 February 2025, 7:00 – 8:30 pm (CET)
The webinar will be simultaneously translated into German and English.
This webinar is part of our Power to the People series on the role of citizens and civil society in European democracy. All previous editions can be viewed here.
With European greetings,
Maximilian Fries and all at Europe Calling e.V.