Twenty Years of European Greens
1984 - 2004
edited by Arnold Cassola & Per Gahrton
Luzius Theiler
Die Grünen/Les Verts (Switzerland)
- EGC delegate in Majvik, Finland 1993
I remember Masala: picturesque Finland, forests, solitude. Majvik was more of a common room than a congressional centre - everything in wood, isolated …. weak beer.
On the journey there, I thought about the transformation from a green co-ordination into a green federation, due to financial necessity. Just as in previous and later meetings, Hans-Beat Schaffner worried about the funds. And he still does. Without money the greens can’t work either.
There was full agreement on the programme. The “Guiding Principles” were decided upon - they are still, ten years later, true and valid guidelines for the European greens: expansion limitations, independence instead of unrestricted world trade, opposition to the capitalistic economy, which then began its apparently everlasting (but nonetheless short-lived) triumphant progress.
On the last day, after the foundation document was ceremoniously signed, I felt a spur of green-historic importance when Paolo Bergamaschi began to sing our anthem “Che sarà” for the first time.
Che sarà... Soon afterwards the greens became part of governments,... and thus from a political movement to a party, concessions were made to “reality”... ignoring pacificism led to the tolerance of Nato military actions, and many of our best friends and supporters walked away, disappointed. That was painful.
It was a difficult situation for greens dealing with power. Power enables changes but it also corrupts people, even green people. Must our power be governing power? And who still demonstrates on the streets every week? I don’t, either.
The greens and power. In my opinion, this will be the decisive question for the next ten years. Che sarà?
