European Democrat Students

Last updated
European Democrat Students (EDS)
Formation1961 (1961)
Type
HeadquartersRue du Commerce 10, B-1000, Brussels, Belgium
Chairman
Francesco Sismondini
Secretary General
Vladimir Kljajić
Parent organization
European People's Party (also European Democrat Union)
Affiliations International Young Democrat Union
European Youth Forum
Website www.edsnet.eu

European Democrat Students (EDS) is a pan-European centre-right student and youth political association, and the official student organisation of the European People's Party. Founded in Vienna by Scandinavian, German and Austrian students in 1961, [1] it represents over 600,000 students and young people in 34 member organisations from 30 countries in Europe and Asia. Its stated goal is to promote a free, democratic and united Europe through a greater student mobility and comprehensive education policies across the continent.

Contents

History

In 1958, a group of Swedish students, members of the Conservative Student League of Sweden, travelled to Vienna, Prague and West Berlin, where they attended the annual meeting of the Association of Christian Democratic Students. A cooperation between the Swedish and West German students was initiated, that was soon extended to include student organisations from the rest of Scandinavia and the United Kingdom.

In response to increasing activities of communist organisations, the liberal-conservative and christian democratic student organisations from these countries saw a need for stronger international cooperation among democratic student organisations in Europe. When the communist International Union of Students organised the "7th World Youth Festival" in Vienna in 1959, christian democratic and liberal-conservative students established the organisation Arbeitsgemeinschaft Neues Leben (Action Committee New Life), the first international organisation of centre-right students in Europe. The new organisation distributed pins with the text "Remember Hungary 1956!"

Carl Bildt proposed the current name of the organisation in 1975 Carl Bildt under nationaldagsfirande vid Skansen 2009.jpg
Carl Bildt proposed the current name of the organisation in 1975

The Arbeitsgemeinschaft Neues Leben quickly evolved into the International Student Conferences, that took place in Copenhagen and Stockholm for the first time in 1960. At the third conference, in Vienna in 1961, the International of Christian-Democrat and Conservative Students, the predecessor of the European Democrat Students, was founded. The organisation considered itself to be the "first avantgarde fighter for the protection of the principles of liberty and individualism," and supported European integration and programmes for student mobility. The founding member organisations were the Freie Österreichische Studentenschaft (Austria), the Conservative Students (Denmark), the Association of Christian Democratic Students (West Germany), the Students' League of the Conservative Party (Norway), and the Confederation of Swedish Conservative and Liberal Students (FMSF). A few months later, the Federation of University Conservative and Unionist Associations (UK) and ESC (Belgium) joined.

The current name of the organisation, European Democrat Students, was adopted in 1975, after it was proposed by Carl Bildt.

Since 1997, EDS has been the official student organisation of the European People's Party (EPP). Full members status is held to the European Youth Forum (YFJ), the International Young Democrat Union (IYDU) and the Robert Schuman Institute. EDS is also recognised as a member association of the European Peoples Party (EPP), where EDS is one of the six EPP associations - in addition to recognition as an NGO at the Council of Europe.

Organising seminars, summer and winter universities, publications, campaigns and political resolutions, EDS connects like-minded students from all over the continent and shapes European student policies as well as the debates within the EPP. In 2011, the celebrations of the 50th anniversary have been conducted in Brussels and Vienna, attracting several hundreds of members, alumni, politicians and partners.

An important shift towards a more wide vision of the world was introduced during the working year 2017-2018 with the first Study Mission organized in Latin America under the title of "Caja Política". A second edition was held in 2019 in Guayaquil and Quito (Ecuador) and it successfully gathered [2] young leaders from a dozen Latin American countries with representatives of the EDS Bureau and Member Organizations. After these events EDS became a pioneer in the center right becoming the first European organization regularly active in Latin America, Europe and Middle East.

Following internal disputes over the operations of the association and the lack of reforms, three of the founding members - Danish Conservative Students, German Association of Christian Democratic Students and Sweden based Confederation of Swedish Conservative and Liberal Students, as well as the Finnish Student Union of National Coalition Party Tuhatkunta and Belgium based Christen Democratische Studenten left the organisation since 2022. Later in 2023, due to different political views, Hungary based Fidelitas left the organisation. Meanwhile, French based Le Jeunes Républicains joined the organisation.

Current Executive Bureau (23/24)

Source: [3]

Chairman:Beppe Galea (Malta)

Sec gen:Vladimir Kljajić (Serbia)

Vice-chairs:

Chairmen

Members

EDS has four categories of membership: Full members, observers, and additionally affiliate and associate members.

The full members are (founding members in bold)

The Affiliate Members are:

The Observer Members are:

The Associated Member is:

Policies

In a 2009 resolution, the organisation expressed its support for the Prague Declaration on European Conscience and Communism, calling for the condemnation of communism, and adopted the declaration's content as part of its general policy. "Communism as a totalitarian regime [...] can only distinct itself from Fascism and Nazism by a more recent expiry date and the consequent damage over time it was able to cause," the resolution said. [6]

BullsEye magazine

Official logo of the BullsEye magazine adopted in the 77th edition. BullsEye logo.png
Official logo of the BullsEye magazine adopted in the 77th edition.

From 1977 to 1997 EDS had an official magazine under the name of Taurus. In the year 1997 the magazine was reshuffled and a new name was adopted. Since then it became The BullsEye magazine and every Council Meeting counted with an issue of the magazine, with an editorial team that enlarged year after year reaching in 2019 the largest number of applicants. The magazine currently covers the European political present, the EU Agenda 2019-2024 and key topics of the future of Education.

In the year 2019 it reached its 77th issue, published during the EPP Congress in Zagreb. [8]

Literature

Related Research Articles

The European Democratic Group, more commonly known as European Democrats, was a conservative political group that operated in the European Parliament between 1979 and 1992. At its height in July 1979, it had 63 MEPs.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Liberals (Sweden)</span> Political party in Sweden

The Liberals, previously known as the Liberal People's Party until 22 November 2015, is a conservative-liberal political party in Sweden. The Liberals ideologically have shown a broad variety of liberal tendencies. Currently they are seen as following classical liberalism and economic liberalism, and have been described as being centre-right. The party is a member of the Liberal International and Renew Europe.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Christian democracy</span> Christian socioeconomic model

Christian democracy is a religious democracy inspired by Christian social teaching to respond to the challenges of contemporary society and politics.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">International Young Democrat Union</span> Global association of centre-right political youth groups

The International Young Democracy Union (IYDU) is a global alliance of centre-right political youth organisations and the youth wing of the International Democrat Union.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Christian-Democratic People's Party (Moldova)</span> Political party in Moldova

The Christian-Democratic People's Party is a Christian-democratic political party in Moldova. The party was led by Iurie Roșca from 1994 until 2011. Until 2005, the PPCD and the (Moldovan) National Liberal Party were the main political organizations in the country supporting the unification of Moldova and Romania. After the PPCD began supporting the anti-unification Communist President Vladimir Voronin, the party has lost its unionist credentials while other parties such as the Liberal Party have taken over the pro-Romanian ideological space. The party has had very poor results in all subsequent elections. Since April 2005, the PPCD has lost several deputies, mayors, councillors and members to the liberal-democratic parties. The PPCD was an informal coalition partner of the Party of Communists of the Republic of Moldova from 2005–2009.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pro-Europeanism</span> Favouring European integration

Pro-Europeanism, sometimes called European Unionism, is a political position that favours European integration and membership of the European Union (EU).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">European People's Party</span> European political party

The European People's Party (EPP) is a European political party with Christian democratic, liberal-conservative, and conservative member parties. A transnational organisation, it is composed of other political parties. Founded by primarily Christian-democratic parties in 1976, it has since broadened its membership to include liberal-conservative parties and parties with other centre-right political perspectives. On 31 May 2022, the party elected as its President Manfred Weber, who was also EPP's Spitzenkandidat in 2019.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hungarian Democratic Forum</span> Political party in Hungary (1987–2011)

The Hungarian Democratic Forum was a centre-right political party in Hungary. It had a Hungarian nationalist, national-conservative, Christian-democratic ideology. The party was represented continuously in the National Assembly from the restoration of democracy in 1990 until 2010. It was dissolved on 8 April 2011.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">European Democratic Party</span> European political party

The European Democratic Party, also known as the European Democrats, is a centrist European political party in favour of European integration.

This article gives information on liberalism worldwide. It is an overview of parties that adhere to some form of liberalism and is therefore a list of liberal parties around the world.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Young European Socialists</span> European social democratic youth association

Young European Socialists (YES), formerly the European Community Organisation of Socialist Youth (ECOSY), is an association of social democratic youth organisations in Europe and the European Union.

The Confederation of Swedish Conservative and Liberal Students is a Swedish student organisation. It considers itself to be non-partisan, but is politically close to the Moderate Party. The organisation is a founding member of the European Democrat Students.

The European Democrat Union (EDU) is one of the three European wings of the International Democrat Union, along with the European People's Party (EPP) and the European Conservatives and Reformists Party. Its members include Christian democratic, liberal conservative, and conservative political parties. It is only a nominal sub-entity of the IDU, since it ceased its activities in 2002.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Youth of the European People's Party</span> Political party in the European Union

Youth of the European People's Party (YEPP) is an umbrella organization of European political youth organisations and is the official youth wing of the European People's Party. YEPP brings together 64 centre-right youth political organisations from 40 countries all over Europe. Founded in 1997 by the 2006–2014 Prime Minister of Sweden Fredrik Reinfeldt, YEPP has developed into the largest political youth organisation in Europe.

The Democrat Youth Community of Europe (DEMYC) is the international umbrella organisation of the youth wings of christian democratic, conservative and like-minded parties of Europe. With currently now more than one million affiliates in its member organisations, DEMYC is one of the strongest political youth organisations in Europe.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Liberal Democratic Party of Moldova</span> Political party in Moldova

The Liberal Democratic Party of Moldova is a conservative political party in Moldova. The party is led by Tudor Deliu. Until 2016, PLDM was led by Vlad Filat, who was Prime Minister of Moldova from 2009 to 2013, in two cabinets. Immediately after the 2014 parliamentary elections, with 21 seats in the Moldovan Parliament, PLDM was the largest of the three democratic pro-European parliamentary parties.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Forumi Rinor i Partisë Demokratike</span>

The Youth Forum of the Democratic Party of Albania is the youth wing of the Democratic Party of Albania. Founded in 1991 following the collapse of the communist regime, FRPD in recent times has grown to become one of the largest youth political organisations in the western balkans, with major contributions and influence within the Democratic Party. FRPD is one of the founders of the Youth of European People's Party (YEPP) in 1997, and in 2020, following years of negotiations, managed to become full members of European Democrat Students.

References

  1. Bauer, Bence (2012). Students on the Right Way. European Democrat Students 1961-2011. Bruxelles: Wilfred Martens Center. pp. 25–32. ISBN   978-9090266671.
  2. "Caja Política inició ciclo de conferencias Rearmando la democracia". El Universo (in Spanish). 2019-06-05. Retrieved 2019-10-29.
  3. "Current Board". www.eds.net.
  4. Heath, Ryan (2017-08-01). "POLITICO Brussels Playbook: New VW scandal — RIP Scaramucci — France labor reform progress". POLITICO. Retrieved 2019-10-29.
  5. "Carlo Angrisano: "El 'procés' interesa muy poco en Europa"". Crónica Global (in Spanish). Retrieved 2019-10-29.
  6. "Motion on Prague declaration on European conscience and communism. Adopted at the CM in Paris, 25/04/2009". European Democrat Students. 25 April 2009. Archived from the original on 2012-04-26. Retrieved 2011-05-14.
  7. "Homepage". BullsEye. Retrieved 2019-10-29.
  8. "EDS European Democrat Students". Issuu. Retrieved 2019-10-29.