Political groups of the European Parliament

Although most of the political groups in the European Parliament correlate to a corresponding political party, there are cases where members from two political parties come together in a shared political group. For example, the European Free Alliance (half a dozen MEPs in the ninth Parliament) and the European Green Party (over 50 MEPs in the ninth Parliament) have, since 1999, felt they are stronger by working together in the European Greens–European Free Alliance group than they would have as stand-alone groups (especially for the EFA, which would not otherwise have enough members to constitute a group). The same is true of the Renew Europe group, most of whose members are from the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe Party, but also includes a dozen from the small European Democratic Party. Both have also had independents and MEPs from minor parties also join their group. For a group to be formally recognised in Parliament, it must fulfil the conditions laid down in the relevant European Parliament Rule of Procedure. This lays down the minimum criteria a group must meet to qualify as a group. The numerical criteria are 23 MEPs (at 3.3 percent, a lower threshold than in most national parliaments), but they must come from at least one-quarter of Member States (so currently at least seven). They must also share a political affinity and submit a political declaration, setting out the purpose of the group, the values that it stands for and the main political objectives which its members intend to pursue together. While 23 MEPs from one-quarter of Member States would also be sufficient to register a European political party, forming a European party is not a requirement to form a group, as long as the criteria of political affinity is met. The requirement of political affinity was put to the test in July 1999, when a varied group of non-attached members, ranging from the liberal Bonino List in Italy to the French National Front, tried to create a new technical group, but Parliament decided that the new group did not, by its own admission, meet the requirement for political affinity. This decision was challenged at the CJEU, which found in Parliament's favour. Further questions were asked when MEPs attempted to create a far-right group called Identity, Tradition, Sovereignty (ITS). This generated controversy and there were concerns about public funds going towards a far-right group. Attempts to block the formation of ITS were unsuccessful, but ITS were blocked from leading positions on committees, when members from other groups declined to vote for their candidates, despite a previous tradition of sharing such posts among members from all groups. These events spurred MEPs, mainly from the largest two groups, to approve a rise in the threshold for groups to its current levels, having previously been even lower. This was opposed by many MEPs, notably from smaller Groups but also from the Liberal Group, arguing that it would be detrimental to democracy, whilst supporters argued that the change made it harder for a small number of members, possibly on the extremes (including the far right), to claim public funds. ==Internal structure==

Groups are often based around a single European political party (e.g. the European People's Party or the Party of European Socialists), joined by other national parties and independent MEPs. Other groups include more than one European party, such as the Greens–European Free Alliance group. While there is no group not centred on at least one European party, the presence of a European party is not a requirement. Each group appoints a leader, referred to as a "president", "coordinator", or "chair". The chairs of each group meet in the Conference of Presidents to decide what issues would be dealt with at the plenary session of the European Parliament. Groups can table motions for resolutions and table amendments to reports. ==Spectrum==

Composition of the 10th European Parliament Positions ==Analyses==

National media focus on the MEPs and national parties of their own member state, neglecting the group's activities and poorly understanding their structure or even existence. Transnational media coverage of the groups per se is limited to those organs such as the Parliament itself, or those news media (e.g. EUObserver or theParliament.com) that specialise in the Parliament. These organs cover the groups in detail but with little overarching analysis. So although such organs make it easy to find out how a group acted on a specific vote, they provide little information on the voting patterns of a specific group. As a result, the only bodies providing analysis of the voting patterns and Weltanschauung of the groups are academics. Academics analysing the European political groups include Simon Hix (London School of Economics and Political Science), Amie Kreppel University of Florida, Abdul Noury (Free University of Brussels), Gérard Roland, (University of California, Berkeley), Gail McElroy (Trinity College Dublin, Department of Political Science), Kenneth Benoit (Trinity College Dublin – Institute for International Integration Studies, IIIS), Friedrich Heinemann, Philipp Mohl, and Steffen Osterloh (University of Mannheim – Centre for European Economic Research). Groups cohesion for sources). Cohesion is the term used to define whether a group is united or divided amongst itself. Figure 1 of a 2002 paper from European Integration online Papers (EIoP) by Thorsten Faas analysed the groups as they stood in 2002. The results for each group are given in the adjacent diagram with the horizontal scale scaled so that 0% = totally split, 100% = totally united. G/EFA, PES, and ELDR were the most united groups, with EDD the most disunited. Proportion of female MEPs for sources). The March 2006 edition of Social Europe: the Journal of the European Left included a chapter called "Women and Social Democratic Politics" by Wendy Stokes. That chapter gave the proportion of female MEPs in each Group in the European Parliament. The results for each Group are given in the adjacent diagram. The horizontal scale denotes gender balance (0% = totally male, 100% = totally female, but no Group has a female majority, so the scale stops at 50%). G/EFA, PES, and ALDE were the most balanced groups in terms of gender, with IND/DEM being the most unbalanced. Party relations The European Parliament does not form a government in the traditional sense and its politics have developed over consensual rather than adversarial lines as a form of consociationalism. Historically, the two largest parliamentary formations have been the EPP Group and the PES Group, which are affiliated to their respective European political parties, the European People's Party (EPP) and the Party of European Socialists (PES). These two groups have dominated the Parliament for much of its life, continuously holding between 50 and 70 percent of the seats together. The PES were the largest single party grouping up to 1999, when they were overtaken by the centre-right EPP. In 1987, the Single European Act came into force and under the new cooperation procedure the European Parliament needed to obtain large majorities to make the most impact. So the EPP and PES came to an agreement to cooperate in the Parliament. This agreement became known as the grand coalition. Aside from a break in the fifth Parliament, Group cooperation Table 3 of 21 August 2008 version of working paper by Hix and Noury gave figures for the level of cooperation between each group (how many times they vote with a group, and how many times they vote against) for the Fifth and Sixth Parliaments, where 0% = never votes with, 100% = always votes with. EUL/NGL and G/EFA voted closely together, as did PES and ALDE, and EPP-ED and UEN. Surprisingly, given that PES and EPP-ED are partners in the grand coalition, they were not each other's closest allies, although they voted with each other about two-thirds of the time. IND/DEM did not have close allies within the political groups, preferring instead to cooperate most closely with the Non-Inscrits. Breaking coalitions During the fifth term the ELDR Group were involved in a break in the grand coalition when they entered into an alliance with the European People's Party, to the exclusion of the Party of European Socialists. This was reflected in the Presidency of the Parliament with the terms being shared between the EPP and the ELDR, rather than the EPP and PES as before. ELDR intervention was not the only cause for a break in the grand coalition. There have been specific occasions where real left-right party politics have emerged, notably the resignation of the Santer Commission. When the initial allegations against the Commission Budget emerged, they were directed primarily against the PES Édith Cresson and Manuel Marín. PES supported the commission and saw the issue as an attempt by the EPP to discredit their party ahead of the 1999 elections. EPP disagreed. Whilst the Parliament was considering rejecting the community budget, President Jacques Santer argued that a "No" vote would be tantamount to a vote of no confidence. PES leader Pauline Green MEP attempted a vote of confidence and the EPP put forward countermotions. During this period the two Groups adopted a government-opposition dynamic, with PES supporting the executive and EPP renouncing its previous coalition support and voting it down. In 2004, there was another notable break in the grand coalition. It occurred over the nomination of Rocco Buttiglione as European Commissioner for Justice, Freedom and Security. The EPP supported the appointment of Buttiglione, while the PES, who were also critics of the President-designate Jose Manuel Barroso, led the parties seeking Buttiglione's removal following his rejection (the first in EU history) by a Parliamentary committee. Barroso initially stood by his team and offered only small concessions, which were rejected by the PES. The EPP demanded that if Buttiglione were to go, then a PES commissioner must also be sacrificed for balance. In the end, Italy withdrew Buttiglione and put forward Franco Frattini instead. Frattini won the support of the PES and the Barroso Commission was finally approved, albeit behind schedule. Politicisation such as the above has been increasing, with Simon Hix of the London School of Economics noting in 2007: The dynamical coalitions in the European Parliament show year-to-year changes. Group switching Party group switching in the European Parliament is the phenomenon where parliamentarians individually or collectively switch from one party group to the other. The phenomenon of EP party group switching is a well-known contributor to the volatility of the EP party system and highlights the fluidity that characterizes the composition of European political groups. On average, 9% of MEPs switch during legislative terms. Party group switching is a phenomenon that gained force especially in the legislatures during the 1990s, up to a maximum of 18% for the 1989–1994 term, with strong prevalence among representatives from France and Italy, though by no means limited to those two countries. There is a clear tendency of party group switches from the ideological extremes, both left and right, toward the center. Most switching takes place at the outset of legislative terms, with another peak around the half-term moment, when responsibilities rotate within the EP hierarchy. ==History==

The political groups of the European Parliament have been around in one form or another since September 1952 and the first meeting of the Parliament's predecessor, the Common Assembly. The groups are coalitions of MEPs and the European parties and national parties that those MEPs belong to. The groups have coalesced into representations of the dominant schools of European political thought and are the primary actors in Parliament. The first three groups were established in the earliest days of the Parliament. They were the Socialist Group (which eventually became the S&D Group), the Christian Democrat Group (later EPP Group), and the Liberals and Allies Group (later Renew Europe). As the Parliament developed, other groups emerged. Gaullists from France founded the European Democratic Union group. Two of the groups (EPP-ED and IND/DEM) were split. EPP-ED are split on Euroscepticism: the EPP subgroup ( ) were centre-right Europhiles, whereas the ED subgroup ( ) were right-wing Eurosceptics. IND/DEM was also split along its subgroups: the reformist subgroup ( , bottom-center) voted as centrist Eurosceptics, and the secessionist subgroup ( , middle-right) voted as right-wing Euroneutrals. The reformist subgroup was able to pursue a reformist agenda via the Parliament. The secessionist subgroup was unable to pursue a secessionist agenda there (it is out of the Parliament's purview) and pursued a right-wing agenda instead. This resulted in the secessionist subgroup being less Eurosceptic in terms of roll-call votes than other, non-eurosceptic parties. UKIP (the major component of the secessionist subgroup) was criticised for this seeming abandonment of its Eurosceptic core principles. Table 2 of a 2005 discussion paper from the Institute for International Integration Studies by Gail McElroy and Kenneth Benoit analysed the group positions between April and June 2004, at the end of the Fifth Parliament and immediately before the 2004 elections. The results are given below, with 0% = extremely against, 100% = extremely for (except for the left-right spectrum, where 0% = extremely left-wing, 100% = extremely right-wing). Seventh European Parliament Eighth European Parliament Major changes compared to the period 2004–2009 were: • The formation of a new political group, the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR). This conservative, Eurosceptic group was headed by 26 MEPs from the UK's Conservative Party. • The Eurosceptic Independence/Democracy (IND/DEM) and Union for Europe of the Nations (UEN) groups suffered heavy losses in the election. On their own, they no longer had enough MEPs to form a separate group. MEPs formerly from these groups formed the Europe of Freedom and Democracy (EFD) group on 1 July 2009. • The centre-right European People's Party now formed its own political group in its entirety, as the former members of the European Democrats left the group to join the ECR. • The political group of the Party of European Socialists renamed itself to the Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats or Socialists and Democrats (S&D) to accommodate the Democratic Party of Italy. The Democratic Party did not become member of the Party of European Socialists until February 2014. Ninth European Parliament History according to group Some of the groups (such as the PES and S&D Group) have become homogeneous units coterminous with their European political party, some (such as IND/DEM) have not. They are still coalitions, not parties in their own right, and do not issue manifestos of their own. It may therefore be difficult to discern how the groups intend to vote without first inspecting the party platforms of their constituent parties, and then with limited certainty. Christian democrats and conservatives In European politics, the centre-right is usually occupied by Christian democrats and conservatives. These two ideological strands have had a tangled relationship in the Parliament. The first Christian Democrat Group was founded in 1953, Liberals and centrists In European politics, liberalism tends to be associated with ideas inspired by classical and economic liberalism, which advocates limited government intervention in society. The Liberal Group contains diverse parties, including conservative-liberal, social-liberal and Nordic agrarian parties. It has previously been home to parties such as the minor French Gaullist party Union for the New Republic and the Social Democratic Party of Portugal, which were not explicitly liberal parties, but who were not aligned with either the Socialist or the Christian Democratic Groups. The Liberal Group was founded on 23 June 1953, Between 1994 and 1999, there was a separate European Radical Alliance, which consisted of MEPs of the French Energie Radicale, the Italian Bonino List, and regionalists aligned with the European Free Alliance. Right-wing nationalists In European politics, a grouping of nationalists has thus far found it difficult to cohere in a continuous group. The first nationalist group was founded by the French National Front and the Italian Social Movement in 1984, A new radical right group was formed during the 8th parliament on 16 June 2015 under the name Europe of Nations and Freedom. Eurosceptics The school of political thought that states that the competences of the European Union should be reduced or prevented from expanding further, is represented in the European Parliament by the Eurosceptics. The first Eurosceptic group in the European Parliament was founded on 19 July 1994. The CDI lasted until 1984. ==See also==