Rave, rave into the dying of the light?

LinkedIn blog post, 25/11/2025, by Sven Franck (en français , in Deutsch)

TL;DR – I just read Jürgen Habermas sour assessment that "further political integration, at least at the core of the European Union, has never been as vital to our survival as it is today. And never so unlikely" and while I agree that we may be witnessing the beginning of the end of the European Union, I'm siding with Dylan Thomas "to not go gentle into that good night".

Destroying Europe one omnibus at a time

The last weeks have been revealing: "Omnibus" is all the "rage" currently - not because sustainable transport, but because it's a de-bureaucratisation smokescreen for pushing de-regulation. The first would make Europe more competitive, the second risks wiping out Europe's unique selling propositions and with it our economies. Who is dictating the agenda: the US and everyone keen on weakening the EU.

Their newest willing servants: the EPP and Ursula von der Leyen. No longer committed to the democratic groups in Parliament who trusted her with a second term, the conservatives prefer breaking the cordon sanitaire and dismantled the Green Deal together with anti-democratic and anti-european forces. What's next? The digital omnibus with de-bureaucratisation, as in "removing cookie banners" as smokescreen for de-regulation and doing away with our data privacy. Your chats, your movements, your DNA, to be sold and mined by Palantir AI. What could possibly go wrong? And more importantly: When do we finally say to enough is enough?

Rage against the machine

I'm heading back from the Volt Europa General Assembly in Frankfurt. It was a great weekend, but as the title suggested, most of our purple bubble, me included, spent a few days raving: about Europe and on dance floors. What I was missing is the "raging". Yes, Volt advocates for a united and federal Europe, a European army and reforms. But so do Mario Draghi, Enrico Letta and many others from the sidelines where you can cheer and boo, but that's about it.

Because the Commission could care less. It's even trying to preempt the European Parliament - mind you the only democratically elected body of the European Institutions - of its limited capacity to influence legislation. Everyone agrees "what" the European project needs (subtle hint: a jumpstart). The question is "how" we get there?

So "how" you ask? Not challenging the Commission and its nationalist agenda could prove to be a nail in the European Union's coffin. There needs to be real opposition to what the Commission is doing. On European level. Not just in Parliament. Not just from the sidelines. Electors need to understand they still (!) have a choice and that this Commission is destroying any chance of European relevance and prosperity in this changing world. They should be raging. And we should not go gentle into that night. Let's get to work.