European right-wing on a mission to silence NGOs

The European conservatives in the EPP group have been waging a campaign against NGOs for years, and not in vain. In May 2024 the Commission issued new guidelines for EU funding, intended to block or cancel funding to NGOs involved in activities that may “damage the reputation of the EU”. At the heart of this is an attempt to prevent NGOs from doing advocacy work and lobbying – to silence or tame organisations with unwelcome views on eg. climate or environmental policies. Now – based on the recent activities and statements from the EPP and their far-right allies in the European Parliament – it’s clear that they are stepping up the campaign dramatically, including a European law on NGOs with a crazy ring to it.

As the right – now backed by the growth of the flanks of the far right – takes aim at the heart of European civil society, the immediate and predictable outcome – if they have it their way – is to make a dire imbalance even more grotesque. In Brussels, the lobbying scene is almost totally dominated by corporate lobby groups that easily dwarf and outspend NGOs. Rolling back the latter’s space even further would have severe consequences for the quality of lawmaking. 

So, what are their main arguments, and how are they backed up by evidence? Actually, in so many ways, their messaging is actively misleading. The air is thick with spin and fake news when they argue their case, so to understand them properly, a no-nonsense guide is needed. 

No to advocacy funding

It is not that you cannot find what appears to be clear language from teh MEPs at the forefront of the campaign. Ahead of a debate on the matter in the European Parliament on Wednesday 22 January 2025, Monika Hohlmeier (MEP, Germany) said: “The contracts of the European Commission with lobbying guidelines infringe the principle of mutual respect among Institutions and impinge on essential principles such as legislative independence, transparency, avoidance of conflicts of interest, fair and impartial distribution of funds and accountability for the proper use of taxpayers' money. We urge the Commission to put an end to this type of contract, to draw the consequences to avoid such scandalous one-sided methods in the future and to ensure that misused money is repaid." 

Here, the objective is clear enough – to defund NGOs.* And the wording leads us to believe what is at play in Brussels is a genuine scandal. Crucial democratic principles are violated, and murky forces are making destructive deals behind the scenes. With such a fanfare, it is worth digging into the main arguments behind the conservative campaign, be it from the politicians in Brussels or in the rightwing tabloid press. What we find, then, is a series of myths and baseless demagoguery. 

At this point, a no-nonsense guide to Conservative spin falls in 6 points:

Spin no. 1: There is a violation of “the principle of separation of powers” at play

This statement is grounded in the feeling among some MEPs that it is unjust and outright wrong to see NGOs that receive EU-funding, object to some of their views. 

It does sound impressive when the MEPs begin talking about a break with old and important yardsticks for democracy, the socalled separation of powers. Separation of legislative, executive, and judicial functions of any state is an important principle. But what is Hohlmeier actually doing when she claims as quoted above there has been a violation of this principal? 

She is referring to the fact that some environmental groups both receive support from the European Commission, and then go on to attack some of the EPPs policies. In the conservative conspiracy theory universe, that is about the Commission calling out its dogs to protect its own interests. They think NGOs are somehow instrumentalised by parts of the Commission to attack them. As evidence they point to ‘contracts’ between certain NGOs and the Commission, which state they are supposed to send a number of open letters to MEPs, and the like. 

That is not how NGOs work, and it is not how exchanges with the Commission about possible EU funding works. If a grant description includes specific action points, they come from the NGOs, not from the Commission. NGOs are supposed to be as clear as possible about what kind of activities they intend to spend the money on. 

Still, this misleading framing caught fire in the media, in connection with the debate in the European Parliament, beginning with the Dutch De Telegraaf, on to Italian Ansa, and to the Czech Forum24, all of whom suggested former Commissioner Timmermans was somehow involved in the ‘plot’. 

But there is no plot and no 'NGO scandal' except maybe in the heads of MEPs from the EPP and the far right. Timmermans for one, rejects any knowledge of or involvement in decisions on that kind of grantmaking. It would be highly surprising if any Commissioner gets involved at that level. It is not a political procedure when grants are awarded to NGOs. There are guidelines and bureaucratic procedures – not political meddling and plotting – all based on decisions made by Parliament and the Council. There is even an external evaluation to assess whether everything is in order. 

Spin no. 2: The environmental arm of the Commission is using NGOs to fight other parts of the Commission 

On the same note, another colourful theory is that one part of the Commission, DG Environment to be exact, is using its supposedly rabid lapdogs to attack the plans of other parts of the Commission, not least DG GROW – the Directorate General that deals mainly with industry and its interests. 

Besides playing a part in the overall argument of conservative MEPs, this conspiracy theory has made it into parts of the press as well, including the German Table Media. 

It may very well be that NGOs are often at odds with DG GROW. But the Directorate General on Environment is not in a position to steer NGOs priorities. If NGOs go after DG GROW it is for obvious reasons: that is where EU priorities on competitiveness clash with environmental and climate policies, as when rules on companies’ reporting are diluted to ease the regulatory burden, or when regulation of chemicals is put on the back burner to help the chemical industry. If NGOs were to avoid conflicts with DG GROW it would be grotesque. They would not be living up to expectations and responsibilities. 

Spin no. 3: The EU is spending no less than €5.4 billion on NGOs under its LIFE programme

When French conservative MEP Céline Imart took the stage in the debate on Wednesday 22 February in the European Parliament, she was furious: “While the United States set out to conquer Mars, the European Union funds NGOs for lobbying with 5.5 billion euros to attack our companies, that are already overburdened, asphyxiated by costs etc.” 

The truth is, NGOs have access to only a tiny fraction of the programme, a few hundred thousand euros per organization in operating grants, a . Valuable to their work, for sure, but not the fortune it is made out to be. A total of €15 million is spent under the LIFE programme for NGOs – covering all sorts of activities. 

Yet her claim is being repeated by some media: “The EU Commission puts NGOs in their place: EU funds amounting to 5.4 billion euros may no longer be spent on lobbying,” a headline in Weltwoche, a Swiss conservative newspaper read. And in a more subtle manner, the same message is implied in articles in German Bayerisches Landwirtschaftliches Wochenblatt and in Politico.

Spin no. 4: A rotten apple legitimizes random attacks on NGOs 

Actually, several conservative MEPs have given some words of praise to NGOs. That goes too for the main instigator of the long standing EPP campaign, Markus Pieper, who said during a debate on the issue in parliament on 17 January 2024: “Thank you to all the clubs and organizations that work voluntarily for the functioning of our society, our freedom, our democracy, from firefighters to town twinning to animal breeders or nature conservation. You are the glue that holds society together.” 

That was the intro to a speech in parliament about the Qatargate scandal in which an NGO, Fight Impunity, was involved. It left the impression that Pieper and his party are mainly concerned a rotten apple. But then Pieper went on to suggest NGO managers might be “enriching themselves”, casting suspicion on NGOs as such. And further on in the debate he would explicitly mention the support given to NGOs under the LIFE programme as if they somehow represented the same kind of problem as the NGO in the scandal.

How does he get from one to the other? 

Fight Impunity was a front group with a hidden agenda which was involved in the biggest bribery scandal in the history of the European Parliament. An NGO by name, Fight Impunity was set up to undermine democratic decision-making, and it shares no common traits with the NGOs currently under fire from MEPs. And as it happens, Fight Impunity operated without EU financial support. 

It’s hard not to argue that using this case to attack many real and serious NGOs is pure and cynical opportunism. Moreover, looking at the lobbying done by repressive regimes over the past decade – the phenomenon to which Qatargate was intimately linked – we found that out of 128 organisations, the vast majority were consultancies and thinktanks, and only one involved a so-called NGO (and again, that case was a front group which had nothing to do with EU funding). 

Still, to Pieper, it is no big deal to jump straight from Qatargate to an attack on EU-support for environmental NGOs. Very convenient. If he has words of praise to NGOs it is certainly not to those with opinions. That phenomenon appears to be both alien and eerie to Pieper.

Spin no. 5: NGOs are opaque. They need to be subjected to rules on transparency and accountability

We should also see the conservative call for more transparency around NGOs in a similar light. In Pieper’s universe, it is “needed to prevent future bribery scandals”. 

To be clear, transparency is not only a good thing. It is highly necessary. 

In Brussels, scores of NGOs have worked hard to improve transparency in the EU institutions. Without them, the lobby register – the so-called Transparency Register – would still be a sad joke. Generally, there have been small, but significant advances on ethics thanks to NGOs, often confronted with staunch opposition from the European Peoples Party. Also, when it comes to obtaining funding from the EU, the organisations attacked so eagerly by Pieper, Hohlmeier and other conservative heavyweights, are actually subjected to rather strict reporting requirements.

So, whenever the conservatives go on the attack over the lack of transparency from NGOs they allow themselves to be very general and abstract, and avoid any attempt to establish an identifiable link between ethical transgressions and the NGOs they so deeply want to defund.

It adds insult to injury that many EPP politicians have a pretty poor transparency record themselves. That includes Monika Hohlmeier who in the last term (2019-2014) registered only 15 meetings, according to Integrity Watch.  

There are very real problems with lobbying transparency, for sure. Such as with corporate funded think tanks that set up office in Brussels without disclosing their funding sources. Most of these problems are easily solved by strengthening the existing Transparency Register, and CEO has made concrete suggestions to that effect. What we often find when such ideas are floated in the European Parliament is that they are quickly met with staunch opposition if not hostility from the EPP. 

Spin no. 6: NGOs work against EU objectives, values and interests

That kind of statement gives us a discrete image of the authoritarian undertone in the conservative campaign. Over the years, Markus Pieper has probably been the MEP that indulged the most in such rhetoric. In a draft report from March 2017 in the European Parliament, that was retracted later, he tried to have parliament demand a stop to funding of organisations “whose objectives are contrary to the fundamental values of the European Union, democracy, human rights and/or strategic commercial and security-policy objectives of the European Union Institutions”.

This line of arguing has not vanished. It was echoed often in the recent debate in the European Parliament. NGOs – ie those members of civil society not on the same page as the EPP – are considered enemies of European interests as defined by the EPP itself. This adds an authoritarian streak to their discourse. While to the EPP,  who dominate the Brussels lobbying scene – corporate lobby groups – are fully legitimate and seem to represent all of our values and interests, those who take issue with their agenda on social rights, the environment, climate change, and consumer rights, are painted as unwelcome intruders. 

Lobbyists chip in

Everybody in the Brussels Bubble knows how cutting funding to NGOs will affect the EU’s lobbying scene. Compared to the massive resources corporate lobby groups command, their privileged access to decision-makers in the Commission, Council and Parliament, the advocacy work done by eg environmental groups is done with timid resources in comparison. But since they are in so many ways groups that stand up for public interests, they have their moments and their successes. 

That is why one of the two associations for ‘lobbyists for hire’, the Society for European Affairs Professionals (SEAP), issued a statement in December in support of the Commission’s new approach: “Prohibiting the use of these funds for advocacy or lobbying is crucial for maintaining the integrity of EU policymaking and fostering trust among stakeholders.”

For SEAP it is simple: the fewer NGOs that interfere in their lobbying on behalf of big business, the better. And, so it seems, that goes for the EPP too. 

Not just about funding

This rightwing campaign’s challenge to NGOs should not be underestimated. The EPP scored a major goal already in May 2024 when the Commission issued its new guidelines to those who receive funding. They introduced a powerful tool to tame or obliterate loud criticism of EU laws or lawmaking. And today, the EPP is in a good position to take the next steps in that after the European elections in 2024, they can count a majority with the far right. 

It has already been made clear by the main conservative MEP on the case, Monika Hohlmeier, that they are going for an end to any kind of support for EU-advocacy work by NGOs that means getting involved in real political battles, not just work by environmental NGOs, but quite generally. And so far they have the Commission on their side. This will be an issue when the institutions begin negotiating the budget for the next multiannual budget for the time after 2027.

But there is more to it than funding. Among the EPP priorities is the idea to have a European ‘NGO regulation’, a law to govern NGOs. While few specifics are provided in their work programme, this entails laws on the governance and funding of NGOs. It is unclear where that will take us, but the campaign the EPP clearly goes well beyond cutting funding. In a draft report by Monika Hohlmeier, prepared for consideration by the European Parliament’s Budgetary Control Committee, the depth of the ambitions are clearly laid out. She wants the Committee to state that parliament must be protected from “undue influence” from “NGOs and networks with a clearly activist agenda trying to directly influence the decision-making process in parliament by sending prewritten amendments and papers for committee decisions and trilogues are harming the work of the House”. To finish, Hohlmeier even suggests Parliament should “sanction NGOs that unduly try to manipulate decisions”.

A touch of Órban

In Hohlmeier’s world, clearly there is something deeply illegitimate about NGO’s advocacy work as such. To her, presenting MEPs with other options than those presented by the Commission or by corporate lobby groups is an abomination, obstruction of the work done by “the House”. As for draft amendments, it is worth pointing out, that the praxis of drafting amendments has been standard for corporate lobby groups for ages, and there is hardly any significant EU law concerning anything slightly economic or financial that is not littered with finger prints and wording crafted by professional corporate lobbyists. During the so-called “Cash for amendments scandal” in 2011, it came out that for MEPs in the EPP, including Markus Ferber from Hohlmeier’s own German party, it was quite natural to be in close contact with financial companies at home when considering new European financial regulation. 

This all invokes echoes of Viktor Órban’s clampdown on NGOs in Hungary, as well as of Donald Trump’s imminent attack on US organisations. While Viktor Órban’s party left the EPP in 2021, it may very well be that Órbanism didn’t. Also, it is worth noting that while this hostile manoeuvre unfolds in Europe, Trump too is moving in on progressive organisations. That parallel development makes it even more eerie. 

In sum, progressive NGOs face a big challenge in the coming years. Defending the rights of NGOs will be a key battle that we cannot afford to lose, for the sake of democracy and for securing social and environmental standards. 

One small step is to sign a petition set up by the Young European Greens to protest measures to silence NGOs. As they put it: “The hypocrisy is outrageous! These same Members of the European Parliament receive thousands from corporations that don’t want to be countered by NGOs fighting for people and the planet.”

We couldn’t agree more. 

 

* NB - Corporate Europe Observatory takes no EU funding and so is not financially affected by this move to defund NGOs.