Federalism in the European Parliament: From Ventotene to the Spinelli Group

Following the conclusion of the Conference on the Future of Europe in May 2022, it remains to be seen whether the European Union will embark on substantial Treaty reform in the future. Federalists are pushing for such reform, however, and they have organised themselves for this purpose in the European Parliament ever since Altiero Spinelli created the 'Crocodile Club' in 1980. His key role in defining and advocating a constitution for a federal Europe – from his co-authored 1941 Ventotene Manifesto, through to his engagement in the Union of European Federalists and his crucial role in the drafting of the 1984 Draft Treaty on European Union – explains the choice of name of the present-day Spinelli Group. This briefing traces the organisation and networking of European federalists and their impact on European integration from outside and inside the Common Assembly of the European Coal and Steel Community and the European Parliament (as it called itself from 1962 onwards) of today's European Union. It demonstrates how federalists and their constitutional ideas embedded in draft constitutions, which were never ratified, nevertheless strongly impacted Treaty reform and the EU's constitutionalisation in the long run.