European Identity - Individual, Group and Society - HumanitarianNet

3.Europe, from the Institutional Referent the PersonalReferent: Being European, Feeling European,Living EuropeanAnna Maria DonnarummaInternational Cooperation NGO: PRO.DO.C.S.Domani Project: Culture and Solidarity, ItalyThe institutional referentThe institutional framework of being EuropeanThe Commission for Institutional Affairs EU, based on the positiveexperience of the Convention that drafted the Chater of FundamentalRights of the Union in 2000, has indicated a similar body, a EuropeanConvention, as the most suitable organism to provide possible responsesfor the key issues facing the future of the Union and to collaborate in thedrawing up of a European Constitution.Currently, the EU has proposed two objectives: to conclude theprocess of enlargement and to redefine the institutional configurationitself through the Convention.The European Council, on the occasion of the reunion celebrated14-15 December, 2001, adopted the Declaration of Laeken, in which ittakes into consideration said objectives and establishes the foundationsof the Convention itself, which commenced activity at its inauguralmeeting on 28 February 2002.The Convention is to approve a constitutional Treaty of sorts tospecify a Federation of Nation-States (a definition suggested by JacquesDelors), whose preamble might possibly be comprised of the Charter ofFundamental Rights of the Union.Several countries (13 to be exact) that are existing candidates foraccession to the Union could participate in the European Parliamentaryelections scheduled for the year 2004: from that moment on otherStates would join the Union.