Who gets Europe?

This programme is part of the festival Forum on European Culture, 17 – 20 September in Amsterdam.

Together, they explore whether a pan-European identity exists, and if so, what it consists of and whether we can preserve it.

In his international bestseller The Strange Death of Europe Douglas Murray argues that Europe faces an existential crisis of its own making. A rapidly transforming population and a guilt-ridden, defeatist attitude lead to Europe’s gradual, but certain downfall. Will the current crisis be the catalyst to push Europe over the edge? Swiss political activist Flavia Kleiner, challenges Douglas Murray in a discussion about what unites us Europeans and the possibility to survive what is most probably going to be the biggest crisis in the EU’s history.

This event will be livestreamed on our website

Speakers

Flavia Kleiner (Switzerland, 1990) is the founder of Operation Libero, which in 2016 managed to defeat a proposal by the right-wing populist party SVP to deport immigrants who had committed any criminal offence, regardless of severity. Since then, she has continued her work with Operation Libero, defeating a number of populist initiatives and formulating strategies for opposing populist arguments and methods in Switzerland and throughout Europe.

Douglas Murray (United Kingdom, 1979) is a British conservative author, journalist, and political commentator. He works as editor for The Spectator and wrote multiple books, such as Neoconservatism: Why We Need It, The Madness of Crowds: Gender, Race, and Identity and The Strange Death of Europe: Immigration, Identity, Islam. The latter argues that Europe civilisation is complicit in its own demise, allowing mass migration into its continent and lacking confidence in its “beliefs, traditions, and legitimacy.”