What happens after Europe's NGOs are dismantled?

Last week on EUobserver, Alberto Alemanno mapped how civic space in Europe is being suffocated – how NGOs die.

This piece asks the natural next question: what happens when they do?

What does Europe look like when independent civil society — the organisations that exist to protect the public interest — is silenced, sidelined or slowly starved out of existence?

The question may feel dramatic. Yet moments of democratic stress — like now — demand clarity, not complacency.

For decades, public-interest organisations have been essential partners in shaping, implementing and enforcing the protections Europeans rely on — clean air and water, safe food and workplaces, a healthy environment, climate ambition, and beyond. They monitor, inform, propose solutions and ensure EU laws deliver real-world benefits.

Their work is often technical and unseen (sometimes not), yet indispensable.

A Europe nobody wants to wake up to

Imagine waking up in a Europe where you can no longer trust the water from your tap, the air you breathe or the food on your plate. Where rules protecting your family from dangerous chemicals, unsafe workplaces or polluted rivers are weakened without scrutiny.

No watchdog. No one to hold governments and corporations accountable. No support for communities defending their rights, health and livelihoods.

This is not dystopian fiction. It is the logical end-point of a trend already visible in Brussels and in several capitals: a deliberate effort to delegitimise, defund and constrain those who bridge citizens and decision-makers.

Democracies erode when accountability fades, truth becomes negotiable and citizens lose their organised voice.

Europe’s cleaner air, safer products and recovering rivers did not happen by accident. Civil society forced action on dangerous chemicals, exposed pollution, stopped nature destruction and defended climate laws when governments tried to weaken them.

This required expertise, evidence, science, community engagement, legal challenge and, often, courage.

Democracy is not a once-every-four-years exercise. Civil society is how people’s concerns reach power between elections – turning participation into accountability and preventing democracy from becoming a spectator sport.

The dismantling has already begun

This erosion is not hypothetical. Health NGOs recently saw EU funding withheld, triggering layoffs and closures. Environmental organisations are targeted by disinformation alleging financial misconduct — accusations repeatedly disproven.

In the European Parliament, a conservative and far-right majority created a group to target environmental NGO funding instead of examining EU funding more broadly.

Civil society does not ask to operate without scrutiny — it has long championed transparency rules and helped establish them. It asks that scrutiny be fair, proportionate and applied to all who influence policy – not selectively weaponised against those whose job is to hold power accountable.

Across member states, we see 'foreign agent' narratives, administrative choke points, Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation (SLAPPs) and resource starvation. Patterns once associated with governments outside Europe’s democratic community are emerging within it.

Power does not disappear when scrutiny retreats – it concentrates

Two-thirds of documented high-level commission meetings are with corporate representatives, while only about 16 percent involve NGOs — a stark imbalance between those representing private and public interest.

When watchdogs weaken, vested interests do not simply gain influence – they write the rules meant to govern them.

A vocabulary of “simplification” and “reducing burdens” is spreading rapidly. Sensible efficiency and smart implementation are welcome, but dismantling protections under that banner is not. Standards that safeguard public health, families, workers and nature are being reframed as obstacles to growth rather than foundations of a fair and competitive Europe.

Once dismantled, safeguards are not easily rebuilt.

Europe faces overlapping pressures: geopolitical instability, a cost-of-living crisis, rising inequality, disinformation, accelerating biodiversity loss, worsening pollution and a climate already beyond 1.5°C. In such a moment, weakening independent oversight is not prudent — it is perilous.

Civil society is not an accessory to democratic life; it is an essential part of it. It strengthens evidence —based policymaking, transparency and accountability. It builds trust, participation and legitimacy. It turns Europe’s laws into lived realities.

Soon, the commission will publish the EU’s first Civil Society Strategy. It could be a turning point, recognising civic space as a strategic asset. It must guarantee meaningful participation, secure stable and independent funding and ensure that independent watchdogs can watchdog.

Europe did not become a global leader in environmental and social protection by silencing independent voices. It became one by embracing them. To weaken civil society is to weaken the Union’s ability to deliver for its citizens, maintain global credibility and navigate the decisive decade ahead.

Civil society is Europe’s early-warning system, evidence engine, accountability safeguard and bridge between institutions and people.

The ecosystem still breathes. But it needs defending. And it is needed now.

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