The Rainbow Group in the European Parliament was a regionalist

political group A political group is a group consisting of political parties or legislators of aligned ideologies. A technical group is similar to a political group, but with members of differing ideologies. International terms Equivalent terms are used diffe ...

in the

European Parliament The European Parliament (EP) is one of the legislative bodies of the European Union and one of its seven institutions. Together with the Council of the European Union (known as the Council and informally as the Council of Ministers), it adop ...

from 1989 to 1994.

History

1989 File:1989 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The Cypress structure collapses as a result of the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake, killing motorists below; The proposal document for the World Wide Web is submitted; The Exxon Valdez oil tanker ru ...

the previous Rainbow Group split. For the third term of the European Parliament, the green parties formed The Green Group, whilst the regionalist parties stayed in the remaining Rainbow Group. This second Rainbow Group was the highpoint of the

European Free Alliance The European Free Alliance (EFA) is a European political party that consists of various regionalist, separatist and ethnic minority political parties in Europe. Member parties advocate either for full political independence and sovereignty, ...

(EFA) to that date. But the

1994 elections The following elections occurred in the year 1994. Africa * 1994 Botswana general election * 1994 Guinea-Bissau general election * 1994 Malawian general election * 1994 Mozambican general election * 1994 Namibian general election * 1994 South Afr ...

saw a considerable reduction in Regionalist representation in the Parliament, with only the

Canarian Coalition The Canarian Coalition ( es, Coalición Canaria, CC) is a regionalist, Canarian nationalist political party in Spain operating in the Canary Islands. The party's aim is for greater autonomy for the islands but not independence. It has been labele ...

Lega Nord Lega Nord (; acronym: LN), whose complete name is (), is a right-wing, federalist, populist and conservative political party in Italy. In the run-up of the 2018 general election, the party was rebranded as (), without changing its official ...

Scottish National Party The Scottish National Party (SNP; sco, Scots National Pairty, gd, Pàrtaidh Nàiseanta na h-Alba ) is a Scottish nationalist and social democratic political party in Scotland. The SNP supports and campaigns for Scottish independence from ...

and People's Union keeping their MEPs. But Lega Nord had been suspended from the EFA following its decision to join the Italian coalition government alongside the right-wing National Alliance. The weakened EFA was no longer able to maintain their own group, and instead allied with members of the French '' Energie Radicale'' to form the Group of the

European Radical Alliance The Group of the European Radical Alliance (ERA) was a heterogeneous political group with seats in the European Parliament between 1994 and 1999. It was formed by regionalist parties from the former Rainbow Group, although its largest and dom ...

Sources

*"Regionalist Parties in Western Europe", , de Winter & Türsan 1998
Development of Political Groups in the European Parliament
ref name="t1s3
Development of Political Groups in the European Parliament
/ref>
Europe Politique
ref name="t1s11

/ref>
/ref>
Democracy in the European Parliament
ref name="t1s1
Democracy in the European Parliament
/ref>
European Parliament MEP Archives
ref name="t1s58
European Parliament profile of Jaak Vandemeulebroucke
/ref>

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Rainbow Group (1989-1994) Former European Parliament party groups Regionalism (politics)