The Green Party - The Greens ( ro, Partidul Verde (Verzii)), often shortened to The Greens ( ro, Verzii) is a Romanian

political party A political party is an organization that coordinates candidates to compete in a particular country's elections. It is common for the members of a party to hold similar ideas about politics, and parties may promote specific ideological or p ...

that ideologically follows

green politics Green politics, or ecopolitics, is a political ideology that aims to foster an ecologically sustainable society often, but not always, rooted in environmentalism, nonviolence, social justice and grassroots democracy. Wall 2010. p. 12-13. It be ...

and

progressivism Progressivism holds that it is possible to improve human societies through political action. As a political movement, progressivism seeks to advance the human condition through social reform based on purported advancements in science, tech ...

. The Green Party is the only political party in

Romania Romania ( ; ro, România ) is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern, and Southeast Europe, Southeastern Europe. It borders Bulgaria to the south, Ukraine to the north, Hungary to the west, S ...

that is a member of the European Green Party (EGP). Thus, it is a full rights member of the European Green Party (EGP), represented by the

Greens–European Free Alliance The Greens/European Free Alliance (Greens/EFA) is a political group of the European Parliament composed primarily of green and regionalist political parties. Formed following the 1999 European elections for the 5th European Parliament, th ...

in the

European Parliament The European Parliament (EP) is one of the Legislature, legislative bodies of the European Union and one of its seven Institutions of the European Union, institutions. Together with the Council of the European Union (known as the Council and in ...

. The Green Party in Romania has one vote in EGP Council, the leading European Greens' Leadership Group, which meets twice a year. At local and central political level in Romania however, it is still a

microparty Microparty, micro-party, or micro party is a term, sometimes pejorative, for a small political party that doesn't attract enough votes to be elected to a legislature in its own right. The term is most commonly used in Australia where the combinatio ...

just like the conservative Romanian Ecologist Party (PER).

History

The Green Party was founded in November 2005 by Gheorghe Ionicescu, after the merger of FER and AP was revoked. Ecologist Federation of Romania (FER) was previously founded in 1990 and is the predecessor of the Green Party. He participated in the presidential election in 2009, supporting the candidacy of Remus Cernea. Also in 2009, Ionicescu died, and Silviu Popa was appointed as a chairperson of the Green Party to replace Ionicescu. Popa was validated at the party congress on 26 September 2009 and resigned in early 2012. At the local elections held in 2012, the Green Party gained 2 mayors (Iclănzel - Mureş and Azuga - Prahova) and 124 local councilors, with 0.87% of the votes at national level. In the 2012, at the parliamentary elections, the Green Party had two MPs (Ovidiu Iane and Remus Cernea) on the USL lists. On 13 May 2013, in the context of the public debate on the exploration and exploitation of shale gas, the Green Party is drifted apart the SLU's position and remains consistent with environmental principles, according to the press release: ''"We oppose to the shale gas, mining operations at Rosia Montana (Roşia Montană), we are extremely concerned that within the SLU there are more and more opinions and intentions to go ahead, to move towards such projects on shale gas and cyanide. Under these conditions, we cannot continue the collaboration with SLU because we would support such a political direction."'' "The Green Party begins a new political path on September 3, 2022. A new team! A new center-left political program! A new approach! At the Dalles Hall in Bucharest, starting at 12.00, the Extraordinary Congress of the Green Party (Greens) will take place. A new statute, a new political program and a new leadership team will be submitted for debate and adoption. They will apply for the positions of co-presidents: Marius Lazăr – political scientist, and

Lavinia Cosma Lavinia-Corina Cosma (born 30 October 1981) is the co-president of the Green Party (Greens), former Romanian deputy, elected in 2016. Politics In 2020, she ran for the Târgu Mureș mayor, which she lost, obtaining 505 votes. The former Mur ...

- counselor for vocational guidance, ex-

USR USR may refer to: * USRobotics, a technology firm * USR (Guadeloupe football club), in Sainte-Rose, Guadeloupe * U.S. Robots and Mechanical Men, a fictional robot manufacturer * /usr, directory in Unix systems, see Filesystem Hierarchy Standard ...

parliamentarian, and for that of executive president -

Adrian Dohotaru Adrian-Octavian Dohotaru (born 20 April 1983, Micești, Tureni, Cluj, Romania) is a Romanian politician, executive president of Green Party, author and civic environmental activist, deputy of the Cluj constituency between 2016 and 2020. Act ...

environmental activist The environmental movement (sometimes referred to as the ecology movement), also including conservation and green politics, is a diverse philosophical, social, and political movement for addressing environmental issues. Environmentalists ad ...

-ex- USR parliamentarian."

Ideology

The Green Party is a party that has a center-left to

left-wing Left-wing politics describes the range of political ideologies that support and seek to achieve social equality and egalitarianism, often in opposition to social hierarchy. Left-wing politics typically involve a concern for those in soci ...

ideology, being among the few

political organizations in

. Before the 2022 Congress, the party was moderate, from the center to the center-left.

Social

The Greens Party is supportive for environmental causes, such as reforestation and reductions in carbon emissions. It supports an extension in individual rights as well as greater

separation of church and state The separation of church and state is a philosophical and jurisprudential concept for defining political distance in the relationship between religious organizations and the state. Conceptually, the term refers to the creation of a secular s ...

, including a gradual removal of all state funding for religious institutions. Like the vast majority of Romanian political parties, it is supportive of

European integration European integration is the process of industrial, economic, political, legal, social, and cultural integration of states wholly or partially in Europe or nearby. European integration has primarily come about through the European Union and its ...

. It is the Romanian party that is most supportive of

LGBT rights Rights affecting lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender ( LGBT) people vary greatly by country or jurisdiction—encompassing everything from the legal recognition of same-sex marriage to the death penalty for homosexuality. Notably, ...

, supporting same-sex marriage and civil partnerships, as well as measures to reduce homophobia in schools and society at large. It supported a boycott of the 2018 Romanian constitutional referendum which attempted to ban

same-sex marriage Same-sex marriage, also known as gay marriage, is the marriage of two people of the same sex or gender. marriage between same-sex couples is legally performed and recognized in 33 countries, with the most recent being Mexico, constituting ...

Environment and Green Economy

The Greens consider that the budgetary and private financial flows invested in industries with high

carbon dioxide emissions Greenhouse gas emissions from human activities strengthen the greenhouse effect, contributing to climate change. Most is carbon dioxide from burning fossil fuels: coal, oil, and natural gas. The largest emitters include coal in China an ...

are today greater than the budgetary and private financial flows intended for adaptation to climate change and the successful green transition. We are basically financing our own demise! The first step towards the success of the green transition means reversing this trend! Today, after 33 years of market economy, in Romania we tax labor more than capital, which inhibits performance, effort, creates major social inequities, affects the social balance. We cannot place the deficit and all the black holes solely on the shoulders of the hard workers. The state can no longer subsidize the failures of big capital endlessly, while keeping social spending or investments for the green transition far below the European average. The logic in which when the profits of big capital increase, the Market is God, and when they are absent, the State is God must be completely eliminated. The success of the green transition means money serving life, not life serving money! They support the participation and representation of young people in democratic and decision-making processes at all levels, including by organizing debating groups in schools, high schools and universities. He believes that children should be involved in the evaluation and formulation of policies through dialogue with experienced people. They also support the

right to vote Suffrage, political franchise, or simply franchise, is the right to vote in public, political elections and referendums (although the term is sometimes used for any right to vote). In some languages, and occasionally in English, the right to v ...

from the age of 16 for all types of elections.

Youth politics

Advocates for all new legislative acts and public policy projects to be approved only after assessing the impact on young people up to 30 years old. They support the introduction of a mechanism for monitoring legislation from a youth perspective, including both an impact assessment and a mechanism for consultation with youth representatives when legislation has an impact on young people. The decrease in the number of NEETS in Romania (young people who neither work, nor study, nor participate in a professional training program) can also be done by developing a wider professional orientation process, starting from the age of 12. They want to enable young people to benefit from visits/short experiential internships to for-profit and non-profit organizations, in close cooperation between schools, local administrations and respective organizations/enterprises to allow young people to have a first contact with the professional environment . They also support the introduction of Universal Basic Income for students over a period of 3 years.

Work and workers

The Greens considered that in Romania and beyond, the "price of work" has unfortunately become the "cost of work". The work performed is not rewarded at its true value in Romania. We are still a country of cheap labor, with an explosive potential that risks blowing up all social balances. The Greens support increasing the minimum wage and linking it to the minimum consumption basket for a decent living. This is the only way decent living will no longer be a dead letter in the Constitution, and purchasing power will not collapse under the pressure of inflationary crises. They support the introduction of the minimum wage in the European Union as a mechanism of social justice, at the national and European level. They support the strengthening of social dialogue in Romania, the reform of the Labor Code from the perspective of the right to collective negotiations, respect for health and safety at work and the balance between work and private life. It pleads for a new social dialogue law to confirm and guarantee negotiations at the national level, to facilitate the formation of unions, the initiation of strikes, the negotiation of collective contracts at the sector level. They demand the reduction of the union representativeness threshold from 50%+1 to 30%. They demand transparent reports on health and safety at work and hours worked by employees, in all public and private companies. The success of the green transition means decent, safe, sustainable jobs, a new healthy work-life balance. They ask the Government and the Parliament to urgently ratify the ILO Convention no. 190, of the International Labor Organization for the elimination of violence and harassment in the world of work.

Youth organisation

Young Greens (

Romanian Romanian may refer to: *anything of, from, or related to the country and nation of Romania ** Romanians, an ethnic group **Romanian language, a Romance language ***Romanian dialects, variants of the Romanian language **Romanian cuisine, traditiona ...

: ''Tinerii Verzi'') is the

youth organisation The following is a list of youth organizations. A youth organization is a type of organization with a focus upon providing activities and socialization for minors. In this list, most organizations are international unless noted otherwise. ...

of the Green Party. Tinerii Verzi, are the only youth organization with a left-green orientation in Romania and also the first to emphasize social and environmental justice. The organization was founded in March 2022. On August 15, 2022, the first General Assembly of Young Greens took place. In the AG, the statute, the program were validated and the members of the National Bureau were elected.

Electoral history

Legislative elections

Notes: ⁴ FER (Green Party's predecessor) previously merged with AP. The merger was revoked after the elections. ⁵ Green Ecologist Party members: PER and the Green Party (PV). ⁶ At that time, for those legislative elections, the Green Party (PV) competed on the PSD ballot, within the Social Liberal Union (USL).

Presidential elections

European elections

Local elections

2020 local election results

References

External links

*
Partidul Verde
(official site) {{Green parties 2005 establishments in Romania Political parties established in 2005 European Green Party Centre-left parties in Europe Global Greens member parties Green political parties in Romania Progressive parties Registered political parties in Romania Pro-European political parties in Romania