What changed between the draft committee report and the plenary report

Changed:E.F. whereas dealing with the past requires utmost impartiality, objectivityimpartiality and dispassionobjectivity both in historical scholarship and the political realm;

Changed:G.H. whereas while there are ‘historical facts’ grounded in professional historical work, including research, teaching and the preservation of sources and historical sites, there is no single monolithic, indisputable and everlasting ‘historical truth’ that one specific group or nation can monopolise and exclusively claim for itself;itself, or use to negate the existence of other peoples, nations or states;

Removed:H. whereas fostering a critical historical consciousness across borders by educational and other means is central for Europeans to be able to come to terms with their past, confidently deal with the present and work towards a common future;

Added:I. whereas interdisciplinary approaches and contextualisation are essential elements for history education, which needs to be associated with European citizenship education as well as exchange and mobility programmes;

Removed:I. whereas European historical consciousness is understood as an individual as well as collective ability and skill to understand, (self-)critically assess and learn from history, which facilitates the recognition of the inextricable connection and interdependency between past, present and future;

Added:J. whereas fostering a critical historical consciousness across borders by educational and other means is central for Europeans to be able to understand and come to terms with their past, confidently deal with the present and work towards a common future;

Changed:4. Stresses the need for an honest assessment of the EU’s ‘politics of the past’, through which it has striven to add legitimacy to the European project andproject, strengthen a European sense of belonging,belonging and foster the peaceful coexistence of the continent’s peoples, by equally acknowledging achievements and existing shortcomings;shortcomings, and by scrutinising the ways in which citizens have been encouraged to engage with the past;

Changed:5. Acknowledges the array of past and present initiatives at European level to foster a common European historical memory, including the Holocaust Remembrance Day, the European Day of Remembrance for Victims of all Totalitarian and Authoritarian Regimes, the establishment of a dedicated remembrance strand in the former Europe for Citizens and current Citizenship, Equality, Rights and Values (CERV) programmes, and various Parliament resolutions such as thethose oneof 2 April 2009 on European conscience and totalitarianism and of 19 September 2019 on the importance of European remembrance for the future of Europe;

Removed:6. Expresses its concern that there continues to be a latent competition and partial incompatibility between different memory frames and remembrance cultures in the Union, especially between Western and Eastern Europe;

Added:6. Expresses its concern that there continues to be a latent competition and partial incompatibility between different memory frames and remembrance cultures in Europe, including between Western and Eastern Europe, but also between countries and nations within certain parts of the continent; stresses that all European countries have concurring and diverging experiences alike that belong to a shared European history; acknowledges the crimes committed by Nazi, fascist and communist totalitarian regimes as well as under colonialism, and the role these crimes have played in shaping historical perceptions in Europe; emphasises the need to bridge existing regional and ideological divides in historical awareness among European countries and peoples with a view to building a common ground for dialogue as well as mutual understanding and respect;

Changed:7. Recognises that the Union’s concern mainly with narrating a story about itself ex negativo, with the horrors of the past and especially National Socialism and Stalinism servingserve as a ‘negative foundation myth’,myth’ providesand provide a strong sense of purpose for the European peace project, yet acknowledges that the Union’s concern mainly with narrating a story about itself ex negativo bears the risk of nurturing a teleological and simplistic black-and-white scheme of history which potentially hampers a fully informed understanding of Europe’s intricate past and reduces incentives to challenge stereotypes and sacred cows of national histories;

Changed:8. Recognises the need for a broader and more holistic understanding of European history for a (self-)criticalcritical and self-reflective European historical consciousness to emerge, in particular by widening the focus of current European remembrance initiatives;initiatives, taking into due account also groups that have been underrepresented so far, and by promoting innovative ways of teaching history;

Changed:9. Stresses the importance toof movemoving away from a European ‘remembrance culture’ that is predominantly top-down and concerned with defining what Europeans should remember towards a bottom-up and citizens-driven ‘culture of remembering’ based on common European principles and values, concentrating on developing capacities for a critical reworking of the past at local, regional, national and European levels;levels, involving civil-society organisations;

Changed:10. Acknowledges the crucial importance of approaching Europe’s past on the foundationbasis of the European core values suchenshrined asin humanism,Article tolerance,2 democracyof the Treaty on European Union and the ruleethical ofand law,philosophical traditions that underpin these values, and of creating an open sphere of discussion that also makes it possible to address difficult elements of national histories and that provides for mutual understanding and reconciliation both within and between European nations;nations, as well as between European nations and the rest of the world;

Removed:11. Calls on the Member States to revise current curricula and teaching methodologies with a view to shifting focus from national towards European and global history and in order to allow for more emphasis on a supranational historical remembrance, in particular by allowing for multiple interpretations of the same historical period and event and by fostering corresponding teaching styles that favour reflection and discussion over knowledge transfer and that are guided by the overall objective of making students learn ‘how to think’ rather than ‘what to think’;

Added:11. Considers the freedom to teach, study and conduct research, including free access to archives and sources, alongside free artistic expression, to be a prerequisite for the generation and dissemination of unbiased and evidence-based knowledge in democratic societies, and for a critical dealing with history in particular; calls on the Commission and the Member States to safeguard those freedoms that are currently at risk, especially due to cases of misappropriation of memory laws, including by means of the EU’s rule of law mechanism;

Removed:12. Calls on the Member States to provide tailor-made (history) teacher training that enables teachers to grasp transnational aspects of history, imparts adequate didactics and principles of modern teaching and is primarily concerned with forming self-reflective young people;

Added:12. Stresses the vital role of education and calls on the Member States to update current curricula and teaching methodologies with a view to shifting focus from national towards European and global history and in order to allow for more emphasis on a supranational historical understanding, in particular by allowing for multiple perspectives on history and by fostering corresponding teaching styles that favour reflection and discussion over knowledge transfer and that are guided by the overall objective of making students learn ‘how to think’ rather than ‘what to think’;

Changed:16.26. Expresses its hope that on the basis of critical self-reflection relating to history and historical responsibility at national level, a truly European reflective discourse on the continent’s past may emerge, with history not being abused for power-political purposes;purposes, and expresses its hope that a ‘community of destiny’ among European peoples will emerge from common historical work;

Changed:17.27. Envisions national collective memories eventually contributing to and merging into a European public sphere, with nationaldiverging remembrance cultures complementing each other rather than being in competition, and dealings with history becoming an issue of civic rather than political action;

Removed:The intrinsic value of ‘historical consciousness’ emerges from the underlying assumption that the knowledge of history is not only a value in itself, but informs our understanding of the present and additionally guides us in our attempts to shape the future.

Added:This report is largely based upon the findings of two studies requested by the European Parliament’s Committee on Culture and Education titled “European Historical Memory: Policies, Challenges and Perspectives” and “European Identity”, and puts the concept of ‘historical consciousness’ into its focus.

Removed:Indeed, historical consciousness helps us interpret the past, but it also assists us in our understanding of who we are, where we are positioned in time, and how we act as participants in continuing the story that will eventually make a historical record. In other words, historical consciousness does not only assist in developing a sensitivity towards and an understanding of the past, but also increases a self-awareness of ourselves, as Europeans in relation to history.

Added:The fundamental value of ‘historical consciousness’ emerges from the underlying assumption that the knowledge of history is not only a value in itself, but informs our understanding of the present and additionally guides us in our attempts to shape the future.

Changed:• The first part (Dealing with Europe’s (dark) past as a risk and an opportunity) acknowledges the importance of dealing with history in a responsible and critical way as a sine qua non, as an intrinsic need to learn from our past.

Changed:1. Dealing with Europe’s (dark) past as a risk and an opportunity

Changed:HistoricallyIn speaking,historical perspectives, we should not consider Europe as a homogeneous civilizationcivilisation and geopolitical space. This kind of perception of the past,space, as Norbert Elias observed even in 1939, builds on the tradition of orientalism, colonialism and anti-communism.1939. What must be the ultimate aim of European memory policies is not to develop an imagined sense of a shared past, but to have a clear direction for the future of the EU and to strengthen a common sense of European belonging.

Changed:Giorgio Agamben rightly asserts that if the idea of Europe has any meaning, it consists of the fact that the Europeans – unlike Asians and Americans – “can gain access to their truth only by means of confrontation with the past, only by settling accounts with their history”.

Removed:As the President of the European Council Herman Van Rompuy stated in 2013: “In Europe, we sometimes overlook the weight of recent history; how people in some parts of the world look at us.” Two studies requested by the European Parliament’s Committee on Culture and Education titled “European Historical Memory: Policies, Challenges and Perspectives” and “European Identity”, the findings of which this report is based upon, clearly demonstrate that – while the past is often referred to in official EU discourses – ‘difficult pasts’ are not sufficiently addressed at European level.

Added:Undoubtedly, the EU has made conscious efforts to deal with Europe’s difficult past(s); it is involved in undertaking memory work and dedicates substantial resources to that aim.

Removed:It is a fact that, on some occasions, the European Union tends to put aside the memories of the cruelty of European colonialism and imperialism for the sake of economic cooperation and interests. It is of utmost importance that we avoid this kind of selective approach to the past and also dare to confront the many unpleasant elements of our histories.

Added:While the past is often referenced in official EU discourses, these ‘difficult pasts’ have as yet not been addressed, however, at European level in a sufficiently broad and reflective manner.

Changed:WeThe mustpath avoidtowards an informed historical consciousness in Europe starts with avoiding building European collective memory solely on aone single negative foundation myth, since this hinders the critical examination of the past.

Changed:Memory work at EU level must not be used as a form of soft power to express political positions or defend political interests. ThinkingRather, thinking about and working with history is a form of orientation in relation to the present and the future. Hence, the main purpose of historystudying teachinghistory should be the formation of historical consciousness as both a collective and individual capacity.