What is Spaceu?

Spaceu is an online tool for the European Parliamentary (EP) Elections, specifically tailored for mobile EU citizens voting either in their country of citizenship or residence, in a moment where the European transnational voting space has become ever more important. In a nutshell, it is an interactive database informing users on their electoral rights and allowing them to compare the conditions and requirements for participating in the political process of their country of residence or citizenship. Spaceu is part of a larger project called ‘European Elections Mobilization and Participation Hub 2024’ (EUROHUB24). Its central ambition is to develop and make available for the general public the most important information provider, across Europe, for the 2024 European Parliament (EP) Elections. Besides Spaceu, the project will develop two additional web portals. The first one, EU&I, is a prospective Voting Advice Application (VAA) based on party manifestos, aimed at helping citizens make an informed choice in the 2024 European Parliament (EP) elections. Available in over 20 languages, the online tool invites users to react to 30 policy statements covering a wide range of contemporary policy issues and political values in European politics. The second online tool, EuroMPmatch, is a retrospective Voting Advice Application based on the past voting behaviour of Members of the European Parliament.

What is the goal of Spaceu?

The main objective of Spaceu is to create a more aware European-wide, politically active citizenry, therefore making EP elections more relevant and transnational. This also may help getting citizens out to vote, given that EP elections are traditionally prone to particularly low levels of turnout. The main target group are EU mobile citizens as well as those with a dual citizenship, but also European citizens at large as this tool is open to all and gives useful information on how to vote to static citizens as well.

How was it possible to implement Spaceu?

The project was supported in part through a grant from the Open Society Foundations, and is based at the Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies' European Governance and Politics Programme (EGPP). The project implementation was led by Lorenzo Cicchi, EGPP's coordinator, together with comms specialists Mattina Popova and Angeliki Xafi. The electoral law experts were recruited from the country teams working for one of the sister project EU&I.