The negotiations on EU’s next long-term budget are continuing in full speed. In the Council, the Danes have now passed on the torch to the Cypriots that holds the presidency the first half of 2026 and will thus lead the negotiations among the member states. For the external dimension of the budget the aim is to reach a final version of the Council’s compromised position of ‘Global Europe’ at the end of the semester. The Danish presidency presented a first version of the Council position at the end of December.
What civil society think
Civil Society has not been less active. CONCORD Europe presented their analysis on Global Europe in December. In the paper CONCORD presents its positions and highlights the need for flexibility to be anchored in a framework that guarantees accountability, predictability, transparency and policy coherence. CONCORD emphasise the importance of the EU to act as a principled and trusted global partner – rooted in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, the Paris Agreement and the European Consensus on Development and that poverty reduction, human rights, gender equality and policy coherence are not aspirational but operational priorities. More concretely, the paper calls for the member states and the European parliament to:
- Protect the integrity of ODA and uphold its primary objective of poverty reduction and sustainable development goals.
- Balance flexibility with robust governance, transparency, and democratic oversight to ensure accountability for all spending decisions.
- Guarantee predictable, participatory, and multiannual funding for partner countries and civil society organisations, recognising them as equal partners.
- Reinstate spending targets for human development, gender equality, climate and biodiversity, CSOs and ensure support reaches the most vulnerable countries.
- Keep grants central, apply strong safeguards to financial instruments, and prevent the diversion of development funds toward trade or geopolitical agendas.
- Reject harmful political conditionality, particularly in migration cooperation, and uphold human rights and development effectiveness principles.
The MFF HUB, an informal network that gathers civil society in the EU, including the large Brussels based networks CONCORD, VOICE, CAN and EPLO, as well as think tanks and UN agencies for joint efforts to increase financing for development, humanitarian help and global climate action in the next MFF, has also presented its position paper Global Europe: A blueprint for long-term prosperity . In the paper the MFF HUB calls the member states and the parliament to:
Sustain ambition & deliver at scale
- Safeguard the €200.3 billion budget for the GEI as the bare minimum for a credible global player.
- Agree on new Own Resources.
- Ensure decommitments flow back to the budget line of origin.
Deliver impact through proven, effective investments
- Reinstate cross-cutting spending targets, dedicating at least 20% of the GEI budget to promoting human development, 50% for climate and environment spending and 85% to projects promoting gender equality.
- Introduce restrictions and safeguards on direct grants to the private sector, including a €5m cap and public disclosure.
- Preserve grant funding by capping the proportion of the GEI that can be used for guarantees.
- Reject aid conditionality.
Uphold transparency and oversight
- Reject provisions that allow the GEI’s ODA target to be adjusted during the course of the budget cycle.
- Set minimum levels of funding for strategic investments, including sub-Saharan Africa, Humanitarian Assistance and the global pillar.
- Define and ring-fence 70% of the geographic and global pillars for programmable activities.
What think tanks think
Not surprisingly the think tanks have too been doing some thinking around Global Europe.
ECDPM, the European Centre for Development Management, have produced substantial work on the MFF. For example, in this recently published commentary they explore how emerging horizontal budget choices are reshaping the context for the Global Europe instrument, and why connecting the dots between internal priorities and external action will be decisive as negotiations move into 2026.
The European Think Tanks Group (ETTG), a network of European independent think tanks working on EU international cooperation for global sustainable development, has presented this brief on Global Europe. The brief provides an overview of some of the key issues and concerns raised in the fourth annual ETTG Dialogue and identifies policy priorities for the negotiations ahead. Background: A few times a year ETTG organises Annual Dialogue on the EU and Global Development, that convenes closed-door dialogue among analysts and policymakers from different EU member states and institutions. At the fourth annual ETTG Dialogue in October the Global Europe was examined and discussed. The key messages in the brief are:
- Maintaining the ambition of the Global Europe Instrument (GEI) proposal will require a compelling narrative bridging the internal and external EU policy objectives.
- The GEI provides flexibility, which must be balanced with predictability and accountability.
- Development commitments must be safeguarded as new tools are introduced.
- Coherence across EU financing instruments is crucial for a credible external offer.