Europe means freedom and solidarity

Fifty years ago, a new chapter in European history began. As we celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Treaties of Rome, we can look back on unprecedented achievements. And we must look forward to new challenges. Europe has been a force for good throughout the past 50 years. This anniversary is the moment to update our common project, which in the age of globalisation is more relevant than ever.

The case for Europe remains compelling. I could explain the rationale for common approaches on energy policy and climate protection. I could set out why we need the single market to match economic growth with social justice. Or I could defend the need to build a strong and efficient European Union, able to shape globalisation according to European values and interests.

But, on this occasion, I want above all to focus on the values that, more than anything else, define the EU and its history: Freedom and solidarity.

Throughout these 50 years, the EU has been an inspiration and a force for freedom and solidarity. Let me illustrate this with two defining moments in my life.

The first was the Portuguese Revolution of 1974. I was just 18 years old. Like most young people in Portugal, I wanted to get rid of the dictatorship that denied my compatriots what other Western Europeans already enjoyed. We could not read the books or write the articles we wanted. Political activity was controlled by the security forces. We lived in a backward and closed society. The revolution changed all that. And thanks to the solidarity of Western democracies, thanks to the perspective of becoming a member of the European family, freedom won the day, in my country, and at the same time in Spain and Greece, too.

The second experience was the change throughout central and eastern Europe in the 1980s and 1990s, building on the determination for freedom shown, say, in Budapest in 1956 and Prague in 1968, initiated in Poland and culminating in the fall of the Berlin Wall and the Iron Curtain in 1989. Here again, freedom was the goal, and Europe the inspiration. And here again, solidarity proved essential.

Through these experiences, I realised that Europe means freedom and solidarity. Not just for some, but for all Europeans. What started in the six founding member states in the 1950s has in the last 50 years spread to the north and the south, the west and the east of our continent.

I was proud to be the President of the European Commission when we completed the great enlargement of 2004-2007.

It has shown once again that the prospect of European integration encourages and consolidates freedom through solidarity. Today, in this great and open Europe, citizens are free to believe and say what they think, to live and travel where they want.

One of the EU's great achievements is the emergence of a truly European spirit which lives side by side with national, regional and local identities. European integration has not done away with this diversity; it has enhanced it. By building a common legal, political and economic order around the cornerstone of the Treaties of Rome, we can live our differences as a source of mutual enrichment.

For centuries, European states made war against each other. Now we live in peace. Not in the peace of a precarious balance of powers and threats. Today we enjoy peace in freedom and solidarity. This is indeed an experiment unique in history.

Our generations have the privilege of living out the dreams of our forefathers. But we must not take this for granted. It has to be nurtured very carefully.

It is the spirit of renewal, of freedom and solidarity that should guide the heads of state and of government of the member states, the President of the European Parliament and me as the President of the Commission when we meet on Sunday, 50 years to the day since the Treaties of Rome were signed.

The Berlin declaration will not be an act of nostalgia but an act of commitment. We will commit to preserve and to promote Europe as the best place in the world to live, as an open society and an open economy, as a common effort for economic and social cohesion.

To achieve a Europe of results, to ensure that our institutions are democratic, efficient and accountable, and to promote our values and to take our responsibilities in the world. We will commit to put Europe where it belongs: At the service of its citizens.