NYTimes: A Green Coalition Gathers Strength in Europe - by Steven Erlanger

Daniel Cohen Bendit

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A Green Coalition Gathers Strength in Europe - by Steven Erlanger

One of the real victors in this month’s elections for the European Parliament is a 64-year-old former radical, an ebullient Franco-German who has turned his efforts to transform society from revolution to ecology.Behind his articulate, vivid presence and sense of fun, Mr. Cohn-Bendit’s Europe Écologie coalition of European Green parties came in third in French voting for the Parliament, winning 16.28 percent of the vote. It was just behind the squabbling Socialists, who had only 16.48 percent, and ahead of a presumptive presidential candidate, François Bayrou of the centrist Democratic Movement, or Modem.

One reason for the coalition’s success, Mr. Cohn-Bendit said in an interview in his Brussels office, is that it concentrated on European issues and the idea of a better future, instead of turning the vote into a referendum on the French president, Nicolas Sarkozy. There was also an element of collaborative fun and joy, he said, evident in the coalition’s campaign videos, which were viewed thousands of times on the Internet. If Mr. Sarkozy campaigned on the idea of working more to earn more, Mr. Cohn-Bendit said, the Green coalition urged, “Work differently for a better life.”