Sweden is the home of the Pirate Party but examples have since
sprung up all over Europe. It is these which Falvinge hopes to
unite in time for elections to the European Parliament in June
2009.
"We are investigating the possibility of running as the first
major pan-European party with a common platform across all
countries," said Falvinge. "We are seeing this as the next logical
step that we should run on a common platform throughout Europe so
that if you look at the French Pirate Party or the Spanish Pirate
Party they should have the same programme as the Swedish Pirate
Party when we run for the common parliament."
Falvinge said that the German and Austrian parties were already
on board and that discussions were ongoing with others. There are
Pirate Parties in Spain, France, Poland, Italy and Belgium.
The movement began in Sweden on 1st January this year but was
given a major boost when an associated unauthorised download links
site, Pirate Bay, was raided by Swedish police. There was public
outcry which only worsened when it emerged that the US
administration had put pressure on Sweden to act against Pirate
Bay.
The movement mushroomed and its international expansion grew
from there. Falvinge, speaking to OUT-LAW's weekly podcast, said
that the party stands for far more than simply legalising file
sharing.
"That we are pro file-sharing is a consequence of us being
pro-civil liberties," said Falvinge. "We are pro-civil liberties
for the exact same reason that the entertainment industry is
against civil liberties, because they have a bottom line to
protect."
"The entertainment industry is what drives today's witch hunt on
civil liberties," he said. "DRM technologies is the large media
cartels' ways of writing their own laws to circumvent copyright
laws and we do have an elected parliament to write such laws."
Falvinge claims that despite the disappointing result his party
has had some policy victories in Sweden. "We have seriously
influenced the debate here in Sweden," he said. "All of the
established parties who won have shifted feet on their stance
towards the file sharing and copyright regime."
