A grey Monday afternoon in Brussels – NGO employees are sitting in front of their screens. A day like any other? Not at all. On this special day in September 2024, several allies from civil society organisations came together to scrutinise if the would-be European Commissioners met at least the basic criteria to take office – all around Club Mate and Syrian delicacies.
The sun set one last time before European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen announced her designated team. The European Quarter emptied once again as the bureaucrats began their daily commute home. But one basement of a community office just came alive with the soft electric buzz of laptops, the fizz of energy drinks and a quiet but excited policy-related chatter of a not-so-shady group of people. Unknown to the system, it was about to be hacked, or more concretely, unknown to the Commissioner candidates, their backgrounds were about to be thoroughly checked…
This is what it felt like to be present at the 2024 Fossil Free Politics hackathon. The aim of the gathering was to search for conflicts of interest in the past and present of the new Commissioner candidates – guided by a meticulous methodology. This meant that the participants, who came with different backgrounds, languages and expertise, did targeted research in groups forming around 3 different topics.
The event had a theme too, it was 2000s hacker culture with an EU bubble twist. The Hackathon was such a good experience of collaborating on what can be an overwhelming topic at times. It showed the potential of all the energy, resources and experience when focused through a common way of working and spiked with some networking fun.
Thanks to all the participants for their enthusiasm, expertise and dedication to the research and for making this evening a hacking good time.