HALMA is a network of European literary institutions which helps to connect European cultural and literary scenes. HALMA provides a platform for the exchange of European writers, translators and literary promoters. Via projects of HALMA institutions, the granting of scholarships and the organization of public events in all participating countries, HALMA creates transnational structures for European literature.

HALMA makes possible cooperations which used to be hindered by the lack of supranational structures or the mere knowledge of potential partners. The network does not only offer information about partners, but is itself available as an initiator and partner for European initiatives and scholarships.

Within this network it is possible to coordinate projects as well as to travel from one European house to another as a scholarship holder, in order to work, to do research, to continue one’s education, or to realize projects. While it was sometimes difficult to beat a track between the different European literary scenes, it is now possible to use a network of already existing roads.

In name and idea the network follows the board game "Halma" (from Greek: jump), which requires a skillful change of location. The more players are involved, the more multifarious and far-reaching each move becomes. The objective is not to eject opposing pieces from the game, but to use these pieces to move from one’s own house to another. In this way Halma aims to make European ideas and regions accessable, and bring together people from different nations with their various historical, political, and biographical experiences.

"The HALMA initiative enables leading figures from  national literary scenes to work together at a range of venues in Europe, to discuss and revisit  their aesthetic and ethical positions regarding perceptions of foreigners as friends and equal  partners in the European project. Or to put it more succinctly: HALMA wants to nurture literature that is truly European", said Frank-Walter Steinmeier, the German foreign minister, in April 2007 in a presentation of the network during the German presidency of the European Council.

In November 2006, the Literary Colloquium Berlin (Germany) founded HALMA together with the Robert Bosch Foundation (Germany) and the Borderland Foundation of Sejny (Poland). Back then, the focus was on the countries of Central and Eastern Europe. Currently there are 26 HALMA institutions in Austria, Belarus,  Belgium, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Serbia, Slovenia, Switzerland, and Wales.