Politeia partners facilitate the European Citizens Consultations

3 April 2007

Three Politeia member organisations were in February and March quite busy with the organisation of their national consultations of the European Citizens Consultations.

The Centre for Liberal Strategies in Bulgaria, the Partners for Democratic Change in Slovakia and the Dutch Centre for Political Participation are the national partners for the implementation of the unique and ambitious project “European Citizens Consultations”.

On a large agenda setting event in Brussel last year 200 ad random chosen citizens from throughout the EU decided the topics for the national consultations during two days of intensive discussion:

‘Energy and Environment’, ‘Family and Social Policy’, and ‘Immigration and the Role of the EU in the World’ turned out to be the most important issues.

In February and March national consultations were held in 27 EU-member states, where during a weekend groups of representative citizens tried to work out their national vision about the Europe they would like to live in in about 20 years. During these sessions, which were partly taking place at the same time, the participants of the national consultations even got the opportunity to get in touch with national consultations in other countries via Skype.

An impression of the Dutch national consultation will follow, and see the next article of the ‘News’ section for an impression of the Bulgarian discussion on the three European topics.

“Europe – that’s us” (The Netherlands)

In the hotel Tulip Inn at Amersfoort, a small town in the centre of the Netherlands, the Dutch national consultations were organised by the Dutch Centre for Political Participation (Instituut voor Publiek en Politiek) in the weekend of 10 and 11 March 2007.

Instead of enjoying the (for Dutch circumstances) marvellous weather 32 citizens were animatedly discussing their visions on the future of Europe: how should alternative energy be used, how can social security be guaranteed for families and how should immigration be managed by the EU in the future?

The two-days’ programme was heavy: workshops in groups took turns with plenary sessions. The plenary meeting was confronted with the groups’ results and the participants was offered the opportunity to vote on all outcomes.

During these two days the usually very quite venue in the middle of the woods near the city had the atmosphere of a bee hive: in plenary session, in the groups and even during the coffee-breaks citizens (that did not know each other before this weekend!) were discussing their views on the future of Europe vivedly.

At the end of the two-days’ marathon on Sunday afternoon the participants were able to hand over their national vision about the future of Europe to members of the Dutch parliament and Dutch Europarliamentarians, that had come to Amsersfoort especially for this occasion.

The Dutch vision will be synthesized with 26 other national visions at an event in Brussels in May and the final report of the 27 consultations will create an input for the EU-summit in June of this year. Participants hope that their voice will be heart (the motto of the citizens’ consultations!) and that politicians in Brussels and beyond will take their vision seriously. Some of the citizens are still quite critical concerning the impact of their efforts of this weekend. But in the sense of citizens’ participation this weekend has been a success: 97% of all participants said at the end of the two days to be much more interested in Europe than before. Therefore, they did not hesitate when they were asked to volunteer for a final video shot in the garden of the Tulip Inn and to shout enthusiastically: “Europe that’s me, that’s you, that’s us.”

For more information see: http://www.european-citizens-consultations.eu (English) and http://wwwlaatjestemhoren.eu (Dutch)

Tatjana Meijvogel-Volk, IPP (Dutch Centre for Political Participation)