Sign here to change Europe

Soon, a million signatures from nine member states will be all it takes to put an issue firmly on the EU's agenda.

What should Europe do? Give more development aid to Africa? Keep Turkey out indefinitely? Make the food industry put big labels on its products if they contain genetically modified ingredients?

Later this year, EU citizens will be able to give direct input in the discussions of the European Commission. The commission is currently finalising the European Citizens’ Initiative, an instrument that gives people in the EU the right to put their concerns on the commission's agenda, provided they collected one million signatures from at least nine countries. Currently, only the European parliament and the European Council of ministers can ask the commission to make new laws.

Bruno Kaufman, the Swedish president of the Initiative and Referendum Institute (IRI), believes this form of public participation will be a milestone. Europe will get a healthy dose of direct democracy, Kaufman said. The citizen's initiative will be "the first instrument for transnational direct democracy in the history of the world". In the past, Europeans were only asked yes or no questions in referendums, if they were consulted about EU plans at all. "Now citizens can attempt to prod Europe into action," Kaufman said.

A work-free Sunday?

Maros Sefcovic, the European Commissioner responsible for the initiative, also referred to it as a step towards further "democratisation" of Europe. "This is all about taking the EU outside of the Brussels beltway and giving it full democratic expression,’’ he said in a speech last February. "The EU often stands accused of complexity and detachment from its citizens. Fostering a lively cross-border debate about what we are doing in Brussels will lead to better rule-making, inspired by the grassroots."

The citizens initiative is part of the Lisbon Treaty, which changed the EU's governance structure. The 2007 treaty came into force last December, but the exact procedure governing the citizens' initiative has yet to be decided on. The European Commission has drafted a proposal and the first initiatives should be admissible no later than December.

Many organisation have already started campaigns. Some 20 pan-European petitions explicitly mention the upcoming citizens' initiative. Members of European parliament are collecting signatures for a work-free Sunday. Others want a ban on nuclear energy, more natural remedies in healthcare, or a partnership instead of full EU membership for Turkey. "That these people have already started, demonstrates the need for such a possibility," said Frank Burgdorfer, chairman of the Berlin-based Citizens of Europe. "This is a step towards a pan-European debate."

What happens next?

He pointed out the initiatives can touch on some surprising topics, referring to rumors about an initiative ito have the EU follow Switzerland in banning the construction of minarets. Another hot topic is an earlier petition by MEPs to limit their meetings to Brussels and end their sessions in Strasbourg. The commission already said this lies outside its area of competence and will therefore not be admissible.

"The practical interpretation of the European Citizens' Initiative is very important,'' said Carsten Berg. On behalf of Democracy International, an organisation for direct democracy in Europe, he is directly involved in the discussions with the European Commission. "This is an enormous step in the right direction," he said, but three major points of discussion remain. How many signatures per country are needed to validate the initiative? How are signatures verified? An issue complicated when signatures are collected through websites and social media. And what exactly happens when an initiative meets all the criteria and is proposed to the commission?

This last point is particularly important, said Berg. The European Commission does not want to commit itself, while several organisations behind the initiative feel there should be clear obligations for the commission.

Lobbies and minorities

"It will indeed be difficult to explain to citizens if the commission fails to take action after a successful initiative," said Janis Emmanouilidis, a researcher at the Brussels' think-tank European Policy Centre. He sees two main problems with the citizens' initiative. First, it can raise false expectations about issues that Brussels cannot or will not touch. And second, active minorities could paint a distorted picture of what Europeans want.

"One million signatures only represent 0.2 percent of the EU population," Emmanouilidis said. "The threshold for comparable petitions and referendums in individual countries is higher. Certain lobby groups and NGOs that are active in several countries can easily launch an initiative. This makes transparency essential. Europeans have to know exactly who is behind the initiatives."

Despite these concerns, most remain optimistic over the initiative. "The member states have already delegated a lot of power to Brussels, but the political discussions are stuck at national levels," said Michael Esler of the German Mehr Demokratie (More Democracy) pressure group. "The legal possibilities of the European Citizens' Initiative are not significant; it is primarily a tool for agenda setting. It could, however, lead to more debate across European national borders about what is going on in Brussels."