Power to the People in
the EU
A view from the Civic
Participation Society, Bulgaria
(at the 3rd NDDIE-Conference, November
15-17, 2002 in Bratislava)
А. What we want to see in the European
constitution?
-
right
of legislative initiative at local/national (by e.g. 0.3% of voters) and
European level;
-
right
to initiate referendum at local, i.e. national (by e.g. 3% of voters) and
European level;
-
right
of recall of all elected officials;
-
election
of judges by the citizens;
-
election
of local/national prosecutors by the citizens;
-
аccess to public information – regulated universally
for the EU;
-
All
merrits of the Swiss army model - used in the future European army;
-
courts
with jury elected by lot;
-
universal
European regulation of local/national electoral procedures;
-
all
the laws concerning participation – adopted by referenda;
II. Rights, rules, policies
supporting the
exercising of participatory rights:
-
right
of civic education – by school and media (cognitive empowering)
-
right
of civic access to the European and local (national) public media (e.g. the
right of any civic initiative signed by 1000 people to get in the news)
(atomisation reduction)
-
right
of translation – funded by EU and national budgets (atomisation reduction)
-
depouperisation
of the citizenry - development and social
regulations (economic empowering)
A2. What the
elites want? Their
European problems and the ways they try to solve them:
-
To
recover the legitimacy of (confidence in) the EU institutions and leadership.
By? Confidence tricking?};-) The good old
way? - Give some rights, give some money… No need rights to work – no real thransfer of
power! Just illusionary - an illusion of democracy must do. (Remember universal
sufrage and national self-determination ‘rights’? Did they give power to the
people and independence to little nations?)
-
To
concentrate power in order to balance global competitors - USA, China and
Japan? That is a common problem for the European
elites and peoples.
-
Security,
defence, terrorism, enemies…(if missing, invent them!};o)
B. What we
want in the way of drafting
and adopting of the constitution?
-
public discussion – state funded and not only in the Internet and ‘contact groups’ but in
the public (big) media and in the streets;
-
right of constitutional
initiative for the citiznes - 2 million signatures from minimum 5 countries.
-
“participatory
component(s)” should be worked out and iserted in the alternative
draft(s) emerging on other (i.g. subordination) basis (federalist, konfederalist, unionist…). If
such component(s) are not inserted in the final draft(s) offered to the voters
(or to parliaments for ratification) nothing else remains to the citizens
percieving themselves as excluded from policy-making in he Union but to produce
a separate draft(s) or amendment(s) to the official
draft(s) or to the adopded constitution if it remains void of viable
participatory components;
·
The humble as far
façade of participatory democracy provided by art. 34 in the last official
draft of European constitution has other functions - not to give rights to the
people but to trick/get their confidece for nothing – for an illusion and great
promis of ‘participatory democracy’ (A horse
for a hen!{:o). Obviously the term has become a hit – as universal sufrage and
national self-determination a century ago.
·
The ‘participatory component’ would
only technically varry
in the different opitons of unification (federalist or unionist or whatever) - in
any case it will persue THE SAME effect: placing the European citizens at
the ‘commanding desk’ of European policy-making by ‘arming’ them with all the
rights and resources needed for direct participation in all the (four) public
powers (legislative, executive, judicial and media) running the ‘State of Europe’
– from bellow or at the top. So in the “Europe of nations” variant where a lot
of power remains in the nations, the participatory rights should be regulated
universaly in the European constitution (not in nacional constitutions) as a
guarantee against a local exclusion of the people from policy-making (which otherwise
will be the case in politically backward countries if more power is left locally
and to the ‘national’ parliaments). For some nations this high standard of
democracy will be introduced from above (even if adopted by local referenda) –
the citizens will be allowed to
vote in it for their rigts from above – from Europe, not from their local power-holders (they
will not be allowed by their national power-holders and can’t outbalance them).
Finland may have the best of civic control on statesmen so they need no DD
rights neither any help from Europe to install it if they want. But e.g., in
Romania or Bulgaria civic control in state and public affairs is merely absent.
So? So they need the help of Europe.)
-
direct
civic participation in the adoption of the constitution – by referendum(s)
-
all
principle alternatives – to the vote.
B2. The drafting process as ‘THEY’ designed it and as we would like to see it.
–
They: Top-down
instalation of a drafting body, drafting procedures, and drafting terms… We: Disband convention, change schedule, start it
down-top, change the whole procedure.
– They: Inserted a human rights component (The Chart) drafted and
adopted without any civic participation before the Convention started its work.
We: Rewrite the
Chart thoroughly after public discussion!
–
They: Kind
chating with NGOs in ‘contact groops’. We: Regulations for a constitutional initiative
for citizens – right to place draft alternatives to the vote.
C. How to get support from the people in Europe for
these demands?
1. How to reach the
people? - Through media (?), through the streets… Who could fund that?
2. How to convince them
to (act in) support of these demands (DD in EU constitution, DD in drafting and
adopting the constitution)? - By communicating to them the set of problems
aggravating and unresolved by representatives and the danger of deceit and
further curtailing their democratic rights a unified European mega-state…
3. What actions for
amounting a max. pressure in process of national and EU decision-making, at the national and EU
decision-makers. Non-violent (street) action. Signatures? – Only if
millions. Media campaigns? – Without
access for citizens to the big media? … Who would fund action?