The Commission has launched the third round of citizens’ panels and calls on European citizens to submit their proposals on-line at the dedicated platform linked to the panel.
Citizens' panels have become a regular feature of participative democracy in the EU following the Conference on the Future of Europe. The conference came to a close on Europe Day 2022 when the three Co-Chairs delivered their final report containing the proposals to the Presidents of the European Parliament, the European Council and the European Commission.
The final report stated that the pledge given to European citizens at the start of the conference in 2021 was simple: to allow, by way of a citizens-focused, bottom-up exercise, all Europeans to have a say on what they expect from the EU and have a greater role in shaping the future of the Union.
A central and particularly innovative feature of the Conference was the European Citizens’ Panels, organised on the main topics of the conference. Panels came up with recommendations that fed into the overall conference deliberations, in particular, into the Conference Plenaries.
“The Conference has constituted an unprecedented experience of transnational deliberative democracy. It has also proven its historical relevance and importance in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic and the Russian aggression against Ukraine,” the report said.
As during the Conference, the panels continue to bring together randomly-selected citizens from all 27 member states to discuss upcoming proposals that affect all citizens. The around 150 citizens are selected to represent the EU’s diversity - geography (urban/rural), gender, age, education, and socioeconomic background.
The panels meet in three sessions. The first one is to generate ideas. The second one is to review the ideas and draft initial citizen recommendations. The third session, which closes the round, submits the conclusions of debates, together with the panel's recommendations, to the European Commission, as part of the package accompanying the relevant proposals.
The topic selected for this year’s panel is A new European budget fit for our ambitions. The sessions will take place in Brussels from 28 to 30 March and 16 to 18 May 2025. Previous topics were Tackling Hatred in Society and Energy Efficiency. The panels are linked to the Citizens' Engagement Platform.
The on-line debate on the platform, opened on 12 February, is available in all 24 official EU languages with automatic translation. Everyone can share their ideas about the new long-term budget’s priorities but have first to sign-in. Until now over 100 proposals have been submitted but traffic is still relatively slow in terms of the number of comments and endorsements.
In parallel with the citizens’ panel, the Commission has also launched the Youth Policy Dialogues to stimulate young people (aged 19 – 30) to participate in EU policy-making. These dialogues preceded the Conference on the Future of Europe and were established under the 2019-2027 EU youth strategy.
The 11th cycle of the Youth dialogue runs from January 2025 to June 2026 covering the Polish, Danish and Cypriot EU Trio Presidencies. The topic of the cycle is based on the Youth Goal#1 of the EU Youth Strategy, focused on Connecting EU with Youth. Commissioners are holding dialogues in different EU cities.
High Representative/Vice-President Kaja Kallas hosted the first Youth Policy Dialogue on the priorities of EU’s Foreign Policy last Friday in Brussels. The event marked a step towards a more inclusive and youth-driven approach to the EU actions around the world, according to the Commission. No report is available from the dialogue as it was not open to journalists in contrast to the citizens’ panels.
M. Apelblat
The Brussels Times
