EuroPolis: A deliberative polity-making project
Everyone laments the democratic deficit at the heart of the European Union. Now someone is doing something about it.
On May 29-31 2009 Europolis brought 400 European citizens from the 27 member states to Brussels to debate immigration, climate change, and the EU policy- making process- a unique experiment in informed decision-making. Participants spent three days discussing these issues in small working groups, and then in plenary sessions with a battery of experts and election candidates.
EuroPolis is a carefully designed experiment that assesses how political and social attitudes toward EU issues change as a result of exposure to information, and what implications this has for political participation and voter turnout. It provides a unique opportunity to rigorously observe and evaluate how citizens’ knowledge, attitudes, and behaviour are modified by exposure to thorough and balanced policy information and participation in thoughtful deliberation during electoral periods. Europolis gives citizens of different nationalities the chance to confront one another, policy experts, and political leaders at the European level. This is an innovative instrument for bridging the often-lamented gap between national and European views in EU democracy. EuroPolis is an important event in the history of deliberative democracy.
The EuroPolis project employs the Deliberative Polling® method, an approach invented by Professor James Fishkin at Stanford University that attempts to put into practice the principle that democratic legitimacy rests on informed opinion, open deliberation, and equal participation of citizens.
On May 29-31 2009 Europolis brought 400 European citizens from the 27 member states to Brussels to debate immigration, climate change, and the EU policy- making process- a unique experiment in informed decision-making. Participants spent three days discussing these issues in small working groups, and then in plenary sessions with a battery of experts and election candidates.
EuroPolis is a carefully designed experiment that assesses how political and social attitudes toward EU issues change as a result of exposure to information, and what implications this has for political participation and voter turnout. It provides a unique opportunity to rigorously observe and evaluate how citizens’ knowledge, attitudes, and behaviour are modified by exposure to thorough and balanced policy information and participation in thoughtful deliberation during electoral periods. Europolis gives citizens of different nationalities the chance to confront one another, policy experts, and political leaders at the European level. This is an innovative instrument for bridging the often-lamented gap between national and European views in EU democracy. EuroPolis is an important event in the history of deliberative democracy.
The EuroPolis project employs the Deliberative Polling® method, an approach invented by Professor James Fishkin at Stanford University that attempts to put into practice the principle that democratic legitimacy rests on informed opinion, open deliberation, and equal participation of citizens.
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The participating organisations are: the University of Siena – Circap, Italy; the University of Essex, United Kingdom; the University of Mannheim, Germany; Fondation Nationale des Sciences Politiques, France; University of Oslo, Arena, Norway; Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, Spain; European Policy Centre, Belgium; Avventura Urbana, Italy; TNS Opinion, Belgium; Median Research Centre, Romania
The donors funding the project are the European Commission under the 7th Framework Programme, Compagnia di San Paolo (Italy), King Baudouin Foundation (Belgium), Bosch-Stiftung Foundation (Germany), the Open Society Institute (Switzerland). |
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On June 3rd at 2.30pm at Residence Palace – Bruxelles, the results of EuroPolis Deliberative Polling were presented.
Please click here to download the press release in English > Click here to download the results on Attitude Representativeness > Click here to download the results on Attitude Change > Click here to download the results on the Evaluation of the DP Process > Click here to download the results on Knowledge Gains > Click here to download the results on Democratic Representativeness > Click here to download the comparative results of Vote Intentions Please click here to download the Executive summary For more information, e-mail us at europolis@unisi.it |
>> UPDATE: A Special Issue of European Union Politics on the EuroPolis deliberative poll was released on September 2014
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