Tom Bentley bangs the table. Demos, his think tank, backed by openDemocracy, got it right on one of the great issues of our time. Little good it did us… or the public across Europe.

Why are government and media in Britain so hostile to each other? Because each seeks to control the narratives that shape people’s lives, says Tom Bentley of the think-tank Demos. In the process, both are damaged – and so is democracy itself.

While Geoff Mulgan makes a strong case that learning has become central to effective governance, Tom Bentley registers a missing dimension in his argument: democracy itself. Learning is not just openness to international experience among policy-makers, or a better chain of command. It is a process that entails deep accountability, transparency, network-based cultures of information at every level – one that recasts relationships between governments and people.

The vast movement and mingling of peoples is a defining feature of societies in the age of globalisation. It poses huge long-term challenges. How can European policy-makers respond creatively? For a start they need ideas that look well ahead, are grounded in current realities and are tested in healthy debate. This is the aim of a collaboration between the think tank Demos, a senior and experienced Dutch civil servant Theo Veenkamp, and openDemocracy. Tom Bentley of Demos introduces the agenda that will shape our project.

Does migration erode or enhance national culture? This question is highly sensitive in many European countries. The problem with the existing European approach to migration is that official distinctions between categories of migrants do not match reality. We need a new, sustainable model that recognises the evolving complexity of human mobility. In our People Flow pamphlet, openDemocracy and Demos have proposed such a model to open up debate. This article summarises its main arguments.

The influence of non-governmental organisations (NGOs) - on governments, corporations, and public opinion - has not been matched by a clear understanding of their own role in the global order. What is their relationship to power? Are they agents of positive change, or merely of protest?