European Union

Following on from the recent Notre Europe Deliberative Poll and the European Citizens' Consultations, both under the aegis of the European Commission's Plan D for Democracy, Dialogue and Debate; on 8 and 9 November the other major institution, the European Parliament opened its main chamber for citizens to debate and share in the political space, with the first Citizens' Agora. The name evokes images of the Athenian city state deciding on its political priorities in the market-place, where every citizen had an equal voice but how did the modern reality measure up?

Who participated?

Jon Worth, a former President of the Young European Federalists turned political communications consultant, as well as a leading EU blogger, takes a look at the difficulties of ensuring fairness in EU representation, and offers a suggestion for reform:

The European Parliament is trying to decide how numbers of MEPs will be allocated between different Member States in the future. The Severin-Lamassoure idea is there should be 750 MEPs, with 6 per Member State, and a maximum of 96 for the largest country. Seats for the countries in between will be allocated according to "degressive proportionality".

With all the complaints about the lack of democracy within the EU, it's easy to forget how little there is in other supposedly democratic organisations. Yes, the European Commission - one of the most powerful bodies in the EU - is unelected. But is that so unusual?

According to the Sun's poll the other day, 81% of the UK population wants a referendum on the EU reform treaty - but what about in other EU countries? Well, back in June the Financial Times ran a poll to find out just that.

The result? It's not just Brits who want a say on whether one of the most complex and convoluted international treaties ever drafted should be adopted.

According to the FT poll, 68% in Italy, 64% in France, 71% in Germany and 75% in Spain want a referendum. Yet at the moment, it looks like it will only be Ireland that will hold a referendum on the new treaty, and only because it is constitutionally obliged to do so. Most EU member states - despite the apparent desire of the people to have a say - are not interested in having a vote.

From the comments to Professor Fishkin's introduction to the concept of the Tomorrow's Europe poll, reader mcconeb gets to the heart of the matter: the EU's little problem with democracy. Have something to add? Leave a comment, or email it in to james.clivematthews [at] opendemocracy.net

James Fishkin's exercises are interesting. They would make excellent school projects or could be adopted on a wide scale for a more interesting form of opinion polling. However, before we talk about hypothetical ways of forming opinions and weeding out special interests, let us look at a more tried and tested one: the democratic system currently used in all European member states.