Ideas of citizen participation, of civil society involvement, of democratic innovation – in short, the quest for reclaiming democracy – has been irrevocably on the rise.
Most recently, the European Council gave its blessing to getting citizens involved in a wide-ranging debate on the direction the European Union should be taking within the Conference on the Future of Europe, in a laudable attempt to democratize the European Union.
Calls for deepening, radicalizing or rescuing democracy have proliferated in the decade following the financial meltdown of 2008. The European Left has been mobilizing behind a Manifesto for the democratisation of Europe – the so-called “Piketty Plan” – which includes a Democratization Treaty for Europe.
