Case

The Europe Assembly

How can Europe help make Danes' lives more meaningful? The political party 'Radikale Venstre' is testing deliberative democracy as a new method for developing their European policy initiatives with the help of ordinary citizens. Both those who are pro-EU, those who are Eurosceptic and those who do not yet have an opinion on the EU.

Background

How can Europe help make Danes’ lives more meaningful? Radikale Venstre is testing deliberative democracy as a new method for developing their European policy initiatives with the help of ordinary citizens. Both those who are pro-EU, those who are Eurosceptic and those who do not yet have an opinion on the EU.

Task

How do Danes feel about the EU and Denmark’s ties to the EU? By establishing The Europe Assembly as a 3-year deliberative process, Radikale Venstre is testing a new method for policy development based on the wishes and perspectives of ordinary citizens.

Solution

We Do Democracy has been the third party facilitators and project manager for the first phase of the Europe Assembly. In the first phase of the Europe Assembly, the focus was on exploring Danes’ ambivalent and contradictory attitudes towards the EU, and thus learning more about the political areas in which divisions and unities seem to reside. We Do Democracy has coordinated the work of the participants to develop recommendations for future European policy. The recommendations will form a common foundation for both Radikale Venstre’s European policy efforts and the European Parliament’s further work over the next two years.

Results

  • The project gave Radikale Venstre new knowledge and insight into Danes’ concerns, hopes and perspectives on the EU, Europe and Denmark’s connection to European cooperation.

Read the final recommendations from the citizens’ assembly here.

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Zakia Elvang

Zakia Elvang

Partner and democracy advisor