Word: european
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...system has received a cautious welcome from Europeans. A group representing thousands of non-governmental organizations, including Greenpeace, the European Trade Union Confederation and the European Women's Lobby hailed it as "an important new step to increase public participation in E.U. decision-making...
...direct democracy campaigners are split on its merits. Bruno Kaufmann, president of the Initiative and Referendum Institute Europe think tank, welcomed the move, saying "it will force people to reflect on how Europe really works." But Carsten Berg, coordinator of the European Citizens' Initiative, an organization advocating more direct democracy in the E.U., warned that the "intrusive personal data requirements, narrow topics and unclear follow-up could render it unusable." And Janis Emmanouilidis, an analyst at the European Policy Center, a Brussels-based think tank, believes it could backfire. "One million people is a low threshold and it risks falling...
...ambivalence is shared by George Schopflin, a Hungarian member of the European Parliament. "It is hard to think what subject might be suitable [for citizens' initiatives]," he says. "Many E.U. issues are unspeakably complicated. And many others that might engage European citizens, like whether we should all drive on the right, are too absurd for the commission to address...
...Leseuer, head of the Thomas More Institute, a Paris-based think tank, says citizens' initiatives amount to mere democratic window dressing. "It is not with old tools that we will build Europe," he says. "This proposal is too heavy and complicated to impose on Europe before anything like a European consciousness exists. I bet that there will be very few initiatives." (See pictures of Paris expanding...
...That may sound cynical and dismissive. But if a passionate European or two manages to collect 1 million signatures, they could prove him wrong...