The Future of Europe: join the debate!
Four months after the publication of the White Paper on the future of Europe, the debate is ongoing everywhere: social networks, Citizens’ Dialogues with Commissioners, conferences, traditional media, visits to national parliaments and so on.
How to engage in the debate on the Future of Europe? There are plenty of ways, and every idea counts for the Commission. A new online platform was launched for citizens to contribute directly in their own language, and choose their favourite scenario among those suggested in the White Paper.
On the European Commission Facebook page, users expressed their opinions in a poll using emojis. During the first 48 hours, over 7,200 voted for the scenario “Doing much more together”, 2,200 for “Those who want more do more”, 912 for “ Doing less more efficiently”, 401 for “ Nothing but the single market”, 199 for “Carrying on”. Overall, the poll was shared on Facebook 685 times, generating almost 22,000 reactions and more than 1,200 comments.
Some figures
To date, over 270,000 citizens have attended more than 1,750 events that we organised. 102 Citizens’ Dialogues with Commissioners were attended by 18,740 people, including Facebook Live dialogues followed by 101,600 viewers. Europe Direct Information Centres (EDICs) disseminated in member states organised 750 events with 85,000 participants. The European Political Strategy Centre (EPSC) , which is is the European Commission’s in-house think tank established in 2014, gathered 4,000 participants in 120 outreach and engagement sessions. Last but not least, 106,000 tweets related to the Future of Europe engaged 43,600 different accounts.
What are the next steps?
In his State of the Union speech in September 2017, President Juncker will take these ideas forward. First conclusions could be drawn at the December 2017 European Council with heads of state and government. This will facilitate a decision on a course of action to be rolled out in time for the European Parliament elections in June 2019.
The Commission has also contributed to the debate come with a series of reflection papers. You can read more in our Medium publications:
· developing the social dimension of Europe
· deepening the Economic and Monetary Union, on the basis of the Five Presidents’ Report of June 2015
