TC - 1 eDemocracy: challenges and actions in the EU Thanassis Chrissafis European Commission DGINFS0-H2 TED Conference on e-Government Electronic democracy: The challenge ahead 2-4 March 2005, Bolzano, Italy

TC - 2 eDemocracy: What is it? It is democracy in modern days! Widespread use of ICTs: it intensfies! Far reaching transformation of social, economic and political life (eInclusion, eBusiness, eGovernment): how it is being shaped? New challenges for a democratic society in an Enlarged EU

TC - 3 eDemocracy: What is it? - 3 pillars. It can be defined as the use of ICTs in order to: Communicate and exchange opinions Citizen -to- citizen, policy makers -to- policy makers Content-based, informed citizens, agenda-driven policy makers, “decide what to decide on” Participate in public debates and policy making Citizen -to- policy makers interactions eParticipation: informed, transparent and accountable decision making Vote for decision making Click the button; regulation and security

TC - 4 Democratic governance of the EU - (Re-)Structure of power Local, national and EU experiences - Participation within and across borders Citizens participation in EU affairs - Improved decision making Fighting the democratic deficit - All these in an Enlarged (-ing) EU

TC - 5 Citizens’ rights European citizenship Digital inclusion Digital forms of classical rights New rights Citizens’ interaction within a Single European Public Space

TC - 6 The potential of eDemocracy EU Constitution, Art I-46 “The principle of participatory democracy: Not less than one million citizens coming form a significant number of Member States may take the initiative of inviting the Commission, within the framework of its powers, to submit any appropriate proposal on matters where citizens consider that a legal act of the Union is required for the purposes of implementing the Constitution” The use of digital technologies makes this opportunity a great one!

TC - 7 Some experiences so far Citizens draw their experience from mass media (e.g. eVoting in the Eurovision song contest!) Politicians face almost daily electronic opinion polls How representative these are? What is their role in forming opinions?

TC - 8 eDemocracy experience at the EU level In the Commission: Interactive Policy Making (IPM) 6,500 consultations over 2 months “Your voice in Europe” offers a single access point in all official languages for Commission public consultation; At EU level: The Greek Presidency launched the e-Vote possibility for EU citizens: “ Welcome to e-Vote: vote for the EU YOU want! E-Vote is an exciting new experiment of the Greek Presidency to use the Internet and new technology to get more people involved in the discussions and decision making process of the EU” An eDemocracy conference in February 2004 was dedicated to taking stock of experiments in the EU

TC - 9 EU actions to promote eDemocracy A significant number of IST projects have been funded in the past few years About 20 projects with a 30 m Euros funding (e.g. TRUEVOTE, WEBOCRACY, ePOLL, etc) Results are already being used One of the IST Prize Awards in IST 2004 conference was an eDemocracy application. Many of the FP6 eGovernment projects contribute, e.g GUIDE on cross-border eID or HOPES and SAFIR on multi-modal access contribute to rights to good administration

TC - 10 SO SO ICT for Innovative Government Overall objective Modernise and innovate public administrations at all levels, foster good governance, new service offers for citizens and companies, new public value. Contribute to easing mobility of European citizens within the Internal Market, making European Citizenship a reality, supporting them as active citizens through innovative government services and through participation.

TC - 11 SO ICT for Innovative Government - summary eParticipation Tools for formulation and enactment of democratic decisions, scalable large scale dialogues, new forms of interactivity, Active Citizen,… (NoEs, STREPs) Intelligent, personalised eGovernment services for all Intuitive interaction, inclusion, multi-channel service delivery platform, context-awareness, privacy protection & enhancement, … (IPs, STREPs) Adaptive and proactive eGovernment Knowledge-based government, process models, admin management tools, transparency technoligies, diversity, multi-level governance,.. (IPs, STREPs) Secure pan-European eGovernment Very large scale, heterogeneous, cross-border admin architectures/ processes/ info-infrastructures; pan-European eGovt ID,… (IPs, STREPs)

TC - 12 SO Complementary measures Road mapping to prepare the research agenda for innovative eGovernment in the 2020 time frame Linking research with eEurope - eGovernment Good Practice Framework Digital divide issues; emerging concepts such as active citizen, networked governance, knowledge workers, … Clustering projects on electronic identity for eGovernment services. Instruments: SSAs, CAs

TC - 13 eParticipation Innovative ICTs for democratic involvement, in particular eParticipation: Research should address innovative tools and methods for fact-based policy development, agent technologies, intelligent formulation and enactment tools supporting the preparation of democratic decisions, scalable dialogue tools as well as new possibilities for interactivity in democratic processes.

TC - 14 Additional eDemocracy related research It is a major research field in social sciences as well – DGRTD actions An increasing number of research centres and teams emerge in the EU: need to establish a good cooperation framework National research programmes seem to give a fragmented approach: need for consolidation

TC - 15 Preparing for FP7 Current Commission proposal is being finalised Council and EP decisions early to mid st Call in late 2006, early 2007

TC - 16 More… eGovernment research website (also for policy and good practice) europa.eu.int/egovernment_research Cordis website Related websites: EU and other research projects e.g. on Cordis, europa.eu.int, eEurope, eTEN, IDA, …