National Campaign
(573 reads)
National Campaign
Sat, 21/03/2009 - 09:43
The EU should run national campaigns to inform the citizens of each nation about this and any future consultation processes. I knew nothing about this process until this morning, when I came across the site on the national broadcasters news website.
The fact that nobody but us knew about the process does suggest that the whole thing is more geared towards what politicians can learn about us more so than what people can learn about politics. The fact is that a focus group, as opposed to a national interactive discussion, means that its much easier to process the views of 50 people across the demographic and form a concensus of opinions the would be reflected across the nation. If they wanted true citizen participation then they should have selected 100 well educated and well informed people very interested in politics who could contribute more efficiently instead of a mixture of people largely ignorant of current political affairs, especially in europe, myself included, who only represent the electorate. Although its a noble cause to gain the views of the "average" person, focus groups have been used like this in the past most noteably by Labour in the early 90's in Britan. So while I do find this a useful learning experience it is only localised to those involved and remains unseen by the public. Plus it will be interesting to see how the next lisbon treaty will be plugged to the people and how some politicians will be canvasing in the upcoming elections in 2009.
In short I agree there should be more awareness made by the EU and while Gay Mitchell made the point that the media is not interested in printing a positive political story (or positive anything), the EU should be able to plug it better themselves
The fact that nobody but us knew about the process does suggest that the whole thing is more geared towards what politicians can learn about us more so than what people can learn about politics. The fact is that a focus group, as opposed to a national interactive discussion, means that its much easier to process the views of 50 people across the demographic and form a concensus of opinions the would be reflected across the nation. If they wanted true citizen participation then they should have selected 100 well educated and well informed people very interested in politics who could contribute more efficiently instead of a mixture of people largely ignorant of current political affairs, especially in europe, myself included, who only represent the electorate. Although its a noble cause to gain the views of the "average" person, focus groups have been used like this in the past most noteably by Labour in the early 90's in Britan. So while I do find this a useful learning experience it is only localised to those involved and remains unseen by the public. Plus it will be interesting to see how the next lisbon treaty will be plugged to the people and how some politicians will be canvasing in the upcoming elections in 2009.
In short I agree there should be more awareness made by the EU and while Gay Mitchell made the point that the media is not interested in printing a positive political story (or positive anything), the EU should be able to plug it better themselves