A new push for European democracy: How the voice of citizens is
included
The European Commission is committed to protecting and fostering
democracy as the EU faces challenges like election interference,
threats against journalists and the spread of manipulative information
[https://commission.europa.eu/strategy-and-policy/priorities-2019-2024/new-push-european-democracy/protecting-democracy_en].
After introducing the European Democracy Action Plan
[https://www.europarl.europa.eu/legislative-train/theme-a-new-push-for-european-democracy/file-european-democracy-action-plan]
in 2020, the Commission adopted the Defence of Democracy Package
[https://www.europarl.europa.eu/legislative-train/spotlight-JD%2023-24/file-defence-of-democracy-package]
in 2023. These initiatives promote citizen and civil society
participation in policymaking to empower them. 

This participation is enabled by the Citizen’s Engagement Platform
[https://citizens.ec.europa.eu/index_en] of the Commission. Here,
citizens can engage and debate with each other on EU policies, which
are then taken into consideration in the European policymaking
process. Another platform where citizens could speak up was the
Conference on the Future of Europe
[https://data.europa.eu/data/datasets/conference-on-the-future-of-europe?locale=en],
which took place in May 2022. The European Parliament, the Council,
and the Commission are following up on ideas discussed during this
conference on different topics like climate change, health, and
European democracy.  

The Commission supports media freedom and pluralism, for example with
the Media Pluralism Monitor
[https://cmpf.eui.eu/media-pluralism-monitor-2023/]. This project is
an initiative from the European Media Freedom Act
[https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX%3A32024R1083]
and evaluates current threats in the media landscape by using open
data sets and researchers' expertise. With this data, an interactive
map [https://cmpf.eui.eu/media-pluralism-monitor-2023-interactive/]
with indicators is created that contributes to transparency about the
state of European democracy. 

Sharing information with citizens helps them understand decisions and
leads to informed participation. Data.europa.eu helps to counter
disinformation by making policy data from Member States publicly
available. Moreover, survey data representing the voice of citizens is
accessible through more than 1,000 Eurobarometer results
[https://data.europa.eu/data/datasets?query=eurobarometer&locale=en],
including the results of the survey on democracy
[https://data.europa.eu/data/datasets/s2966_fl522_eng?locale=en]. This
survey contains data on the opinions of citizens about the state of
democracy in their country and possible threats it may face.  

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Publication Date/Time
2024-06-24T08:00:00+00:00
Open Data strengthens transparency and counters disinformation