Organised Civil Society and European Governance CIVGOV

1
Organised Civil Society and European
Governance(CIVGOV)

• Coordinator Università di Trento -- Carlo Ruzza
• Countries covered Italy, Belgium, Spain Basque
  Country, Spain Santiago, Germany, Greece,
  France, Sweden, the UK - Essex, the UK
  Stirling, Hungary, Poland.
• European Institutions and Organised Civil Society

2
The structure of EU consultation

• Consultation takes place in a variety of fora
  green papers e white papers, consultation reports
  and communication. The Better Lawmaking
  initiative is periodically reassessed to
  consider progress in including civil society.
• In legal terms, a duty to consult is established
  in the Treaties, and ideal consulting principles
  have been codified as a duty to strive for wide
  participation, openness, accountability,
  effectiveness and coherence.
• CONECCS includes over 700 organizations 200
  are public interest groups. Since 2005 rules for
  inclusion had been tightened to ensure a broader
  European base, openness, transparency and better
  ability to provide an input to the Commission.
• Consultation should occurr in a broad, open,
  coherent, efficient and accountable manner. Key
  principles are transparency, representativeness,
  quality of information, and internal democracy.

3
Civil society in EU policy making

• Calls for a deeper and clearer involvement of
  civil society are for instance reiterated in the
  White Paper on Governance for whose preparation
  a special group considered ways to better
  incorporate views from civil society and the
  Better Lawmaking initiative which is
  periodically reviewed to assess progress also in
  terms of the involvement of civil society.
• The draft Constitutional Treaty advocates a
  participatory democracy
• A better civil society involvement is now a
  policy priority reflected for instance in
  Commissions documents and the website

4
Environmentalism, Anti-racism, Regionalism

• The environmental coalition operates in one of
  the most successful EU-level policy area in which
  it had a significant influence
• With the Amsterdam Treaty a solid legal basis was
  provided to anti-racism by article 13. Since
  then, a set of initiatives has emerged at EU
  level
• Since the seventies ethno-regionalist movements
  have re-emerged in Europe. The process of
  regionalisation under way in all the large
  member-states has given greater legitimacy to
  regionalism.

5
Civil Society, MACs and policy discourse

• The three movement families attempt to exert
  influence in broad advocacy coalitions (MACs)
  that constitute the EU-level voice of organized
  civil society. They differ greatly in terms of
  policy impact.
• Influence depends from multiple variables such as
  the type of legal base, structure of policy
  networks, interests mobilised, etc.
• At EU level there is a need to use experts to
  technicalize conflicts and scientificize
  conflicts because often there is no easy use of
  majoritarian rules. Also information is difficult
  to gather given the scarcity of resources. As a
  consequence the inclusion of interest
  organizations has always been accepted and
  encouraged.

6
Convergence

• both EU and OCS concur in stressing the
  importance of improving implementation of
  policies, improving policy knowledge with the
  help of OCS, emphasising the importance of
  horizontal diffusion of policies and the general
  importance of civil society.
• Both kind of actors stress the information-providi
  ng, monitoring and ideational role of OCS, its
  contribution to policy deliberation, its
  connections with marginalised sectors of the EU
  population and its ability to represent them.
• They also stress the communication potential of
  civil society and therefore its media impact, and
  its implications for the legitimation of policies
  in the public sphere. They reiterate the
  counterbalancing business dominance.

7
Common Codes

• Even if there are internal differences, both EU
  and OCS concur in stressing the importance of
• improving implementation of policies, improving
  knowledge with the help of OCS,
• the importance of horizontal diffusion of
  policies and
• the general importance of civil society

8
Frames Identified

• OCS and EU frames

9
Common codes identified in all policy sectors

• Priorities in all sectors

10
The meaning of civil society for Institutions

• Institutions stress the information-providing
  role of OCS
• Contribution to policy deliberation
• Connections with marginalised sectors of the EU
  population and ability to represent them
• Communication potential and implications for the
  implementation of policies
• Counterbalancing business dominance
• In brief support for both vertical and
  horizontal governance

11
The social contributions of OCS

• Although secondary, among institutions an
  emphasis emerges on
• gathering information and communicating with the
  public.
• disseminate the awareness of desired lifestyles
  (such as environmental or non-discriminatory
  ones)
• aggrieved citizens - such as local victims of
  pollution incidents
• communicating with the public
• influencing the media

12
The meaning of civil society for OCS

• OCS shares the views of Institutions
• In addition it demands greater accessibility
• It criticises the Commission for insufficient
  attention and for being pro-business biased
• It advocates a stronger state

13
OCS Concerns

• Percentage of importance of civil society
  ,implementation horizontality Improve
  Knowledge frames in the three sectors

14
Different concerns

• Democracy (7.1), the importance of civil society
  (11.0) and minority rights (8.6) and
  citizenship (3.8), - all political concerns -
  are almost exclusively stressed by OCS.
  Conversely, the economic dimension stressed by
  institutions emphasises development (16.8),
  implementation (11) and financial information
  (14.2)

15
A study of national civil societies perceived
openness EU level
16
Responsiveness by sectors / EU