Tapping into the potential of cities and regions to promote European participatory democracy and the fight against climate change

What do Covid-19 and Climate Emergency have in common? Besides being the top global concerns of 2020, they are also two matters where local administrations (mayors and regional governors) often attempt to get more involved in the fight, launching joint calls and appeals or formalising networks where best practices and common strategies are discussed on a pan-European level.

This approach applies to European citizens’ initiatives too, where it is both useful and important to those conducting European citizens’ initiatives and to municipal authorities themselves, to be connected on a political level and help provide a progressive future for participatory democracy and the European Citizens’ Initiative. In this way, European citizens can get important (often previously unknown) information regarding their democratic rights, while municipalities can increase their political leverage. Both effects help bring the citizenry closer and more involved with EU politics.



The roles of municipalities and regions are essential on the EU political stage, both in terms of decision making and policy development and implementation, as well as in the strengthening of participatory democracy instruments. A lot of investment is being made to inform European citizens at all levels about their voting rights, but a fully functioning European democracy also requires  a maximum level of awareness of the citizens’ participatory democracy rights too.



A highlight so far of the StopGlobalWarming.eu ECI, an initiative aiming to compel the European Commission to adopt a carbon pricing policy, has been its success at gaining political support and leverage through a focus on municipalities. Palermo (Italy), Dortmund (Germany), and Dublin (Ireland) are among the first cities which publicly endorsed the European citizens’ initiative and committed to inform their citizens about the possibility to sign it on their website. The medium-sized city of Aprilia, in Italy, is the first city in Europe to include on its website the link to the collection system of StopGlobalWarming.eu. Lazio Region backed the initiative as well, and the Assessor to Climate Enrica Onorati recorded a video to express her support for carbon pricing policies and the important role of participatory democracy in promoting this proposal.

Palermo was the first city to give public endorsement for the StopGlobalWarming.eu campaign, leading the path for further city and regional shows of support. Paolo Petralia Camassa, Deputy Mayor of Palermo, participated in the marathon HEY EU, TAX CO2 organised by StopGlobalWarming.eu, explaining the reason for this support:

“…city administrations have the political spectrum of the local reality, and having this political perception allows us to be the first to recognise the consequences of global warming and general climate change related issues.”

Local government has a number of characteristics which make it an essential feature of participatory democracy, ideal as a focus point in the strategy of a European citizens’ initiative campaign, and a simple and important line of action for committed citizens who want to bring climate actions to the core of democratic processes.

The most important aspect of the municipal level from a political perspective, is its closeness to the citizens. At this level, such as in elections for mayors or local councillors, citizens can see a closer connection between their vote and the impact of this vote on their everyday lives. They can see the changes they have influenced often much more directly than at a national or transnational electoral level. In recent years local administrations have increased their commitment to provide citizens with local instruments of citizen consultation and even deliberation. The most famous examples are -among the others - the cities of Barcelona, Madrid, Milano which activated instruments such as participative budgeting and lead the way of participatory democracy at local level. Including the European Citizens’ Initiative in this evolving participatory democracy framework can accelerate exponentially the impact of European activism and the fostering of a sense of European citizenship.



Activists of the pan-European movement EUMANS! who are taking part in the European citizens’ initiative StopGlobalWarming.eu  launched a particular type of action: contacting local mayors, municipal and regional councils to invite them to support the StopGlobalWarming.eu local resolution template (which you can find below and in this thread on the ECI Forum), which is built on two main pillars:



1) The formal support to the proposal of a carbon pricing policy

2) The commitment to inform citizens about the possibility to sign the European citizens’ initiative



When municipal authorities commit to supporting the campaign, they provide publicity to their citizens, who previously may have never even heard of the European Citizens’ Initiative before. In this way this political connection and subsequent outreach helps relate matters on an EU scale to those who may normally never show interest in or awareness of them.

Furthermore, the active support of such prominent political representatives also increases the Initiative’s political leverage and general media awareness and focus. City and regional authorities often have close ties between themselves, and as in our case with the Mayors of Palermo and Dortmund, municipal support can lead to a chain reaction.

A focus on the municipalities can also lead to benefits in efforts to increase citizen participation in ECIs and EU politics in general. Should municipal governors start informing their citizens more of citizens’ movements which affect them, such as ECIs, this will exponentially increase the awareness of these under-utilised democratic tools. This works both ways. With mayors and local authorities increasing their involvement in concerns at the EU level, the EU political leadership will recognise more the important role that municipalities can have in our democratic system. What’s more, in an age where populations of large cities are often finding themselves disconnected with the political consensus of the rest of their countries' populations, an increase in political leverage of cities is both a welcome asset to citizens’ movements and the wider populations of these urban districts.

It would be interesting to explore together with the European Committee of the Regions, the European Economic and Social Committee and the other European institutions and organisations involved in strengthening participatory democracy, ways how this practice could be systematised, for example by supporting all promoters of European citizens’ initiatives in their outreach in local municipalities and regions.

Thank you for reading our post -  please do comment below if you want to know more about our action, or if you want to discuss joint strategies to involve local administrations in a more systematic way in the promotion of European citizens’ initiatives.

Also please don’t forget, if you have time, to sign our initiative at stopglobalwarming.eu, or see what else EUMANS! are involved in at https://eumans.eu/.

Link to the local motion on the EUMANS website https://eumans.eu/local-motion-municipalities-and-regions-stopglobalwarmingeu