News

Commission European Citizens' Initiative website launched

Commission ECI website & support tools & services, launched at http://ec.europa.eu/citizens-initiative/public/welcome ECIs will go live on 1 April 2012.

White House seeking input on e-participation

What are the most effective forms of technology and web tools to encourage public participation, engage with the private sector/non-profit and academic communities, and provide the public with greater and more meaningful opportunities to influence agencies’ plans? - before 3 Jan 2012 at http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2011/12/06/seeking-your-input-us-open-government-national-action-plan

White House launching e-Petitioning website

We the People: Announcing White House Petitions & How They Work, from the White House Blog.

Initial 2011 Meeting of the W3C eGovernment Interest Group

The W3C eGov Interest Group are restarting meetings for this group and welcome participation. The group is open to all those interested in the advocacy, adoption, and standards of eGovernment.

2011 Knight News eParticipation Challenge Winners

16 projects that the Knight Foundation has selected as winners of the fifth Knight News Challenge are announced. See http://www.knightfoundation.org/blogs/knightblog/2011/6/22/announcing-2011-knight-news-challenge-winners/

mySociety Evaluation Reports Published

mySociety have put out a pair of "warts-and-all" detailed looks at two of their core websites.

Participatory Budgeting Recife, Brazil, wins the Reinhard Mohn Prize 2011

Over the past four weeks, 11,600 citizens in Germany were invited to select the winner for the Reinhard Mohn Prize 2011 for democracy and participation, out of the 7 finalists. Voting is now over and the winner has been selected. See www.vitalizing-democracy.org

Petities.nl is adapting the Open ePetitions Data Standard

Based on the ePetitions Open Data Standards defined in the UK, Petities.nl is implementing an opne API that will allow interaction with EuroPetition and other ePetitioning/ECI systems.

More EU citizens benefitting from online public services

More people across the EU now have access to public services online, according to Europe's 9th e-Government Benchmark Report released today. The average availability of online public services in the EU went up from 69% to 82% from 2009 to 2010. Putting more Government services online helps cut costs for public administrations and also reduces red tape for businesses and citizens. The report reveals the best and worst performers in the EU, focusing on two essential public services: 'finding a job' and 'starting a company'.

EuroPetition Evaluation Report published

Pilot trials in 5 Member State Clusters of17 Local Authorities and 8m citizens, found that the EU-wide multilingual EuroPetitioning service is successful in improving peititoning of the European Parliament and as a platform for European Citizens Initiatives.

European Parliament and Council reach agreement on the Regulation on the citizens' initiative.

Today the Implementation Regulation for European Citizens' Initiatives (ECI) was finalised. For the first time this will allow citizens to directly suggest new EU legislation. An innovation contained in the Lisbon Treaty, the ECI will allow at least one million citizens from at least one quarter of EU Member States to invite the European Commission to bring forward legislative proposals in areas where the Commission has the power to do so. The organisers of a Citizens' Initiative, a citizens' committee composed of at least seven citizens who are residents of at least seven different Member States, will have one year to collect signatures and the Commission will have three months to examine an initiative and decide how to act on it. On request of the Council, the legislation on the European Citizens' Initiative will start applying only one year after it is published in the Official Journal, meaning that the first initiatives can be considered from early 2012.

INCA10 competition on "Inclusive Society" now open until 8 Nov 2010

The INCA (Innovative and Creative Application) Award is an open competition for developers, encouraging them to build applications which are both “cool and useful”. Winners will receive a prize in money as well as visibility across Europe and at the awards ceremony during the iMinds conference (December 16th 2010). www.inca-award.eu

UK Consultation Institute Launches "The Directory of e-Petitions Applications"

The aim of the Directory is to provide UK local authorities with a reference point for e-petition software suppliers. At present there is no source where local authorities can see, first, who the suppliers are that sell e-petition software and, second, a place to compare the suppliers and their offerings side by side.

Call For Papers - International Journal of Electronic Governance (IJEG)

Special Issue on: "(Re)Creating Public Sphere, Civic Culture and Civic Engagement: Public Service Media vs. Online Social Networks" Guest Editors: Prof. Petros Iosifidis, City University London, UK Prof. Michael Meimaris, University of Athens, Greece

Funded PhD studentships at Edinburgh Napier University

Applications are invited from candidates who would like to undertake a three-year funded PhD studentship within the Institute for Informatics and Digital Innovation at Edinburgh Napier University. The Institute comprises five research centres, of which the Centre for Social Informatics is one (http://www.csi.soc.napier.ac.uk/).

Developments in the ECI

The European Commission is continuning to revise and simplifiy their proposed Regulation covering the implementation of the European Citizens' Initiative

Dialogue on eParticipation in Central and Eastern Europe

PEP-NET, the Pan European eParticipation Network invites practitioners in the field of civic engagement to participate in an online discourse about electronic Participation in Central and Eastern Europe.

European Parliament hosted event in Edinburgh on the European Citizens' Initiative (ECI)

Project member Peter Cruickshank of Edinburgh Napier Univeristy speaks at European Parliament hosted event in Edinburgh on the European Citizens' Initiative (ECI)

EuroPetition on Dutch Radio

3th February 2010

Some thoughts on security issues

Deciding how to verify signatures, and how to secure and validate petitions is crucial to developing a trustworthy system.

European Parliament's Petitions Committee Meetings in 2010

 

Consultation on epetitions procedures for England

The UK Department for Communities and Local Government (CLG) has launched a consultation on the e-petitions process for English councils. This consultation runs for 12 weeks from Wednesday 2 December 2009 until Wednesday 24 February 2010.

A flow diagram of the petitioning process

Presenting a flow diagram to help with visualising the petitioning process

European Citizens Initiative - Consultation Green Paper published.

Commission has opened a broad public consultation to seek the views of all interested parties on how the citizens' initiative should work in practice.

Scottish Parliament debates its (e-)petitioning system