Procedural Aspects of Using the Dialogue Model of Political Participation in the EU: Level of the European Parliament

Abstract

The article provides a comprehensive study of the procedural aspects of the use of petitions to the European Parliament as a tool for the dialogue model of political participation of EU citizens indicates that it is an integral element of participatory democracy, which creates such institutional conditions that allow the formation of subject-subject relations in the field of politics. Methodological support formed on the political science discourse of the functional tools of participatory democracy, which revolves around the definition of standards for measuring and evaluating participatory democracy in the context of the idea of Good Democracy; determining the place of the dialogue model of political participation in the space of post-democracy and online democracy; characteristics of the prospects for participatory democracy in conditions of permanent crises and global risks; concretization of the role and functions of petitions in the processes of modernization of the coordination of citizens' interests in the period between elections, made it possible to prove that the right to appeal belongs to the range of tools of participatory democracy, which is designated at the EU level as an opportunity for citizens to use a clear and transparent way of interacting with EU institutions and to participate in democratic political process, influencing the formation of the political agenda. It was found that certain features of the procedural aspects of filing petitions to the European Parliament indicate that the EU has formed a clear and understandable procedure for filing and considering petitions, which is systematically updated towards expanding the boundaries of participation of EU citizens at each stage of consideration of a petition. It is important for Ukrainian political practice that a number of rules for considering petitions, primarily those related to deadlines, have an informal status. However, the absence of formal rules does not provide for the practice of delaying the process of considering petitions both at the level of the European Parliament and during the involvement of other EU institutions. It is substantiated that the main functions of internal parliamentary discussions in the process of considering petitions reveal the discursive nature of policy-making in the EU and free access to relevant instruments. PETI, as a coordinating committee, initiates and facilitates collaboration with other parliamentary committees to create the basis for an internal parliamentary discussion of a petition or group of petitions. The main principle of participation in it is the principle of granting the right to participate to all interested parties. It is proved that a statistical cut of the interest of EU citizens in the use of petitions indicates a consistently reproducible interest in petitions, which in the context of EU member states demonstrates its importance both for citizens of the founding countries and for citizens of the EU member states of the third wave of enlargement. It has been substantiated that one should not idealize the tool of petitions as functional for articulating and representing the interests of citizens. However, it is precisely with its help that it is possible to measure the dynamics of the participatory democracy process and monitor those interests on which the European policy is not sufficiently focused, but which are important for the population of the EU member states.

Keywords

• democracy
• dialogue model of political participation
• petition
• European Union
• European Parliament