Improving public participation for climate action and resilient democracy in the European Union

Why public participation matters

Meaningful and high-quality public participation in climate policymaking promises a two-fold reward: it can strengthen democracy and increase public support for robust climate action. These outcomes are achieved through increased transparency, enhanced trust in democratic processes, heightened legitimacy of policy decisions and processes, and reduced political polarisation.² ³ As the EU advances its green transition policies, increasingly directly affecting citizens' daily lives, meaningful public participation is critical to ensure climate action that is effective, legitimate, fair and broadly supported by society.
The European Commission has highlighted the strengthening of public participation in EU decision-making as part of its strategic priority to improve overall democratic governance. To do so, the Commission is planning to enhance existing mechanisms and introduce new ones, including annual Youth Policy Dialogues and a Youth Advisory Board. In any case, public participation mechanisms should follow established good practices to ensure inclusive engagement of citizens and stakeholders, and to foster meaningful discussion and deliberation. Only high-quality public participation can maximise benefits for democracy and climate action and contribute meaningfully to the Commission's goals of simplification and effective implementation.

Read the policy brief here

Key Issues

• Meaningful public participation is a powerful means to strengthen climate action and democratic governance as it fosters policy effectiveness, legitimacy, and public support for policymaking. Current turbulent political times underscore the need to harness the full potential of public participation.
• A wide range of mechanisms for public participation in EU decision-making exist at both the EU and Member-State levels. However, these mechanisms are characterised by important gaps and shortcomings, undermining their potential to provide meaningful and high-quality public participation.
• The identified mechanisms face key challenges including imbalanced participation, implementation gaps, limited impact and transparency, low public visibility, and lack of deliberative spaces across governance levels.
• We propose seven pragmatic action points to improve the quality and impact of public participation mechanisms for EU climate governance. These are aligned with the European Commission's strategic priorities, particularly the goal of strengthening democracy.