Is the emperor naked?
procedures and expected results of the conference on the future of Europe
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.60054/PEU.2021.8.9-21Keywords:
Laeken Conference, White Paper on the Future of Europe, Conference on the Future of Europe, Participation, Decision ShapingAbstract
The Conference on the Future of Europe is not the first attempt of the European institutions to bring a debate on the future of the EU to European societies. The last such approach was the European Commission’s 2017 White Paper on the Future of Europe.
The conference’s concept purports to take a bottom-up approach but does not really do so as the organizational details presented below show. The European institutions want to keep the discussion process under control and also hinder each other through the principle of unanimity.
At the time of writing, the results of the conference are not yet available, let alone a mapped-out way to implement them. However, scepticism is warranted that the conference results will change the structure and policies of the EU.
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