Social inclusion and greater participation by citizens in the political process formed the main theme of a public consultation conference in Dublin yesterday.
The Democracy Commission, an independent body of two think-tanks, Dublin-based Tasc and Belfast's Democratic Dialogue, held the consultation in Liberty Hall, attended by more than 200 people.
The commission was set up to respond to concerns about the nature of democracy in the Republic and Northern Ireland.
Last May the commission published a report which found that people were not disengaged in politics but felt disempowered.
The consultation day, entitled "Standing at the crossroads - what path should Ireland take in the 21st century?, will lead to a final report next autumn.
The Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government, Mr Roche, opening the conference, said elections were the most valid and distinctive way for citizens to participate in the decision-making of the State.
"At the local elections there was a 60 per cent turnout. There would be a howl of outrage if that remaining 40 per cent were denied the right to vote," he said. "I'm concerned at the level of turnout and involvement in politics. If democracy as we know it is to continue to flourish in Ireland, we must find more ways to engage people in the decision-making processes."
In addition to the ballot box, there was something empowering about the social partnership model. The role of the media was essential to democracy, Mr Roche continued.
"I don't like to see as they have in the US, a partisan media, a tabloidisation, simply an expression of bias. That is not a free media."
Wilful attempts had been made to distort the truth about the European Constitution and he hoped there would be an honest and truthful debate.
The keynote speaker, Mr Fintan O'Toole, Irish Times columnist, said the meeting was timely as many would have come there with images of Kiev.
Everybody in the Republic took for granted the culture of basic democracy which they had been fortunate enough to inherit.
Democratic participation suggested an inherited culture and respect for democracy.
Historically, three limitations were set to the emergence of a fully democratic Ireland.
These were the establishment of sectarian polities, North and South; the relevance of a strange distorted conspiratorial notion of what democracy was - for example, the armed wing of Irish republicanism; and the corruption of Irish politics - where a small elite group influenced policy by bribes.