A special Oireachtas committee is hearing submissions in an effort to help the Government deal with the consequences of the Lisbon Treaty rejection. Here, Green Party member Déirdre de Búrcaspells out what exactly is required
THE IRISH rejection of the Lisbon Treaty is a serious issue confronting Ireland and other European Union member states and institutions. But there is a danger that if political energies are concentrated on the immediate question of the Irish rejection of the treaty, the EU will continue to avoid dealing with the longer-term - and more fundamental - question of its own political legitimacy.
There is a real need to tackle the growing sense of alienation from the European project experienced by so many EU citizens. If this does not happen, very necessary political developments and reforms within the EU will face much stronger popular resistance from citizens in the future.
Eurosceptic political groupings of the extreme left and right across Europe are likely to benefit from - and exploit - this popular disaffection. The EU could well find itself in a strange and contradictory position where it will increasingly experience democratic resistance, and even revolt, from its own citizens, despite its well-deserved reputation as a strong promoter of democracy at an international level.
These contradictions arise because, while the EU is a recent and very successful political experiment in transnational democracy, its development has occurred in the face of significant challenges.
One of the EU's greatest challenges has been the question of how to engage citizens fully in the project and to maximise their participation in the democratic life of the union.
The EU has described itself as a "union of states and of peoples". However, in the first 50 years of its existence, it has largely functioned as a union of states. Member states have pursued their own interests through the institutions of the EU on behalf of their citizens.
Citizens, on the other hand, have experienced the institutional architecture of the EU as unfamiliar, and its decision-making procedures as bewildering and complex. They have tended to be somewhat passive in relying on their governments to represent their interests at a European level.
In an age when the traditional political model of representative democracy is increasingly under pressure to accommodate an emerging participatory democracy, citizens are unwilling to hand over complete responsibility to their political representatives to decide on important issues such as the transfer of national competences to an EU level.
The continuing process of EU integration has meant that, at intervals, in certain member states, the ratification of EU treaties has involved directly consulting citizens.
The first Danish No vote to the Maastricht Treaty in 2000, the first Irish No vote to the Nice Treaty in 2001, the Dutch and French No votes to the constitutional treaty in 2005, and the Irish No vote to the Lisbon Treaty in 2008 all reflected an ambivalence on the part of citizens in relation to proposed developments within the EU.
This was despite the fact that the proposed developments had been supported by their own governments. While public unwillingness to support particular EU treaties was linked, to a certain extent, to the reforms and policy developments within those treaties, in my opinion it was also connected to deeper fears and motivations.
In the case of the Lisbon Treaty referendum in Ireland, I believe that fears concerning a loss of Irish influence and identity within the EU, together with a general lack of trust in the EU institutions, all contributed to the final No vote.
Questions concerning a loss of influence and identity are linked to an understandable traditional Irish attachment to nationalist values and a less-developed sense of European identity, fears about EU enlargement and the related reduction in influence of smaller states such as Ireland, and concerns about the limited opportunities available to Irish citizens to directly influence EU decision-making.
The question of a lack of trust in EU institutions has, in my opinion, to do with popular perceptions about their remote and impersonal nature. EU institutions have been quite ineffective to date at communicating their policy successes and the significant additional benefits that have accrued to citizens as a result of EU membership.
Furthermore, most EU citizens would find it difficult to name or put a human face on the senior officials of any of the main EU institutions. The European Commission is one of the most high-profile EU institutions.
The fact that EU commissioners are appointed rather than elected gives rise to a popular view that the EU is run by "faceless bureaucrats". Because citizens know little about EU institutions and how they operate, they are often willing to believe the worst about them. To date, it would appear that there has been a level of political denial in relation to these long-standing problems within the union.
Surely it is time to tackle these challenges in a meaningful way? The following solutions would go some way towards achieving this goal:
• An EU information service should be established in every member state, whose remit would be to encourage a much greater level of public engagement with the EU. Ideally, a reputable body in each member state - with an understanding of the specific cultural character of that state - should be given this function.
• An EU-wide cultural programme should be funded and developed that would help citizens to gain a greater appreciation of their European heritage. This could help citizens to appreciate the complementarity of their national and European identities.
• A contemporary and inspiring narrative about Europe and what it means to be European should be developed. This narrative could help citizens to identify to a greater extent with the purpose and aims of the European project.
• EU civil society should be mobilised by making opportunities available to it to enjoy a level of democratic participation in EU policymaking not available at a national level. For example, the very preliminary stages of preparing EU directives could involve an EU-wide "online" consultation with interested citizens' groups.
• More EU-wide referendums and plebiscites should be held in relation to EU policy decisions.
• More EU-wide elections should be held to encourage the emergence over time of a European political identity, or demos.
• EU institutions should cultivate a more human face. Senior EU officials should regularly visit member states and their national parliaments to engage in dialogue about upcoming legislation, policy challenges and so on. They should also participate in public events where they would have an opportunity to connect with citizens.
• The remit of public service broadcasters should be extended to include a responsibility to provide an agreed and balanced level of coverage of EU affairs. The possibility of providing certain incentives to commercial broadcasters to do likewise could be explored.
• Finally, future institutional reforms of the EU should address the particular concerns of smaller states in an expanding EU. Permanent equality of representation in at least one of the major EU institutions should be guaranteed to smaller states.
• Senator Déirdre de Búrca is the Green Party's spokeswoman on European Affairs and the party's representative on the Joint Oireachtas Subcommittee on the Future of Ireland in Europe