9 January, 2024 | Katherine Arena
The transnational mini-public in Brussels
Following the national mini-publics held respectively in Italy, Germany, Poland, France, and the Netherlands, REGROUP organized its final citizens’ jury event – the Transnational Mini-Public – in Brussels on 23-24 March 2024. In this blog post, participants’ perspectives on the event and on pandemic management by their national governments will be addressed together with the relevance of the innovative citizens’ jury approach.
Citizens’ juries are a type of mini-public that focus on citizens playing an active role in policy making by discussing policy recommendations on some relevant topics. A total of 20 citizens (4 per country) were randomly selected to participate in the event in Brussels. The event took place over one weekend, during which facilitators and resource persons introduced the four main topics researched in REGROUPs work package 4, namely disinformation; scientific communication; the role of non-elected experts in policy making; and political trust. The core and innovative features of this event was that participants could communicate in their respective languages thanks to live interpretation, and that participants were expected to draw lessons from their experience at the national level to formulate European-wide recommendations that would then be communicated to the European Commission. Participants were divided into two groups, with each group focusing on two of the four topics. They discussed policy recommendations previously developed at the national level, selecting which ones to endorse, and determining how to adjust them based on insights gained from the general discussion. The event culminated with selecting policy recommendations, followed by a general discussion among participants, who voted on which recommendations to include in the citizen’s jury’s final report.
Ten policy recommendations so selected can be found in the REGROUP transnational mini-public report.
High participants’ engagement
From the beginning of the event, engagement was high: participants were very invested in addressing the four main topics and creating policy recommendations. The talks given by the resource persons sparked interesting conversations with the participants. Two main questions were asked by citizens during this plenary session:
“How can information reach people and resonate, if trust is low?”
“What is the role of the EU? Little was known about the supranational level during the pandemic”
These sorts of questions emphasize the need for improved communication and transparency as a way to build trust and increase awareness of the structures that influence policy and decision-making, particularly at higher governance levels like the EU.
The outcomes of the discussions
Diving further into the discussions, during the process of selecting the policy recommendations, it was fascinating to observe how different national contexts shaped diverse perspectives. To bridge these viewpoints, some participants suggested identifying keywords that could connect them to the European level.
Another participant highlighted that many recommendations for addressing the Covid-19 crisis focused on what had not worked and how to improve it. They proposed shifting the emphasis toward positive messaging that acknowledges what is working, as this could help build trust.
At the same time, transparency emerged as a topic often juxtaposed with trust, particularly regarding how information is communicated to citizens. The consensus was that a distinct process is needed to verify information before it is shared as well as on having more accessibility to it by maintaining the plurality of the sources.
By the end of the discussions, one key question emerged , among participants, namely: “Are we, as a society, prepared to address these themes?”. This question in turn linked to the various contexts participants represented, the diverse sources of information they accessed, and the limited understanding of the broader European context, highlighting how discussion was essential to get a better understanding of the pandemic crisis management.
The overall participants’ experience
Lastly, participants expressed appreciation for this new experience, highlighting how the discussions helped them understand different realities and shaped their perspectives on the pandemic crisis and its management. They also recognized the importance of integrating the European level, which was unfamiliar to many, in these discussions. While some felt that this perspective might be somewhat unrealistic, many remained hopeful about bringing about change through the policy recommendations.
The event was seen as an opportunity for community building among diverse participants from different countries and socio-cultural backgrounds. This can encourage ongoing dialogue and engagement, which can lead to more active citizen participation in future policy-making efforts.
As a next step, there will be a concluding research paper on REGROUP’s citizens’ jury mini-public approach coming in early 2025 from the University of Groningen.
The transnational mini-public documentary can be found here: https://regroup-horizon.eu/transnational-mini-public/