The Travelling Assembly
Towards a permanent Peoples' Assembly for Europe
To members of the Assembly and all interested citizens
We are a radically transparent and inclusive network - open to all - which has come together to constitute this assembly. We believe in the creative power of democracy to address the challenges facing Europe and the world, and that citizens themselves should be at the heart of this story!
And so we invite you to debate a big question:
Reflecting on your experience of recent crises, what needs to change for Europeans to overcome future storms? And, how can we, the people, help better steer the European ship?
You will first need to chart a course, a direction of travel. We suggest that together, you imagine a desirable future for the places where you live, your town or city, where new measures could help
… to overcome conflict with our European neighbours,
… to mitigate environmental breakdown whiling taking care of the refugees it may bring
… to find agreement on asylum despite disunited views,
…. to make a common good of food, housing, education and healthcare, … to take care of those left behind,
… to come up with the money needed for these endeavours!
And last but not least…
…to bring about a future with you in it, through a European Peoples’ Assembly. Yes, this is an ambitious agenda!
But politics is, or should be, about negotiating big picture transformations. The future people’s assembly will not only recommend specific policies and monitor EU institutionst It will also meet on a regular basis to reflect on what crisis may come next, which hard choices and difficult trade-offs will be needed to to overcome them, and what the EU can do to stay on course. This democratic experiment will serve to kick off this process as you set an agenda for the next EU.
Note: the Democratic Odyssey’s topic selection process is crowdsourced, from below, from the project’s community. The above themes are just a starting point. As this journey continues, our vision is that randomly selected citizen participants will refine the broad topics down to more specific focus areas. These will then be taken up, in multiple sessions, as the Assembly evolves into a permanent institution. For more information about the Democratic Odyssey, and to join the project’s Constituent Network check out our website.