Avrupa Birliği’nde karar alma sürecine katılım ve “Avrupa vatandaşları girişimi”

Demokrasinin tarih boyunca geçirdiği dönüşüm nedeniyle, anlamı ya da anlamının ne olması gerektiği de zamanla değişime uğramıştır. Robert Dahl, demokrasinin günümüzde geçirmekte olduğu üçüncü dönüşüm sü- recini, ulus ötesi sistemlerin, ulus devletlerin siyasi, ekonomik, sosyal ve kültürel özerkliğini azaltarak, gelişmekte olduğu süreç olarak tanımlar. Ancak, demokrasinin üçüncü dönüşüm sürecinde, karşımıza önemli bir soru çıkmaktadır. Demokrasi ulus devlet sınırları ötesinde var olabilir mi? Bir başka deyişle, ulus aşan sistemler için demokrasi mümkün mü- dür? Avrupa Birliği, ulus aşan sistemlerde demokrasinin mümkün olup olamayacağının analiz edilmesinde bir model olarak karşımıza çıkmak- tadır; ve bu modelde hem temsili hem de katılımcı demokrasi uygulama- ları gözlemlenmektedir. Avrupa Birliği karar alma sürecinde temsili or- ganların rollerinin güçlendirilmesi, daha demokratik bir Avrupa Birliği için temsili demokrasi perspektifinden atılan adımlardır. Lizbon Antlaş- ması ile getirilen bir yenilik olan ‘Avrupa Vatandaşları Girişimi’ ise, Birlik içinde demokrasinin güçlendirilmesi için atılmış bir katılımcı demokrasi örneğidir.

Participation in the European decision-making process and the “European citizens' initiative”

What democracy means and should mean have been subject to change, for democracy has undergone transformations over time. Robert Dahl defines the last transformation that democracy undergones now is a process, in which the transnational systems reduce the national states’ political, economic, social and cultural autonomy. In this process, there is a question we face is of whether de- mocracy is confined to the nation-state. In other words, is democracy thinkable beyond the nation state? To answer this question, the European Union can be taken as a model for transnational democracy. By way of this model, we observe a transnational system can create a political structure and decision-making proc- ess based on both representative democracy and participatory democracy. Strenghtening the roles of the representative institutions –the European Parlia- ment and the national parliaments- in the European decision making process enhances the democratic quality of the Union in sense of representative democ- racy. Besides, new initiatives have been taken to get European citizens more in- volved in the European decision-making process in sense of participatory democ- racy. One of them is the European Citizens’ Initiative, which was introduced by the Treaty of Lisbon as an innovative step to enhance the democratic quality of the Union.

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