The Agenda Setting Potential of the European Citizens’ Initiative: The case of the Right2Water campaign

Launched in 2012, the European Citizens’ Initiative (ECI) enables one million EU citizens to come together to invite the European Commission to propose new legislation. It is therefore recognised primarily as an agenda setting device: giving EU citizens the opportunity to influence directly the EU’s legislative agenda. To date, however, no new legislation has been placed on the EU’s agenda as a direct consequence of an ECI campaign, as Regulation 211/2011 underpinning it might lead us to expect. This has led to stakeholders and campaigners reporting feelings of disappointment and frustration towards the Initiative. However, in this paper I argue that there are several broader impacts of the ECI in terms of agenda setting than those set out in the Regulation, and that there is capacity for the ECI to affect both the legislative and public agenda in unanticipated, yet not insignificant, ways. The paper includes an in depth exploration of a particular ECI campaign, Right2Water, which pressed the European Union to recognise access to clean water and sanitation as a human right. This case has distinctive features that demonstrate many of the positive aspects of use of the ECI mechanism from the perspective of democratic theory, particularly in terms of agenda setting. These features include the local level participation and activism triggered by the outcome of the campaign and its impact on local, municipal and national political agendas (not least the self-organised referendum on water privatisation in Thessaloniki in Greece which resulted in the municipal government calling off the sale of water services), and the agenda setting power of the transnational campaign in terms of generating public debate and legislative proposals outside of the direct means as intended by the ECI regulation. This case has a very important story to tell regarding the potential of the ECI to affect agenda setting and, significantly, to address democratic legitimacy in the EU. The paper will emphasise the unanticipated and indirect influence on agenda setting at the EU, national and local levels, and the significance of the ECI as a means of participation in EU politics.