Over the years I’ve continually argued that the European Union needs to improve its representative democracy – it needs to develop federal institutions, and give citizens a genuine voice at elections. Yet while, in essence, I still believe in that, I nevertheless have to admit that representative democracy is struggling...
Today’s Guardian has an article entitled “Public to choose policies as coalition gets the X Factor“, stating ministers will ensure that the most popular petition on the government website Direct.gov.uk will be drafted as a bill. Sigh. There is not a hope in hell that this is going to work....