THE STATE OF THE EUROPEAN UNION REPORT. Europe in a period of transition

29 How can participation in the Conference on the Future of Europe be improved for organised civil society and citizens? Patxi Aldecoa Luzárraga General considerations In this paper, we are going to answer the following ques- tions: is the Conference on the Future of Europe relevant? Why? What for? Does civil society play the decisive role that it should? Did it begin well, coinciding with the in- stitutional call of 10 March and the perspectives it had raised? How can its working be improved to strive to- wards the goals and purpose of the CoFoE? We are working from the great relevance of the Conference on the Future of Europe as an innovative instrument presented two years ago by the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, clearly differentiating it from the European Convention and, of course, the Intergovernmental Conference. Civil society should play a central role in it as the CoFoE lies within what is known as participative democra- cy. This is particularly developed in article 11.2 of the Treaty on the European Union which states that “the institutions shall maintain an open, transparent and regular dialogue with the representative associations and civil society.” Furthermore, we should not forget that the Europe- an construction project that we know today arose as a consequence of various proposals from organised civil society and particularly in The Hague Congress in 1948. The Conference on the Future of Europe might have be- gun better as in the first inaugural session on 19 June held in Strasbourg, citizens were not present in the end and civil society only had a small presence. Above all, it came about with minimum repercussions, if not behind the back of the European public and the Member States, when it was called over 4 months ago, and more than two years have gone by since the need for it was raised. In addition, since 19 June, the Conference has come to a halt and will remain at a standstill until the end of October as the next plenary session will not be held until 22 October.