This text-file contains selected letters on the Citizens' input project. The file was last updated 28.01.1996 - Mikael Böök / book@kaapeli.fi Date: Sat, 06 Jan 1996 12:34:06 +0200 From: Mikael Book To: [hCa-list etc] Subject: Citizens' input - how to proceed? Dear hCa people, Below, please find my notes on the Citizens' input-project, and a request to the hCa: One of the plans discussed at the 4th hCa in Tuzla last October was entitled "Citizens' input into the EU inter-governmental conference". In the related workshop, I proposed that we create a Citizens' input-service on the World Wide Web (Internet). This would allow organisations and individuals to enter their proposals/points of view for the IGC. Relevant historical and literary materials should also be included. Financial support would be sought for the planning and editorial work, some equipment (e.g. scanners) and travel expenses. As a result we would get an European electronic directory (archive, library, "map"). This directory should be made available and accessible to readers and writers via public libraries in the different countries. This implies that we want to open and extend a new zone of cooperation between the public libraries and the hCa. The efforts to install such a European Citizens' input service on the Web and in libraries should also be combined with an effort to create the "mechanisms" (of lobbying and PR-work) whereby to deliver the citizens' input to the press and the decision-makers of the IGC. My impression from the aforementioned workshop in Tuzla, and from what I have gathered elesewhere, is that such "mechanisms" are especially weak and underdeveloped as far as the peace and human rights movement is concerned. The main partners in this project would be: 1) the hCa; 2) the "Knot at the Cable", Web-site of Helsinki City Library and the Katto-Meny cooperative society; 3) other public libraries on the Web; * * * The Citizens' input-project is thought to facilitate transnational coalition and intervention "from below" into the political integration of Europe. More generally, this project could be seen as part of an strategy to extend and re-vitalize the public sphere of the so called information society. The underlying idea of the project is that an information society can only be created by the public itself, i.e. by a network of readers and authors. (I use the term 'authors' to designate authentic producers of information; writers, artists, researchers, journalists, teachers etc.) "European information society" thus means the formation of a European public and a European public sphere. Europe has a common market. It does not have a common public sphere. This is one of the real, historical problems which the peoples of Europe are facing if they are to form a political union. The problem is, clearly, related to the question of "making Europe more relevant to its citizens", as the Reflection Group puts it; according to the Reflection Group this is a key task of the IGC. (By the way, The Reflection group's Report, Brussels 5th December 1995, is available via www.cec.lu, the recently opened Web-server of the EU Commission.) The question, here, is whether "making Europe more relevant to its citizens" is not a type of problem which ought to be solved by the citizens themselves rather than by the governments? Another question is, of course, _what is relevant in Europe_? Of course, technology as such cannot solve the problem of developing a common European public sphere (Oeffentlichkeit). Yet in this respect, as a medium, the Internet presents some advantages when compared to newspapers, radio och television. Simply, the Internet is a great medium for transnational networking at the level of civil society. On the condition, of course, that transnational civil networks really exist and are active. (The hCa is one such network.) * * * Back at home, in Helsinki, I set out to initialize this project; contacted people of the hCa and others; began to prepare an application for money from the Finnish government's special funds for "the information on the EU inter-governmental conference"; tried to convince the board of Katto-Meny about the importance and desirablity of this project; and to elaborate a draft project plan. Some hCa-people have responded to the Citizens' input project- proposal. Positively, as far as I understand. But it is not yet clear if the hCa, as an organisation, wants to start the Citizens' input project. In order to proceed (or not), I must now ask for a negotiation and a decision. In previous messages, I suggested that the Citizens input-project be discussed during the ICC of the hCa, in Prague 18-22 January. I don't know if that is still possible. I will not be able to attend the ICC myself. Note: The Katto-Meny coop. soc. (of which the present writer is the director) is an internet provider for NGOs, public libraries, authors, artists and journalists. Katto-Meny runs a Web-server ("The Knot at the Cable") jointly with the Helsinki City Library, which thereby became the first public library on a WWW-server, opened 28 February 1994. Just for the comparison, the European Union opened _its_ first WWW-server (the "Information Market Europe"), only in the Summer of 1994. Yours, - Mika Mikael Book * Katto-Meny * Tallbergink 1/39 * FIN-00180 Helsinki book@kaapeli.fi * Phone +358-0-6947730 * Fax +358-0-6933219 (att Mika) Date: Sat, 13 Jan 1996 09:35:40 +0200 (EET) From: Mikael Book To: Helsinki Citizens' Assembly Cc: [hCa-list etc] Subject: Re: Citizens' input - how to proceed? Hello, dear hCa people, [this connects to my message of 6 January]: according to Mary Kaldor, the proposal that we [the hCa-people] create a European Citizens Input [into the EU inter-governmental conference] via public libraries and the World Wide Web, is "a great idea" [that's what she said by e-mail to me]. So why don't we do it? Because the hCa's office in Prague does not [yet] have access to WWW ? But that's centralistic thinking. A transnational organisation does not need to be as weak [in a certain area of its activities] as its central office. Besides, the project itself [Citizens' input] should contribute to solving this problem [of the Prage office's access to WWW and, for that matter, of WWW-access of the other hCa-activity spots]. Or, is there a general suspicion that this will cost more money than the hCa can afford? As said before, we should apply for money [very soon now] from the funds granted by the Finnish Chancellery of State for information about the IGC of the EU [produced by non-governmental organisations]. I think it is important that we make this application. The government officials I have contacted [here in Helsinki] have not yet been able to answer my question about the rules: is this money granted to _international_ organisations at all? This, I feel, may be a politically interesting question in other countries as well. Yet how can I proceed with the application, if you [the hCa people and the executive organs of the hCa] do not give me clear signals. So tell me: how to proceed? - Mika PS If you have WWW-access, you can find the Citizens' input project, at http://www.kaapeli.fi/~book/ [and I can will you copies of the project proposal if you ask me]. Mikael Book * Katto-Meny * Tallbergink 1/39 * FIN-00180 Helsinki book@kaapeli.fi * Phone +358-0-6947730 * Fax +358-0-6933219 (att Mika) gsm 940 5511 324 From her@digihaag.ddh.nlTue Jan 16 08:23:39 1996 Date: Mon, 15 Jan 1996 00:39:42 +0000 From: Herbart Ruitenberg To: [hca-list] Cc: her@digihaag.ddh.nl Subject: Re: Citizens' input - how to proceed Re: Citizens' input - how to proceed? book@katto.kaapeli.fi (Mikael Book) wrote Sat Jan 13 05:35:40 1996 > So why don't we do it? Because the hCa's office in Prague does > not [yet] have access to WWW ? But that's centralistic thinking. > A transnational organisation does not need to be as weak [in a > certain area of its activities] as its central office. Besides, > the project itself [Citizens' input] should contribute to solving > this problem [of the Prage office's access to WWW and, for that > matter, of WWW-access of the other hCa-activity spots]. The situation with the IGC input from HCA is now as follows. The Prague secretariat distributed to the national sections of HCA about 10 documents, produced at and after the London July conference, plus a decision of the september ICC of the structure of the proposed document. The best document in my view was a contribution of Fraser Cameron, of the policy and research staff of the EC, to the London Conference. Next weekend the ICC will convene in Prague. Nina Schou will put there on the table a document that she will compile from the contributions that arrived until now. (That was decided in the workgroup I attended in Tuzla, Mika was there too.) This paper will be decided upon, and possibly after some revision be used to lobby with. I went through the European Commission's report and the Reflexion group report, seeking out what we should comment on. I hope to send my compilation 'paper' based on the same documents as Ninas within 2 days to Prague and to this list. It is a hell of a job. The IGC will start in March. One problem with the EU is that they have no address, they are just 15 governments.. I'm trying to find out from the Foreign Office in The Hague what the addresses should be to send our paper too. I agree that there should be a WWW site with our documents. That it has not been organised so far is a question of lack of personnel in Prague, I feel. The 10 documents I referred to are only available on paper, regrettably, apart of my own first contribution that I sent by email to Prague. I will put Mika Book's proposal on the table in Prague. I also will put on the table the need to have all HCA documents also available in WWW-form. After the IGC we'll know how much time we have I'm involved in founding a civil affairs server in The Hague, Digitaal Den Haag. (Digital City The Hague) It is already in the 'air' as www.ddh.nl, but some more organisation to structure it and to formulate norms re formatting is being done. Herbart Ruitenberg From book@katto.kaapeli.fiTue Jan 16 11:36:04 1996 Date: Tue, 16 Jan 1996 11:33:52 +0200 (EET) From: Mikael Book To: [hca-list etc] Subject: Citizens' input and ICC-meeting David Mc Reynolds, an American pacifist, said: >> Europe is perfectly able to deal with the Balkans to which Herbart Ruitenberg, a Dutch social democrat, replied: >This has proven to be untrue. The European Union is not a union, but a >set of quarrelling governments, without a unionwide public opinion. And I, a Finnish project maker, agree with Herbart. [ Note that to be a project maker -- that's what Swift calls us in in "Gulliver's Travels -- is no better than to be a pacifist or a social democrat.] But are not we, the hCa people, those who could and should develop "a unionwide public opinion"? In my opinion, yes. Which is why we need the project "Citizens' input into the EU inter-governmental conference", or Citizens' input, for short. Herbart Ruitenberg promised to put the project-proposal I have written on the table at the hCa's ICC-meeting in Prague next week-end. I am happy about that, because I cannot go to Prague myself. And, the info Herbart gave on the planned hCa input into the IGC was encouraging. [We could scan the most essential documents which are produced so far with a scanner if they are not available on diskette or by e-mail.] Nex week-end in Prague, I hope the hCa will decide [or agree]: 1) to become a partner in the Citizens' input-project; in order to formally confirm its participation, I suggest that hCa buys a share in the cooperative society Katto-Meny which runs the Internet-site "Knot at the Cable" jointly with Helsinki City Library [the share costs 250 FIM = ca 60 dollars; Katto-Meny is a society of "information-producers"; it has 210 members most of which are non-governmental and non-commercial (cultural, literary, educational, ecological, peace, humanrights, journalistic etc) organisations.] 2) to set up a World Wide Web-site for Citizens' input into the IGC at "The Knot at the Cable" [a time-table for when it opens should also be set; we can do it before 1 March 1996, I think] and, generally, to contribute to developing WWW as an element of European public life, in co-operation with public libraries; 3) to prepare an [or more than one] application for funding of the project [I have proposed an application the Finnish govts fund for NGO-produced IGC-related information, but there may be better ideas] 4) to name members of a group which works out the details of how we [the hCa people] can make use of the WWW. The group could include, for instance, Eric Bachmann, Herbart Ruitenberg, Nina Schou, Stefan Doettinger, Pat Chilton and myself. [These are all persons whom I met in Tuzla; Chilton and Ruitenberg I also know from the END Conventions of the eighties.] For that group and for the others who may want to join in I am ready and willing to set up a separate [open] mailing list at "The Knot at the Cable". [In that way, we avoid to bother the subscribers of the HCA-list with too much detail aboyt this one single project] - Mika Mikael Book * Katto-Meny * Tallbergink 1/39 * FIN-00180 Helsinki book@kaapeli.fi * Phone +358-0-6947730 * Fax +358-0-6933219 (att Mika) gsm 940 5511 324 From book@katto.kaapeli.fiSun Jan 28 18:09:57 1996 Date: Sun, 28 Jan 1996 12:39:52 +0200 (EET) From: Mikael Book To: Herbart Ruitenberg Cc: John Williams , Pat Chilton , Helsinki Citizens' Assembly , katto-hallitus@katto.kaapeli.fi Subject: Citizens' input /after the Prague-meeting Herbart Ruitenberg cc: hCa office in Prague, John Williams, Pat Chilton, the board members of Katto-Meny (incl Timo Mielonen) Hello Herbart, I understand from Timo Mielonen [who attended the hCa meeting in Prague two weeks ago] that hCa did not yet make any formal decision on the Citizens' input project. I understand it was agreed, though, that you [Herbart] is to proceed with the planning. Timo showed me a copy of a paper [looks like a pm or minutes from the meeting] which says that "There have been offers from Mika Book in Helsinki, and Herbart Ruitenberg (DDH = Digitaal den Haag) to set up an HCA-Web. The cost Helsinki is not clear, but probably low. The cost in the Hague is depending on the sophistication and time-consumption of what is demanded. DDH does have an automatic web-production facility converting incomin email to web-pages". I should like to make a few comments on this: 1. As far as I can see, the Citizens' input project is not even mentioned in the above-mentioned pm/minutes. Under the heading "What needs to be developed?" the pm/minutes only speaks about the organisation of the hCa itself. 2. To say that "there has been offers from Mika Book etc" is perhaps an understatement. What I have suggested is that we engage in a rather ambitious international political project, involving a number of European NGOs + public libraries. Could it be possible that you have misunderstood my proposal, i e mixed it with a commercial business offer? 3.On the other hand I have tried to indicate a practical way to set up a web-site for the Citizens' input project [in the first place] and also for the hCa. This can no doubt be understood as a business proposal because I am offering the service of Katto-Meny. I tried to make very clear how much it would cost to have a web-site at "The Knot at the Cable". Please, tell me what is still unclear about these costs. Maybe it is a good idea to set up the web-site of the Citizens' input-project in the DDH instead of doing it in the Knot at the Cable? If so, please tell me why. (The Knot at the Cable is certainly also capable of converting incoming e-mail to web-pages.) But the best solution would be to have several web-sites for this project, in several countries --isn't that our goal? In addition to these comments, I have news about the application I have been talking about, i e about the money which the Finnish Chancellery of state is granting for ngo-related EU-information. The officials have now made clear, that this money will only be granted to Finnish associations. Thus it seems that neither an application from the hCa nor from Katto-Meny would be considered. But I don't doubt that we can easily find a Finnish association which is willing to apply for the financial support that we would like to receive. Yours, - Mika Mikael Book * Katto-Meny * Tallbergink 1/39 * FIN-00180 Helsinki book@kaapeli.fi * Phone +358-0-6947730 * Fax +358-0-6933219 (att Mika) gsm 940 5511 324