About

CIVICO Europa is an non-profit, independent, and transnational association, aiming to give a new impulse to the European project and, specifically, to democracy and citizenship in a radically changing world.

CIVICO was born out of the May 9 Movement (M9M): a collection of individuals from all horizons, generations, and backgrounds who, after on May 9th 2016, came together to spur a revival of the European project, calling for citizens, opinion leaders, as well as national and European leaders, to launch a common reflection on the future of the EU. The resulting "May 9th Appeal for a European renaissance" gained significant momentum: it was published in several leading European newspapers, thousands of citizens expressed their eagerness to join the movement, and heads of states and government solicited members of the M9M, who were then received by the presidents of the European Commission and Council.

CIVICO was launched as a result of this appeal. Its first act was to author a report on "The European Way for a Better Future" (available below) structured around the realisation that in order to preserve our threatened democracies, and the EU specifically, their representative character must be complemented by a new form of direct and continuous civic participation. This appeal also was published and presented to high-level decision-makers (including presidents Juncker and Macron), thereby significantly contributing to the creation of the current political momentum for democratic consultations.

Since then, CIVICO has been working on this democratic complement, fueled by its core belief that the time has come to reinvent the link between EU citizens and EU institutions and, generally, to bridge the representative gap in modern democracies.

Indeed, in order to guarantee the Union a sustainable future, citizens must now be placed at the heart of its political dynamic and regain ownership over their representation through enhanced participation and deliberation. CIVICO takes it as its mission to carry such change through any positive project aiming at empowering a European civic society and creating a citizens' Europe.

The first of these projects is the #WeEuropeans initiative.

The report The European Way for a Better Future