[arlort]

Because it doesn't, people are just embarrassingly ignorant of how the EU legislative process works so when a vote to give first approval to a text is cancelled before it takes place journalists and reddit all over pull out the mission accomplished banners and when a negotiating position is approved everyone has a surprised pikachu face

The "proposal" was made something like 3 years ago, the killing never happened and the passing, if it passes, will happen in at least one year from now because this will definitely take a long time to get through parliament and even longer to get through the trilogue.

The process is many things but quick it is not

[zelphirkalt]

This is of course a process, that does not lend itself to be democratic, because it is way longer than most people's attention span. People don't manage to remember things that happened in politics 4 years ago in their own country. Now they are required to follow up on dozens of shitty proposals, all probably illegal in their own country, and those don't even happen in their own country? That divides the number of people, who even start looking into this stuff by a factor of 1000 or so.

[mejutoco]

Is there a website that tracks these? That would be a nice divulgation process.

[GeoAtreides]

what do you mean, a slow bureaucracy is a democratic bureaucracy. the last thing you want is a highly efficient bureaucracy enacting change quickly.

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[scrollaway]

People’s attention span has decreased to a matter of days now, if not hours. Have you seen how quickly front page news in the US is forgotten?

The democratic process needs a revamp but it shouldn’t be driven by the general populations attention span.

[squigz]

People on average are really not that stupid and are absolutely capable of looking back a few years for context.

[basisword]

>> that does not lend itself to be democratic, because it is way longer than most people's attention span

The attention span of the general public _shouldn't_ matter. That's why we elect politicians.

[andrepd]

> Because it doesn't, people are just embarrassingly ignorant of how the EU legislative process works

Hmm, now whose fault is it that the EU institutions are so complicated and opaque? The citizens? The journalists? Or maybe...?

[andriamanitra]

Complicated, sure, but opaque? EU is incredibly transparent – the amount of information on the European Council website [1] is daunting. There are vote results, meeting schedules, agendas, background briefs, lists of participants, reports, recordings of public council sessions, and so on and so on. All publicly available in each of the 24 EU official languages for whoever cares enough to look. And it's not just the council! The EU Treaties and Charter of Fundamental Rights of the EU gives any EU citizen the right to access documents possessed by EU institutions, bodies, offices and agencies (with a few exceptions for eg. public security and military matters) [2].

The problem is mostly the sheer amount of things going on, you couldn't possibly keep up with it all.

[1] https://www.consilium.europa.eu/

[2] https://www.ombudsman.europa.eu/en/document/en/163352

[arlort]

They're not complicated for anyone with above room temperature IQ. And they're almost identical to how it works in the member countries anyway

And in a democracy if you don't know how your own laws are made the fault is always yours as a voter

[surgical_fire]

> Hmm, now whose fault is it that the EU institutions are so complicated and opaque? The citizens? The journalists? Or maybe...?

They are not. People just don't bother themselves to spend half a calory in brain power to read even the Wikipedia page about it, and just repeat shit they read in forum posts.

I mean, here on HN, a website where people are supposedly slightly above average in terms of being able to read shit, the amount of times I read how EU is "bureacrats in Brussels" "pushing hard for changes" is weird.

[Xelbair]

The issue is not with the lack of understanding of "process". But sheer frustration because there's nothing you can do as just a citizen. An unelected council of !notAyatollah has decided, and this thing is being pushed at glacier slow pace.

If EU is a trade union this is a severe overreach, if EU wants to be a federation, there's not enough checks and balances. This is the crux of the problem.

The issue is that this is a legislation that only ones in power want(censorship on communications channel where they themselves are exempt from it), that has been pushed over and over again under different names(it goes so far back - it started with ACTA talks and extreme surveillance proposals to fight copyright violations) and details in implementation and/or excuse(this time we get classic "think of the children")

[saubeidl]

The Council is a meeting of the heads of state, all of which are elected in their respective countries.

Your problem is with the leadership of countries, not with the EU as an institution. I agree that it is a problem btw, but I think you got the wrong culprit. This isn't pushed on the states by the EU, this is the states using the EU to push it and launder the bad publicity.