Last week's summit of direct democracy experts in Salzburg, sponsored by the Initiative and Referendum Institute Europe and an Austrian law institute, produced a series of recommendations for the European Union on how to implement the first transnational ballot initiative in the world. The initiative power is part of the Lisbon Treaty, a European constitutional reform that is likely to be adopted later this year. (The Irish have been holding it up).

This European initiative is not a full citizen's initiative, which produces a binding popular vote on substantial. It's what Americans might call an "indirect initiative" -- it only forces the EU parliament to consider proposals.

There were two iitems of interest in this "Salzburg Manifesto" to anyone who follows direct democracy: 

-Access. The summit manifesto calls for reducing the number of countries that must sign onto an initiative for it to move forward. It also suggests providing more time for collecting signatures, which would make the process more open and less costly.

-Digital signatures. The manifesto argues for permitting signature gathering over the Internet, and urges the EU to set up systems to do this. If such a signature gathering model emerges in Europe, it might be adapted here in the U.S. States prohibit such electronic signature gathering, but the idea is attractive because it could reduce the expense of qualifying measures for the ballot.

For those interested in learning more, the full Salzburg Manifesto is attached to this post.