An Agency of the EU for democratic quality and participation

Abstract The article suggests creating a new Agency at the EU level focused on the democratic quality of EU decision‐making processes and democratic participation in it. The Agency would be tasked with three roles corresponding to 11 goals: institutionalising citizens' panels, organising national parliaments' cooperation and providing structure and expertise to assess the democratic quality of decisions taken at the EU level. The statutory nature of the Agency appears to be essential for the proposal to be successful given its independence vis‐à‐vis other EU institutions and, to a lesser extent, its expertise on democratic issues.