The first two real problems of European public concern on www.public-policies.eu

The first two problems of European public concern on www.public-policies.eu

The first two real problems of European public concern have been published on www.public-policies.eu. Now, everybody can give solutions and ideas to the issues of Mass adoption of e-invoicing within the European Union and the EU strategy for the Danube Region.

As the European citizen engagement platform is developing and coming to its final version, it comes natural for me to publish the first two real problems. I did a little research on two issues that seem to be hot during these days. I have to admit though that I am not a specialist in e-Invoicing and in the development of the Danube region, but this is not really important under “SMART Method of Public Policy.” The only thing that matters is the will to solve a problem of public concern. So here I am, taking the first step towards bringing the voice of the citizens closer to the decision makers on these two issues. If you have a good idea about these topics, please feel free to offer your input on the newly created webpages of Mass adoption of e-invoicing within the European Union and the EU strategy for the Danube Region. “SMART Method of Public Policy” has five steps that can be checked out at http://public-policies.eu/index.php/a/Description_14.

February 28, 2010  Tags: , , , ,   Posted in: 1 SMART Method of Public Policy  No Comments

PhD research regarding entrepreneurship in the South-East region of Romania

CA TINEA recent research activity conducted over 117 medium-sized enterprises from the South – East region of Romania has revealed the following:

  • The majority of the employees of the companies that were interviewed do not participate in training courses related to project management and personal development. However, company administrators consider that such courses are useful to increase competitiveness in times of economic and financial crises.
  • Personnel under 40 years of age suffer from a lack of professional training and dedication to job requirements.
  • Companies have expressed an interest in accessing European Union funding. However, they do not have complete information that would allow them to start a project and finalize it. This lack of information is mainly due to lack of access to specialists who would write the projects and submit them. The majority of entrepreneurs consider they can not write the projects themselves but on the other hand, they are not aware of consulting companies or other organizations that could help them. Their main information source is the mass-media.

As a result, companies have adjusted to the effects of the economic crisis, diminishing their activity and laying off people, decreasing the running expenses and stopping investing in their development. These measures have generated increased social unrest.

This report has been done with Cristi Dumitru, Communication Manager at Lower Danube University of Galati, Romania.

February 22, 2010  Tags: , ,   Posted in: 6 My PhD in Economics  No Comments

The European Voluntary Service, a great opportunity for participation

European Voluntary Service Training Course, Predeal, 3-7 february 2010

European Voluntary Service Training Course, Predeal, 3-7 february 2010

Last week, I attended a training course about the opportunities offered by the European Voluntary Service (EVS). The European Commission allows organizations to host volunteers from other countries in a learning program of up to one year. The themes are numerous and community development is one of them.

The EVS offers great perspectives for SMART Development Centre, as it may engage European volunteers in thematic citizen engagement projects, using the European participation platform at www.public-policies.eu and the Romanian participation one at www.politicipublice.ro. Besides the pretty big complexity of the Program, volunteers could bring great value to our future participation endeavors. In addition, they could develop their community engagement skills, so this experience would definitely be a two-way learning process.

Any Romanian host organization receives a lump sum of eur420 per volunteer per month, to cover administrative costs as well as food and accommodation for the volunteer. This is pretty decent given that the amount is higher than the average sallary in Romania.

I will write again about our future EVS program once SMART Development Centre is accredited as a host and coordinating organization. Congrats to the organizers, the Romanian National Agency for the Youth in Action Program and the facilitators (also because I had 20 minutes to present SMART Method of Public Policy :) ).  More details at www.anpcdefp.ro.

February 13, 2010  Tags: ,   Posted in: 3 Training Courses and Seminars  No Comments

Test the citizen engagement platform at www.public-policies.eu: STEP 3

Once a problem’s page is generated, any person interested in the problem in question can offer a solution, filling in the “solution form” at the bottom of the page. The scoop is for the problem to receive as many solutions as possible. These are filtered according to the three criteria (valuable, feasible and sustainable) by the partner organizations. Once a solution is chosen, one of the organizations issues an official policy paper that asks the target public institution to solve the problem and consider the solution. This policy is uploaded on the problem’s page. Once the public institution issues a response, this one is also published on the same problem’s page. At this moment, the problem poster has two options:

  • Either approve the response and thus close the problem’s page.
  • Or disapprove the response. In this case he/she will state the reasons and the participation process is started again.

The page of a closed problem on www.public-policies.eu

The page of a closed problem on www.public-policies.eu

February 8, 2010  Tags: , ,   Posted in: 1 SMART Method of Public Policy, 2 Participative Democracy  No Comments

Test the citizen engagement platform at www.public-policies.eu: STEP 2

Once the “Problem identification form” is submitted and an administrator aproves it, a script generates the “Problem’s page” as seen in the picture below.  At the top, there is the name of the category of the problem, the title of the problem and a “share” widget that allows for easier dissemination over the Internet. The body of the page contains the photo of the problem, a photo of the problem-poster with hyperlink towards his/her website, the name of the problem poster, his/her profession, organization, the date when the problem was posted, the target institution to solve the problem, and a status bar. This tells the visitor how far away in the participation process is the problem, according to the following legend:

  • Red: the problem has been approved by an administrator.
  • Orange: the problem has received at least one solution.
  • Yellow: the project partners have published a policy paper.
  • Light green: the target institution has issued a response.
  • Dark green: the problem poster is satisfied with the answer or the action of the target institution.

The lower part of the problem’s page contains the form that allows citizens to publish their solutions to the problem of public concern in question.

Tip: Once you publish a problem, use the “share” widget to promote your problem in order to get as many solutions as possible.

The problem page, on www.public-policies.eu

The page of a problem of public concern, on www.public-policies.eu

January 31, 2010  Tags: , ,   Posted in: 1 SMART Method of Public Policy, 2 Participative Democracy  No Comments

Test the citizen engagement platform at www.public-policies.eu: STEP 1

The online citizen engagement platform available at www.public-policies.eu allows you to publish a problem of European public concern and offer your solutions to the problems already published. We are currently testing the work that the programmers have done so far and invite you to check it out. We are interested in the overall feeling of the participation experience. The platform serves “SMART Method of Public Policy” described here.

The first step is to raise a problem of European public concern, click-ing on the “Raise a problem” link:

Raise a problem of European public concern

Raise a problem of European public concern

Then, fill out the “Raise a problem of public concern” link. Instructions are on the right-hand side of the online form:

Raise a problem of European public concern

Raise a problem of European public concern

January 24, 2010  Tags: , ,   Posted in: 1 SMART Method of Public Policy, 2 Participative Democracy  One Comment

“Democracy is fulfilling dreams” officially accepted for competition

Democracy Video Challenge 2010

Democracy Video Challenge 2010

The two-minute clip “Democracy is fulfilling dreams” has been officially accepted for competition in the Democracy Video Challenge 2010 and is up for Round 1.  It is also now live on the contest page, at http://www.youtube.com/democracychallenge. Here is what follows next (Source: the rules of the contest):

Round 1: Contest Sponsors will evaluate Video Submissions at the country level. Three videos from each country will be nominated to the semifinalist pool. Round 1 judging will be completed on or about March 31, 2010.

Round 2: An independent panel of judges comprised of film experts and democracy and youth organizations will evaluate the semifinalists. They will choose three finalists from each of the six world geographic regions as defined by the U.S. Department of State (Western Hemisphere, East Asia Pacific, Europe, Africa, Near East, South & Central Asia) and three anonymous finalists for a total of twenty-one finalists, which will be revealed on the Contest site (www.youtube.com/democracychallenge) on or about May 15, 2010.

Round 3: The twenty-one finalist Video Submissions will be posted on the Contest site in mid-May 2010, and the general public will have until 11:59:59 GMT, June15, 2010 to vote (one vote per person per day) for their favorite videos using YouTube’s rating system, based on the criteria set forth above. One grand prize winner from each of the six world geographic regions, as defined by the U.S. Department of State, and one anonymous winner will be selected on or around June 18, 2010.

The winner could be you!

Well, in case you missed my clip, here it is again :):

January 20, 2010  Tags: , ,   Posted in: 2 Participative Democracy  No Comments

My video for the Democracy Video Challenge 2010: Democracy is fulfilling dreams

The challenge is to create a short video that completes the phrase “Democracy is …” Winners will be selected from every continent to meet in the United States. It took me all day to interview 16 people about their dreams, create the clip and register it in the contest. It was fun, though pretty tiresome. I will let you watch it to see what is the scoop between democracy and dreams.

This is a wonderful project idea made by a consortium of organizations: the Center for International Private Enterprise, the International Youth Foundation, NBC Universal, the National Democratic Institute, the International Republican Institute, the Motion Picture Association of America, New York University, the Recording Industry Association of America, Tisch School of the Arts, TakingITGlobal, the University of Southern California’s Annenberg School for Communication & Journalism, and the U.S. Department of State. The official website of the project is http://www.videochallenge.america.gov/

January 17, 2010  Tags: , , ,   Posted in: 2 Participative Democracy  No Comments

Invitation to test the participation platform on www.Public-Policies.eu

Public Policies Made by Citizens (Europe)

Public Policies Made by Citizens (Europe)

This post is indeed an invitation to anybody interested in the field of “participative democracy.” I am developing the citizen engagement platform “public policies made by citizens” together with partners from Romania, Italy, France and Greece. We managed to win a grant from the European Commission’s Youth in Action Programme. My first important deadline for this year is to have it ready by February 1. So, here’s what I invite you to do:

  1. First, choose any problem of European concern and make sure you know how to explain it.
  2. Then, go to www.public-policies.eu and click on the “Raise a problem” link (let me know if it is easy to find).
  3. In the next step, fill out the form, click “Add” and let me know if it is reasonably easy to publish the problem.
  4. Once the problem is approved by me, you will receive an email. Please, let me know if you receive that email and if you like it.
  5. Visit the page of the problem and let me know if it has a coherent layout, which is easy to understand and use.

Now, start doing some outreach using the “SHARE” widget, to have friends or just other people post solutions to your problem, filling in the online form from the problem’s page.

This would be all for the moment. The entire method of participation is explained in the menu, under “SMART Method of Public Policy” at www.public-policies.eu.

January 7, 2010  Tags: , , ,   Posted in: 1 SMART Method of Public Policy, 2 Participative Democracy  No Comments

A Day in Bran

Bran Castle and Bran Customs Museum

Bran Castle and Bran Customs Museum

I am spending the New Year in Bran, my most favorite resort in Romania. Together with some close friends of mine, have decided to learn some new things about this fascinating place that gave birth to the legend of Dracula and that is very rich in history. The first interesting place that we discovered was a small cript that once hosted the heart of Queen Mary of Romania. She was so in love with Bran, that she wanted to leave her heart here.

Bran Castle overlooks the road of Bran, which was considered to be the most important merchant road that linked Transylvania to Wallachia, two of the three principalities of Romania. On this road, linked to the most important European mercantile roads, intense commerce took place between the Orient and Western Europe. When passing through the Bran Valley, the merchants had to pay a customs duty called “tricesima,” equal to 3.3 percent of the value of their merchandise.

Photo Gallery: Bran Castle, Bran Customs Museum, the cript where the heart of Queen Mary of Romania was deposited in 1940.

The Romanian Government gave Bran Castle to the Habsburg family this year. From my point of view this was not fair, as the Castle was given by the Municipality of Brasov to the Royal Family in the 1920s, when they were crowned. All the pieces of furniture were moved inside the new Bran Customs Museum. The Romanians pay a rent of 10,000 euro a month for the building. Here is what was moved from the Castle:

I passed through Bran Valley many times, but I never realized that the ruins of the walls that once guarded the Bran Customs are still standing. They used to separate Transylvania from Wallachia. Now, unfortunatelly, they are not marked properly and not used for touristic purposes. So, you need to pay attention to find them.

Photo Gallery: the ruins of the wall that defended the Bran Customs and that divided Transylvania from Wallachia.

Further resources about Bran: Bran Castle Museum, Wikipedia, On the Footsteps of Dracula.

December 31, 2009  Tags: , , ,   Posted in: 4 Travels  No Comments