Citizens’ legislative initiative as an institution of deliberative democracy and an expression of constitutional consciousness

Abstract

The paper is a partial result of the research on importance and scale of constitutional consciousness, in the context of citizen’s participation in power, particularly in law making process. It has been based on the assumption, that the institution of citizens’ legislative initiative provided in the Constitution has become a significant tool of civic participation in power in a democratic state of law. Such institution, in turn, assumes a liaison, a deliberation between the citizens and the authorities which is truly available only if a society is interested in participating in public life. Deliberative democracy becomes real under twofold condition: the citizens are conscious of their constitutional rights and also aware of the changes needed at the political and economical level. The most valuable benefits from citizens’ legislative initiative are: running an election campaign (getting signatures for a petition); passing the information about the project; exchanging views and opinions in a discussion (also through the media). The paper points out lacks and week-points of currently binding legislation that may limit the effectiveness of such institution. What is more: the final content of the legislation depends on the political factors – the parliament. Regarding the low trust-level for public authorities and politicians, the citizens’ participation in the law making process is hardly significant. Nevertheless, the general potential of citizens’ legislative initiative to manifest the constitutional principles of rule of law and sovereignty in practice – is undeniable. Modern democratic state of law shall strengthen the citizens’ consciousness and empower them to implement the constitutional right for citizens’ legislative initiative. The paper leads to the conclusion, that the lone consciousness is not enough and it shall be followed by communication and interactions between citizens and political decisional bodies