To promote the European Local Democracy Week (ELDW) among local and regional authorities, a webinar, organised by the Congress on 4 October 2022, brought together ELDW national coordinators and participating municipalities from Europe, Morocco and Tunisia, with the participation of Congress Thematic Spokesperson on the ELDW Bryony Rudkin (United Kingdom, SOC/G/PD) and Congress Secretary General Andreas Kiefer.
ELDW participants presented their initiatives aimed at providing local responses to environmental and climate challenges, in line with this year's ELDW theme, "Protecting the environment: local communities take action" and with the Congress’ priorities for 2021-2026. “Environmental disasters have hit us hard over the past year, and these events only reinforce our commitment to act to mitigate environmental crises and their consequences. Resilience must be embedded in the foundation of our communities and built from the bottom up”, Congress Spokesperson Bryony Rudkin stressed.
Representatives from municipalities in Germany, Portugal and Türkiye delivered presentations on sustainability and resilience, providing their own good practices and examples of citizen engagement at local level in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, climate change, polarisation and extremism. Moreover, the meeting provided an opportunity to discuss proposals for the ELDW’s biennial theme for 2023-2024, centred around the idea of democratic resilience.
Participants also heard presentations on the World Forum for Democracy, to be organised by the Council of Europe from 7 to 9 November in Strasbourg under the theme “Democracy: A New Hope?”, and on youth engagement in response to current challenges from Congress Youth Delegate Nina Koistinen (Ireland).
ELDW flagship events will be held during the week of 15 October – a date chosen as a tribute to the European Charter of Local Self-Government, which opened for signature on this date in 1985.
The European Local Democracy Week (ELDW) is a pan-European initiative co-ordinated by the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities of the Council of Europe since 2007. Throughout the year, municipalities and their national associations are invited to organise initiatives all over Europe aimed at promoting citizen participation, fostering dialogue between the community and public authorities, strengthening trust in elected representatives and institutions and providing a European dimension to local initiatives. A flagship event takes place during the week of 15 October, the date of the signature of the European Charter of Local Self-Government in 1985.
