*** Democracies Online Newswire - http://www.e-democracy.org/do *** I have now returned from one of my recent "e-democracy walk-about" and vacation with almost no Internet access. I encouraged a number of people I met along the way to send in 500 word articles on innovative and important "e-democracy" projects. Below is the first article. It introduces the EU-StudentVote effort which will run a binding supra-national election for an EU-wide representative student body via the Internet next fall. Steven Clift Democracies Online Written for DO-WIRE by the President of EU-StudentVote, Franck Biancheri <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>. EU-StudentVote.Org First European-Wide Online Election -EU-StudentVote - Voting open to 25 million European students The EU-StudentVote project, the first online election of a European student council, announced today the launch of its web site - http://www.eu-studentvote.org. The revolutionary project, which is open to 25 million EU students, is intended to help position the European Union as a leader in 'e-democracy' and to address the critical issues of Euro-democracy and Euro-citizenship. The council, to be elected at the end of November 2001, will serve as the prime interlocutor between European institutions and university students in the matter of education policies. To promote the first online election ever realized at a European level, EU-StudentVote's organizers have developed an extensive web site. The site, currently available in French, English and German, provides background information on EU-StudentVote, guidelines to participate in the project, and information about how to become an official sponsor. All other information will be available in the eleven official EU languages by July. As part of the EU-StudentVote 'campaign' site, EU-StudentVote will create several forums addressing issues related to the project: a Recruitment European Virtual Exhibition (REVE), where companies will be able to communicate their objectives and job offers to millions of students; university-focused fairs organized around student services and activities; and two 'virtual fairs' dedicated to e-democracy and e-learning. Ultimately, EU-StudentVote expects to attract about 15 million visitors to the 'campaign website', and motivate 1 million voters to express their opinion online. EU-StudentVote is dedicated to raising European students awareness of their representative associations and of critical issues related to European higher education. Currently, about 95% of European students do not recognize the names of active student organisations at the European level. EU-StudentVote organizers are encouraged, however, by the project's reception thus far. EU-StudentVote was launched in front of 2,000 enthusiastic European students and several EU leaders during the Newropeans 2000 Congress last October; the congress website has received 1 million visitors. The student council will be elected directly by European students voting from any computer with Internet access, over a three to four day period. Sociologists will follow and assess the entire election process in order to inform future research and projects on Euro- voting and e-voting in general. About EU-StudentVote EU-StudentVote, a non-profit organisation created to manage the project, was founded by four key players from complementary fields: Election.com (The Comprehensive Election Solutions Company), the CNRS (French National Research Center) and research teams from the other 14 Member-States), Prometheus-Europe (a European NGO which organised a few months ago the Newropeans 2000) and Europe 2020 (a leading European think-tank very involved in the issues of democratising the European Union). As British Prime Minister Tony Blair said: "We need to harness email and the Internet to make ourselves more accessible to our citizens. EU-StudentVote will set an excellent example." EU-StudentVote: "Students cannot change the world today … but they can definitely change tomorrow's world." Contact information: Mélanie Blanchard, Corporate Partnerships: +33-1-58-17-06-54; [EMAIL PROTECTED] Adrienn Kiraly, Promotion/Communication: +33-1-42-22-88-61; [EMAIL PROTECTED] Ingvill Alisoy, Universities/Registration Authorities/Candidates: +33-1-42-22-88-61; [EMAIL PROTECTED] ^ ^ ^ ^ Steven L. Clift - W: http://www.publicus.net Minneapolis - - - E: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Minnesota - - - - - T: +1.612.822.8667 USA - - - - - - - ICQ: 13789183 *** Please send submissions to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] *** *** To subscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] *** *** Message body: SUB DO-WIRE *** *** To unsubscribe instead, write: UNSUB DO-WIRE *** *** Please forward this post to others and encourage *** *** them to subscribe to the free DO-WIRE service. ***
