While the European Union (EU) has become increasingly crucial for the life and the work of its 450M citizens, the European integration process itself has historically been characterized by cyclical crises. While looking back, it is clear that economic and political tensions have previously opened new opportunities for widening and deepening the EU's integration. The present crisis seems different. A long-term falling trend of public trust in national and EU institutions has been undermining the European integration process and more recently “citizen dissatisfaction with national governments and disaffection from the EU has been on the rise” (Schmidt, 2015, p.57). The EU has had to face a long-lasting economic crisis, accompanied by the rise of populist and anti-EU parties that have been present in the European Parliament since the last two legislatures. Today, and on top of the political crisis described earlier, for the first time in the history of the EU, an unexpected force of disruption, such as the health crisis caused by the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic, has contributed to create an unprecedented critical situation for the European Union.
Aware of this epochal conjuncture, European leaders and Policy Makers have called for "The Future of Europe'' conference. This Conference should help to address the crisis openly, enlarge the participation of European citizens in European governance, and ultimately define the fundamental values and principles that have shaped the European communities, whose building “has always been plagued by uncertainty” (Williams, 2009, p.551). Following the delay caused by the COVID-19 pandemic outbreak, the debate is now restarting with renewed energies. Recently, the European Commission has launched the European Democracy Action Plan (EDAP) to counter disinformation and the rise of extremism and nurture pluralism in the European public space. Media, politics, and Institutions are all involved in contrasting the rise of extremism and reducing the distance between people and politicians, strengthening media freedom, and fighting disinformation. The EDAP tries to connect traditional goals pursued by the institutions over time: citizens’ empowerment and participation, transparency, innovation as institutional tools to improve internal cohesion in the European Public Sphere.
