Advanced information and communications technologies (ICT) are one of
the pillars on which to develop the political cohesion of the European
Information Society. It is therefore crucial that the elected
representative of the European citizen, the MPs of the member states,
actively shape the discussion on how to develop and to apply these
technologies in the interest of good democratic governance in Europe.
The annual EPRI (European Parliaments Research Initiative) conference
facilitates the exchange of MPs on ICT-related topics and aims to
expose its participants to general and specific IST issues and debates.
The relevance of the EPRI conference is based on the combination of
exchanging experiences, vision building and leadership development.
The EPRI initiative already exists since 1999 and has developed into an
self-sustained network of stakeholders with knowledge and experiences
in ICT-related decision making..
So far, eighth EPRI conferences have taken place in:
In March 1999 under the patronage of Laurent Fabius, the French
National Assembly organised the first European Conference of Members of
Parliament on Information and Communication Technologies. Since then,
parliamentarians from EU member states interested in information
communication technologies (ICTs) have participated in eighth EPRI
conferences. Each conference sought to highlight the opportunities
offered by ICT for both Members of the European Parliament and Members
of National Parliaments. The conferences centered on discussions about
strategies, best practices and recent developments in ICTs. Other
issues included how ICT can act as a tool for democracy in member
states and how ICT can contribute to a more democratic process of
decision-making between citizens and their representatives through
increasing the visibility of parliamentarian work.
The EPRI conferences were organised by the EPRI secretariat which
became part of the EPRI knowledge project in August 2004. EPRI
knowledge is a European project - financed by the European Commission -
which aims to promote debate and the exchange of viewpoints on
information society technologies between European parliamentarians’.
EPRI knowledge will build on the EPRI Initiative through organising
EPRI conferences and workshops and carrying out studies and reports on
different aspects of ICT. The results of these studies give a valuable
first-hand input to the EPRI conferences which will take place annually
over a three-year period.
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