The institutional reform process needs to be seen in the bigger picture of the European Citizens’ Initiative and the many flaws that its application has revealed. Since becoming operational on 1 April 2012, 52 ECI proposals have been submitted to the European Commission, yet only three of them managed to fulfil all requirements to be successfully submitted to the Commission (‘Water as a Human Right’, ‘One of us’ and ‘Stop Vivisection’). Since 2012 the number of submitted ECIs has been progressively decreasing: while 2012 saw 23 ECIs be submitted, in 2015 there have been only two ECI proposals.

In view of the upcoming votes on the European Citizens' Initiative Democracy International has a compiled background dossier.