Completed consultations

The 2019 consultation on the directives gathered 1,840 contributions and led to the addition of a proportionality clause and a transitional regime. The 2022 one on the digital market brought together 2,100 contributions and led to setting the identification threshold at €1,000, after considering €500.

The 2023 consultation on checklists made it possible to reduce the checkpoints from seventeen to twelve, which small galleries found too many.

Three lessons emerge. Small operators are under-represented in the first consultations, which led to creating suitable channels of participation — local meetings, oral contributions. Concrete contributions are more useful than general positions. Finally, States respond more when the stakes touch their institutions.

The systematic publication of the reply is considered essential by 91% of contributors surveyed: it gives the sense that participation is not in vain.

Consultations have an effect that goes beyond OIMAP. Several States have drawn on them for their own transposition procedures and adopted similar rules on public participation. Universities study them as an example of open governance in an international organisation.

This influence strengthens the legitimacy of the texts adopted and favours their application, because the players who took part in drafting them recognise themselves in them more readily.