European citizens have the right to ask the Commission to propose legislation on a matter on which they consider that an EU legal act is required for the purpose of implementing the Treaties.
As prerequisites, the request must be within the scope of the Commission’s legal powers and the organizers of the initiative must collected at least one million supporting signatures from at least seven Member States.
In case of a successful initiative, the Commission responds by way of a communication. In the communication, it assesses the initiative from legal and political perspective and outlines the actions it intends to take, if any, its reasons for doing so and the envisaged timeline for these actions.
Detailed information on ECIs is available on the dedicated Commission's ECI webpage, and in the ECI-Regulation.