Theoretical and Legal Basis of Public Consultations in Ukraine

One of the methods of involving the public in the formation of public policy, which is widely used in democratic countries, is public consultation. It is a tool that develops dialogue and trust between all participants in this process and makes the development and adoption of reforms more relevant to the demands of their consumers. The culture of public consultations in Ukraine is only gaining popularity, and therefore it is very important to form the conceptual, methodological and legal basis of this participation mechanism. Foreign and domestic approaches to understanding public consultations are considered. On their basis, the key characteristics of public consultations were formed, namely: the two-way nature of communication between a public institution and interested citizens; application both during the development of policies and at the stages of their updating and implementation; completeness by the adoption of a decision or the adoption of a normative legal act, which necessarily takes into account the suggestions of the public; initiation of the consultation by issuing an official document by the authority (resolution, order, etc.) that describes in detail the content and terms of the public consultation; the obligation to include in the target audiences of public consultations citizens, groups of persons, legal entities that are tangential to this policy, who will be the first to use the services that will arise as a result of the implementation of the policy, as well as independent experts and representatives of public organizations. The history of the formation of Ukrainian legislation on public consultations is analysed. The differences between the current draft of the Law on Public Consultations compared to the 2016 draft are highlighted, namely: the presence of a non-exhaustive list of subjects of power; identification of parties interested in public consultations; supplementing the forms of conducting public consultations with targeted consultations; replacement of the Information Register of interested persons with an online platform for interaction with citizens and institutions of civil society; lack of disciplinary responsibility for violation of the requirements of the law for officials of subjects of power, who are responsible for conducting public consultations; reducing the number of principles of conducting public consultations from seven to six and adding the principle of proportionality instead of the principles of the rule of law and legality. It has been established that the procedure for conducting them proposed in the draft Law on public consultations meets international standards and good practices and existing theoretical and methodological developments and covers the following stages: drawing up a plan for conducting public consultations; drawing up a consultation document; publication of a consultation document; provision of informing interested parties about holding public consultations; holding events within the framework of public consultations; publication of proposals received during public consultations; study and analysis of proposals; publication of the report on the results of public consultations and the final draft of the regulatory and legal document.