The European citizens' initiative allows one million EU citizens to participate directly in the development of EU policies, by calling on the European Commission to make a legislative proposal. The 1st April 2012 marks the launch of European Citizens' Initiatives, which was introduced by the Lisbon Treaty. From that day, a million citizens from across Europe can come together on an issue that is important to them, and ask the Commission to do something about it.

Registering initiatives is a key early step in the process. The request must be made by a citizens' committee made up of at least seven EU citizens who are resident in at least seven different EU Member States. Once registered, the committee will have 12 months to collect the necessary statements of support from at least seven Member States. The threshold to count as one of those seven Member States is fixed at 750 times the number of MEPs for that Member State. Anyone of voting age for European Parliament elections can support an initiative.
The number of statements of support has to be certified by the competent authorities in the Member States. The Commission will then have three months to examine the initiative and decide how to act on it. It will meet the organisers so they can explain the issues raised in their initiative in more depth. The organisers will also have the opportunity to present their initiative at a public hearing organised at the European Parliament. The Commission will then adopt a Communication explaining its conclusions on the initiative, what action it intends to take, if any, and its reasoning.

More information: http://ec.europa.eu/citizens-initiative/public/welcome?lg=en