Competing for consultation: Civil society and conflict between the European Commission and the European Parliament

Bouwen, Pieter

doi:10.1080/01402380701239715

Cited by 21 publications

(10 citation statements)

References 19 publications

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“…This consultation regime lacks a formal legal basis and (most importantly) third party adjudication, while its design was the subject of informal bargaining between the Commission and the Parliament at its outset (Bouwen ). The formal decision‐making power to design and redesign this informal institution rests solely with the EU institutions (mainly the Commission), while the affected actors lack any formal decision power, although they are indeed widely and formally consulted on this issue as shown here (Kohler‐Koch & Finke : 209).…”

Section: Designing a Stakeholder Consultation Regime For The Eu: Biasmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The European Union operates one of the most elaborate and ambitious consultative regimes. Formalised as a policy practice in the beginning of the 2000s (‘White Paper on European Governance’), the EU consultation regime stirred controversy from its very inception: the Commission and the European Parliament debated the institutional arrangements governing it and its potential to boost the bargaining success of the former in the legislative decision‐making process (Bouwen ). Its policy relevance and impact on policy outcomes, as well as its capacity to deliver a legitimate, open, transparent, inclusive and evidence‐based policy‐making process were often questioned (Quittkat ; Quittkat & Kotzian ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Designing stakeholder consultations: Reinforcing or alleviating bias in the European Union system of governance?

Bunea

2016

European J Political Res

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Consultations with stakeholders are a policy instrument widely used by policy makers to design policies and prepare legislative proposals across national and supranational systems of government. The European Union has recently reviewed its stakeholder consultation regime and asked for stakeholders’ policy input. This offers an opportunity to examine empirically stakeholders’ own evaluation of the regime and to ask a fundamental question about its democratic credentials: Do stakeholders recognise the EU consultation regime as reinforcing bias in interest representation by benefiting policy insiders, or conversely as an instrument that alleviates bias in supranational policy making? Building on rational choice institutionalism, this article outlines the potential distributional outcomes of the regime and argues that they are likely to vary along the lines of a classic divide in policy making that opposes policy insiders to outsiders. Two competing narratives are discussed in relation to the expected direction of this variation by focusing on insiders’ incentives to support or oppose the regime. The observable implications are tested empirically on an original dataset containing information about stakeholders’ positions on the evaluation of the regime status quo, its proposed further institutionalisation and their recommendations for change. The findings describe a consultation regime that seems to have created conditions alleviating bias in stakeholders’ participation in supranational policy making. This is evident in the lack of systematic, significant differences between insiders and outsiders in the evaluation of the consultation regime. Where differences do occur, they are consistent with the image of a consultation regime that has not reinforced bias in favour of policy insiders. These actors are found to be more critical of the regime status quo, its institutionalisation and more inclined to recommend policy improvements. This supports an optimistic view over the democratic credentials and legitimacy of the EU consultation regime and outlines an additional scenario under which policy actors that are traditionally associated with exerting more power and influence find themselves stripped of their privileged position in the context of European supranational governance.

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Section: Designing a Stakeholder Consultation Regime For The Eu: Biasmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Designing stakeholder consultations: Reinforcing or alleviating bias in the European Union system of governance?

Bunea

2016

European J Political Res

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“…27 27 The debate following the publication of the White Paper has been particularly violent within these two institutions. For detailed studies, see Delcourt (2007) and Bouwen (2007). …”

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confidence: 99%

The social construction of the participatory turn: The emergence of a norm in the European Union

Saurugger¹

2010

European J Political Res

177

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At the beginning of the 1990s a new discourse emerged at the European Union level, insisting on the necessity of ‘civil society’ participation in decision‐making processes. Based on a ‘strategic‐constructivist’ research design, this article addresses the question of the emergence of this participatory turn in the official discourse and its transformation into a norm. It argues that the continued activism of an elite forum, consisting of political and administrative actors as well as academics, created the momentum that brought the concerned actors to accept the participatory norm and to play the roles required by it. However, due to internal competition amongst norm entrepreneurs, and a changed political situation, this norm is still contested, making it difficult to assess how its implementation will function.

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“…This document is available on the European Commission's website (European Commission 2001). For an interesting discussion on the competition among EU institutions for civil society input see Bouwen (2007). 10 On multi-level governance within the EU see Bache and Flinders (2005), Hooghe and Marks (2001) and Bernard (2002).…”

Section: Conclusion -Themes and Prioritiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Religion and European Integration: Predominant Themes and Emerging Research Priorities

Houston

2011

Religion Compass

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Even before the controversy over the Invocatio Dei, proposed for inclusion in the preamble to the European Union’s defunct Draft Constitution, the role of religion in European integration had moved toward the centre of political consciousness. As early as 1992 the then European Commission President, Jacques Delors, had stated that ‘If in the next twenty years we have not given a soul to Europe, given it spirituality and meaning, then the game will be up’.1 Throughout the remainder of his tenure, and beyond it, corporate religion was given an increasingly prominent role in strategic and affective considerations of further European integration. This new role for religious associations has now been incorporated into the recently ratified Lisbon Treaty, where ‘open, transparent and regular dialogue’ has been formally established. The article will consider the question of European integration and the role of ‘public’ religion within this by disentangling two predominating thematic approaches, and thereafter discussing their inter‐ (and intra‐) thematic tensions along with the potential avenues that they offer for future research.

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Competing for consultation: Civil society and conflict between the European Commission and the European Parliament

Cited by 21 publications

References 19 publications

Designing stakeholder consultations: Reinforcing or alleviating bias in the European Union system of governance?

Designing stakeholder consultations: Reinforcing or alleviating bias in the European Union system of governance?

The social construction of the participatory turn: The emergence of a norm in the European Union

Religion and European Integration: Predominant Themes and Emerging Research Priorities

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