He who controls the process controls the outcome? A reappraisal of the relais actor thesis

Abstract

In the early years of co-decision, scholars posited that informal trilogues would empower individual negotiators vis-à-vis their respective institutions because of their privileged position in the process of EU legislative decision-making. Now that the procedural framework governing trilogues has been tightened significantly in recent years particularly with the aim of controlling the negotiators, this article investigates if individual negotiators can still exercise control over the process of decision-making, biasing end results towards their own preferences. Based on a case study of the EU's fourth Railway Package, we conclude that this is indeed the case. Applying a new conceptual frame for analysing informal negotiations, we present first conclusion as to how chief negotiators can manipulate negotiations processes to achieve preferred results in this specific but influential forum of negotiations.

Trilogues in Council: disrupting the diplomatic culture?

“…Rather than adding one extra player to the Council's game, trilogues thus make the member states interact with a much larger set of actors than only their fellows in the Council, and also with different purposes. Whilst the traditional image of Council negotiations is bargaining, deliberation, or some mixture thereof between working party attachés or the ambassadors in Coreper (Kaniok, 2016;Warntjen, 2010), we now also see strong evidence of lobbying members of the EP after a loss in the Council (e.g., Brandsma & Hoppe, 2020), as well as using the same contacts to monitor the Presidency and contain any agency losses.…”

“…Trilogues institutionalize self-restraint through urging MEPs to moderate their demands and through limiting public scrutiny into the legislative process. In turn, this deprives the EP from one of its strongest sources of legitimacy and therefore political significance (Curtin & Leino, 2017), and some research provides evidence that MEPs have indeed moderated their claims (Brandsma & Hoppe, 2020;Burns & Carter, 2010). The density of Council-EP interaction in and around trilogues has allegedly provided many opportunities for the Council to socialize MEPs into this myth and disseminate professional norms attuned to the Council's culture (Burns & Carter, 2010).…”

“…This has happened to some extent under the pressure of the EP and organized interests, but it would be mistaken to assume that the EP has spearheaded these changes exclusively. Member states, too, have been agents of change in making trilogues permeable (e.g., Brandsma & Hoppe, 2020), paradoxically undermining the norm of confidentiality that is cardinal for the Council working method. Hence, in view of these organizational and normative changes in the Council's institutional environment we should take seriously the possibility that the Council has adapted its internal workings to these inter-institutional changes (cf.…”

Talkin’ ‘bout a Negotiation: (Un)Transparent Rapporteurs’ Speeches in the European Parliament

“…In other words, if MEPs' interventions are linked to rapporteurs' initial speeches, the extent to which rapporteurs discuss the negotiation process might affect the extent to which this process is further debated by the whole plenary. Rapporteurs' speeches are in this way crucial to the transparency and legitimacy of the European legislative process; the information that they do or do not share influences the way the EP exercises its powers (Brandsma & Hoppe, 2020). In practice, this means that rapporteurs advise fellow MEPs on the need to uphold the EP's positions vis-à-vis the Commission and the Council and/or to accept the position of one or the other of these institutions (Lord, 2018, p. 7).…”

Inside the black box of trilogues: introduction to the special issue

“…Second, academic debates have evolved from an early focus on processes of informalisation (Farrell andHéritier 2004, Shackleton andRaunio 2003), via institutionalisation (cf. Reh 2012, Roederer-Rynning andGreenwood 2015), back to informalisation (Brandsma and Hoppe 2020). The question today is perhaps less to what extent trilogues can continue to be characterised as 'informal' or 'formal' institutions, but to conceptualise and explain the many shades of (in)formality over time and across institutions.…”