Title Promoter Affiliations Abstract "Lobbying for the people: Interest groups and public pressure in EU legislative politics." "Stefaan Walgrave, Jan Beyers" "Media, Movements and Politics (M2P), Antwerp Centre for Institutions and Multi-Level Politics (ACIM)" "Opinion leaders often criticize EU lobbying as a 'disease for democracy' and detrimental to the public interest. The lobbying scandals that make it to the news headlines typically involve business lobbyists that influence or bribe corrupted policymakers in smoky backrooms. The public image of EU lobbying is very negative. This negative image, however, might not be an accurate depiction of what lobbying and interest group politics in Brussels entails. In many instances, interest groups – such as business groups, NGOs and labor unions – serve as key transmission belts between the public and EU policymakers. These organizations can make EU policymakers more responsive by informing them about how much support a specific policy issue enjoys among citizens. The role of interest groups in elucidating public pressure to policymakers remains largely neglected in both responsiveness and interest group studies. Clarifying this role will precisely be the focus of my postdoctoral project. The main research question I aim to answer is: To what extent and under which conditions are EU policy outcomes responsive to public pressures articulated by interest groups? Empirically, the project departs from a stratified sample of policy proposals put forward by the European Commission. For each proposal, I will identify – by triangulating multiple data-sources – the entire set of stakeholders that sought to influence the legislative outcome and the information about public pressure they voiced." "The Emperor's Ear: Lobbying and Networking at the Roman Imperial Court during the Principate" "Lieve Van Hoof" "Department of History" "The phenomenon of lobbyists attempting to influence the decisions of government is nothing new. While official, regulated lobbying is a modern institution, informal lobbying is much older. In Roman Antiquity, many individuals and groups tried to influence imperial decisions to their advantage. I will investigate the lobby work of Greeks from Asia Minor in the first three centuries CE. Texts by famous orators stress the role of their rhetorically trained colleagues in embassies to the emperor – though at least one such orator is known to have been so nervous on his first mission that he fainted in front of the emperor. The one-sided picture of these literary sources can and should be counterbalanced by and complemented with epigraphical texts, i.e. Greek inscriptions that were erected in large numbers in the province of Asia. These reveal that people with different backgrounds such as athletes or artists could equally play a role in deliberations at the imperial court. The project aims to come to a better understanding of the hotly debated political system of the Roman Empire by broadening the traditional focus and sharpening the analysis: the concept of lobbying enables us to consider more aspects of decision-making than the aims and methods of people with formal power positions. For those who had the right background, the right connections and the right strategies, Rome was a power that could be negotiated with and, in some cases, even used to one’s own advantage." "Lobbying for the people: Interest groups and public pressure in EU politics." "Iskander De Bruycker" "Media, Movements and Politics (M2P), Antwerp Centre for Institutions and Multi-Level Politics (ACIM)" "Opinion leaders often criticize EU lobbying as a 'disease for democracy'. The lobbying scandals that make it to the news headlines typically involve business lobbyists that influence or bribe corrupted policymakers in smoky backrooms. The public image of EU lobbying is very negative. This negative image, however, might not provide an accurate picture of what lobbying and interest group politics in Brussels entails. Interest groups – such as business groups, NGOs and labor unions – may serve as key transmission belts between citizens and EU policymakers. Organized interests can make EU policymakers more responsive by informing them about how much support a specific policy issue enjoys among citizens. However, the intermediary role of interest groups in elucidating public pressure remains largely neglected in both public responsiveness and interest group studies. Clarifying this role will precisely be the focus of my research project. The main research question I aim to answer is: To what extent and under which conditions do interest groups facilitate or distort the public responsiveness of EU policy outcomes?Empirically, the project departs from a sample of 43 policy issues on which public opinion data is available. For each issue, I will identify – by triangulating multiple data-sources – the entire set of stakeholders that sought to influence the legislative outcome, the lobbying strategies they developed and how this affected the public responsiveness of EU policy decisions." "“Basil of Caesarea. Networking, Lobbying and Self-presentation in his Letters and Letter Collection”" "Lieve Van Hoof" "Department of History" "This project studies the letters and the letter collection of Basil, the bishop of Caesarea in Cappadocia (ca. AD 330-379) as a means of (self-)presentation. The focus of this project is on the interaction between Basil ’s letters and his letter collection, and the reception of Basil, both during his lifetime and in later periods." "Lobbying and litigation for policy change - Assessing compliance and congruence of the EU framework on interest representation" "Geert Van Calster" "Institute of Private International Law" "In the EU, litigation has increasingly become an essential part of interest representation and, ever more, the lines characterizing political and legal strategies of interest representation are blurring. The role of lawyers is only one of normative considerations that arise. Legal ethics rules come into play where lobbying ends and legal advice begins. Be that as it may, empirical analysis suggests that the glass wall between lobbying and litigation does not truly hold. If so, both strategies are merely different tools in the same toolkit, brought into play strategically, targeted to influence legislation at the discretion of interest groups. The question arises, should this not be adequately regulated? The research proposal puts forth a research design to assess whether the EU legal system adequately regulates interest representation and to what extent regulatory clarification is justified to ensure transparency and accountability in law-making processes.Notwithstanding participatory gains, regulating interest representation constitutes a vital prerequisite for transparent, accountable and legitimate democratic administration. Therefore, this research proposal is not only be relevant to interdisciplinary scholarly research on interest group studies as such, but also instrumental to our democratic process, its regulatory structures, and the interest group actors who are encouraged to abide by them." "Lobbying and litigation for policy change - Assessing compliance and congruence of the EU framework on interest representation" "Geert Van Calster" "Institute of Private International Law" "In the EU, litigation has increasingly become an essential part of interest representation and, ever more, the lines characterizing political and legal strategies of interest representation are blurring. The role of lawyers is only one of normative considerations that arise. Legal ethics rules come into play where lobbying ends and legal advice begins. Be that as it may, empirical analysis suggests that the glass wall between lobbying and litigation does not truly hold. If so, both strategies are merely different tools in the same toolkit, brought into play strategically, targeted to influence legislation at the discretion of interest groups. The question arises, should this not be adequately regulated? The research proposal puts forth a research design to assess compliance and congruence of the EU legal system adequately to frame interest representation and to discern whether (and to what extent) regulatory clarification is justified to ensure transparency and accountability in law-making processes. Notwithstanding participatory gains, regulating interest representation constitutes a vital prerequisite for transparent, accountable and legitimate democratic administration. Therefore, this research proposal may not only be relevant to interdisciplinary scholarly research on interest group studies as such, but also instrumental to our democratic process, its regulatory structures, and the interest group actors who are encouraged to abide by them." "Lobbying and Carbon Pricing Policies in North America" "Katja Biedenkopf" "Leuven International and European Studies (LINES)" "This PhD will answer the research question: What interest group, lobbying, issue and institutional factors affect an interest group's preference attainment for carbon pricing policies?" "Lobbying for forest justice? Transnational dimensions of forest justice advocacy in the European Union’s (EU's) Voluntary Partnership Agreements (VPAs)" "Jan Orbie" "Department of Political Sciences" "The Voluntary Partnership Agreements (VPAs) form the external leg of the Forest Legality Enforcement, Governance and Trade (FLEGT) Action Plan, an ambitious plan to bring an end to world-wide trade in illegally logged timber. Through the VPAs, the EU negotiates with timber-producing countries on forest management reforms related to ecological and social sustainability, in return for market access for verified legal timber products. These reforms are subject to extensive multi-stakeholder dialogues. An often-heard argument in favour of the VPAs is their potential to make forests more socially just by institutionalising rights and empowering marginalised actors. More critical scholars contest these arguments by pointing to the VPAs’ inability to counter structural power imbalances. This PhD examines to what extent and how the VPAs effectively influence justice advocacy in the forest sector by researching (1) the organisation and content of justice advocacy in the VPA processes, (2) the transnational dimensions of justice advocacy in the VPA processes and (3) the influence of transnational cooperation processes on the (non-)emergence and travel of forest justice norms. This will be achieved through the in-depth case study of two VPA processes. The research will combine multiple innovative qualitative research methods, including elite interviewing and Qualitative Network Analysis (QNA)." "Lobbying the state or the market? A study of civil society organisations' strategic behaviour" "Bart Kerremans" "Leuven International and European Studies (LINES)" "Civil society organisations’ (CSOs’) political advocacy is commonly acknowledged to be an important part of pluralist political systems, as groups representing diverse interests present their perspectives and expertise to policymakers to shape policy. While the literature has often implied that CSOs are resource-poor and thus constrained to protesting in the street or petitioning policymakers from outside, it is increasingly clear that CSOs can use a range of advocacy strategies during their campaigns.The interest group literature has split these strategies into ‘inside’ and ‘outside’ strategies – targeting decision-makers directly or going through the public – but has largely ignored strategies with other targets, including those that target actors in the private sector. In contrast, the literature on social movements has explored these market-oriented strategies, but often remains limited to more confrontational strategies and overlooks more ‘inside’ strategies, or direct contacts with companies.This dissertation combines these two perspectives to uncover the reasons why CSOs choose among and combine their advocacy strategies to use inside and outside strategies in the state and the market. It consists of three cumulative sections, which each examine a different choice and builds up to a better understanding of CSOs’ strategic choices. Theoretically, this research builds upon lobbying theories of inside and outside strategies and the political opportunity structures approach from social movement studies. Methodologically, this dissertation combines exploratory case studies (chapters 3 and 4) with fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (QCA) used for measurement and analytical purposes (chapters 6 and 7). It examines a total of 28 different CSO campaigns.The first section aims to answer the question of how and why CSOs combine inside and outside lobbying in their campaigns towards the state. The emphasis on combining strategies towards the state only is important to investigate how each type of strategy works and under which conditions they may be used together. Chapters 2 and 3 find that while combining strategies may be risky due to their very different logics, outside strategies can also be key for groups to get policymakers to listen to their demands, particularly for groups with less structural power.The second section answers the question of why CSOs use indirect lobbying strategies in their campaigns. These ‘indirect strategies’, where groups target their advocacy at the market to influence public policy, or vice versa, bring market strategies into the picture. Chapters 4 and 5 highlight the two types of indirect lobbying – regulatory and surrogate politics. They find that indirect strategies are often used because a more direct route is blocked, but they also have certain benefits for groups, particularly for public mobilisation, which can also explain why groups use these strategies. Chapter 5 also develops a novel conceptual framework to examine CSOs’ advocacy action in both the state and the market.The final section turns to the central question of this research: why do CSOs combine lobbying towards state and market actors in their campaigns? Here, I examine how these strategies are combined when CSOs lobby on one particular issue over a specific period of time. Chapters 6 and 7 build upon the work in previous chapters to examine this question. They find that there are differences between the way groups use strategies in the state and in the market: inside strategies are the ‘core’ of state campaigns, while outside strategies are more important in the market. There are two types of campaigns that use market strategies: those targeting only the market, and those where groups use market strategies to supplement their state lobbying and encourage public mobilisation. Structural factors were the main reason why groups used market strategies in their campaigns, and resources allowed groups to combine strategies when institutional structures were less open.By examining the range of strategies that CSOs can take when lobbying for policy change, this dissertation highlights the similarities and differences between strategies in the state and the market, and makes the case for including both in our studies of political advocacy. The findings shed a generally positive light on the representation of citizens and the inclusion of CSOs in the political system: most of the groups studied here did not turn to the market or use outside strategies purely because they were excluded from traditional avenues of representation, but rather as a conscious choice to increase public mobilisation or because of beliefs about the best way to create change. They are not necessarily an indication that CSOs are disadvantaged, but rather reflect the creative advocacy strategies used by CSOs in their attempts to shape public policy." "Policy Influencing, Lobbying & Advocacy." "Nadia Molenaers" "Development processes, actors and policies" "This project represents a formal service agreement between UA and on the other hand Min. Buitenlandse Zaken (NL). UA provides Min. Buitenlandse Zaken (NL) research results mentioned in the title of the project under the conditions as stipulated in this contract."