Lobbying Brexit Negotiations: Who Lobbies Michel Barnier?

David Coen and Alexander Katsaitis
Additional contact information
David Coen: Department of Political Science, University College London, UK
Alexander Katsaitis: Department of Government, London School of Economics and Political Science, UK

Politics and Governance, 2021, vol. 9, issue 1, 37-47

Abstract: Interest groups have a vital role in international negotiations and carry the potential to influence their outcome. This article contributes to discussions surrounding Brexit and institutional change in the EU, focusing on Article 50 negotiations and stakeholder engagement. Drawing from theories on deliberative democracy and institutional legitimacy, we argue that different groups are given access to the Chief Negotiator depending on the resources they can contribute. Assessing our expectations, we inspect the entire interest group population that held meetings with Michel Barnier and his team from 2016 onwards. On the aggregate, we observe a pluralist approach. A closer inspection reveals a tightly knit circle of insiders that hold unparalleled access. To the extent that these meetings offer a glance into the future of EU lobbying, European trade and professional associations are likely to observe growing cohesion and significance. Conversely, UK private interests will see their presence and influence diluted as their relevance grows smaller in Brussels. Following the trends we observe, think tanks and socioeconomic interests are likely to experience a continuous surge in their involvement in stakeholder activities.

Keywords: Article 50; Brexit; European Union; interest groups; lobbying; pluralism (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.cogitatiopress.com/politicsandgovernance/article/view/3666 (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:cog:poango:v9:y:2021:i:1:p:37-47

DOI: 10.17645/pag.v9i1.3666

Access Statistics for this article

Politics and Governance is currently edited by Carolina Correia

More articles in Politics and Governance from Cogitatio Press
Bibliographic data for series maintained by António Vieira () and IT Department ().