19 December 2023
“This Is Not a Foreign Agents Law”
On Tuesday, 12 December 2023, the Commission adopted its long-awaited Defence of Democracy package, which includes a Proposal for a Directive on Transparency of Interest Representation on behalf of Third Countries. Dubravka Šuica, Commissioner for Democracy and Demography seemed eager to clarify what the Directive is not. Šuica emphasised that the Directive “is not a foreign agents law”. But the more a statement is repeated, the less credible it appears. Rather, the opposite appears to be true. And so, the devil is not in the name, it lies in enforcement. Despite the Commission’s assertion that full harmonisation of the Directive prevents Member States from gold-plating or potentially worse activities, the Commission has limited control over how Member States apply and enforce their national laws. This is the biggest risk of the proposal. Continue reading >>
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13 January 2023
Tougher Integrity Rules for the European Parliament
The current scandal at the European Parliament might trigger an overdue discussion: Foreign officials should be either prohibited to lobby on legislation or be subject to rigorous disclosure rules. Continue reading >>
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15 December 2022
The Qatar Scandal and Third Country Lobbying
The EU was given the worst kind of early Christmas present: a corruption scandal that has rocked the Union to its core giving ammunition to anti-EU populist actors and drawing attention and schadenfreude from outside the EU. The facts of the case remain under investigation, but the case has already been approached from many angles.Qatar has been given the role of an international villain in this story, and the EU has used the opportunities to frame the case as malign third country efforts to corrupt the EU. While there is no denying the corrupting role of a third country, the EU’s framing enables it to pose as a victim, which, as I argue in this blogpost, is intellectually dishonest and harmful. Continue reading >>
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