How online insourcing might improve EU policy development—the view from inside the European Commission

• Author: Adriaan Buyserd,Bob Jong
• Date: 01 November 2015
• Published date: 01 November 2015
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1002/pa.1533

■Practitioner Paper

How online insourcing might improve EU

policy development—the view from

inside the European Commission

Adriaan Buyserd

1

and Bob de Jong

2

*

1

BANNING Advocaten, EU & Competition Law Departments—’s-Hertogenbosch, The Netherlands

2

The London School of Economics and Political Science, London, UK

Perhaps policy-makers are not the most progressive of actors when it comes to incorporating online technologies in

their everyday workflow, but they are certainly not dismissive of the Internet and its potential for policy-making

(e.g. European Commission, 2011, 2012). Could online insourcing, for example, be a way to improve the quality of

new legislation?

This article presents the current view from the European Commission (‘EC’). We have found that many of its

Directorates-General (‘DG’) are actively investigating into the possibilities of insourcing more and better policy

contributors at the pre-legislative stage, by means of online technology. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

INTRODUCTION

The EC is arguably the European Union’s(‘EU’)

main policy-maker (Klüver, 2012; Van Schendelen,

2010). Under the Treaties, it has the near-exclusive

right to propose new policy. This gives it a strong

foothold in the pre-legislative stage—usually the

phase when most of the real policy choices are made

(Vaubel, 2009). Indeed, final legislation often resem-

bles the original policy proposal remarkably well

(Kassim, 2001).Actors find it challenging, apparently,

to amend policy proposals, once submitted to the

other EU Institutions. As such, the pre-legislative

stage has been dubbed ‘the most fertile opportunity

for exertinginfluence’(Thomson & Hosli, 2006, p. 15).

All the more reason for practitioners to invest

heavily in the pre-legislative stage, where new poli-

cies are formed.

They are helped, in a way, by the fact that the EC

is understaffed. On average, only about 17 officials

work on a new policy proposal (Van Schendelen,

2010). Even aside from the complexity of the many

different cultures and languages to take into consid-

eration, this is a remarkably low number, given the

impact of EU policies on EU Member States, their

governments, businesses, citizens and third parties

(Bouwen, 2002).

Understaffing could easily result in a ‘knowledge

gap’, with a very real impact on the quality of

proposed legislation (Marks & McAdam, 1999;

McLaughlin, Grant, & Maloney, 1993; Van

Schendelen, 2010). The EC, however, has found

several ways around its capacity problem. Most

notably in this context, it relies on organizing a

structured political debate between interest groups,

as a method to insource the information it considers

necessary to come up with policy proposals

(informational lobbying) (Klüver, 2012). As a result,

it appears the EC—perhaps necessarily so—is more

accessible than its equivalents elsewhere.

However, many of those int erests groups do not

find their way into the (crucial) pre-legislative

stage (Klüver, 2012). The EC itself sees this as

problematic. It has voiced a ‘desire to consul t

groups and people beyond the circles of established

groups’(Van Schendelen, p. 82). It wants to avoid

*Correspondence to: Bob de Jong, The London School of

Economics and Political Science, London, UK.

E-mail: b.de-jong@lse.ac.uk

Journal of Public Affairs

Volume 15 Number 4 pp 334–339 (2015)

Published online 10 June 2014 in Wiley Online Library

(www.wileyonlinelibrary.com) DOI: 10.1002/pa.1533

Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.