How, and under which conditions, can consultative committees exert influence if they have access to legislators (voice) but no formal veto power (vote)? In drawing on the Committee of the Regions and the European Economic and Social Committee of the European Union, this book shows that consultative committees face several challenges when it comes to influencing the content of policies, but are nevertheless sometimes successful in getting their opinions heard. It develops a sender-receiver model and puts it to a comprehensive empirical test. A quantitative analysis and three in-depth case studies on the European citizens' initiative, the European grouping of territorial cooperation and the Liberalisation of Community Postal Services show how capacities, incentives and preferences of consultative committees and legislative decision-makers need to be configured to allow for the influence of consultative committees.
Author Biography:
Diana Panke is Professor of Governance in Multi-level Systems at Albert-Ludwigs-University Freiburg. She was previously Associate Professor at University College Dublin and research associate at Freie Universitat Berlin. Her research interests include international and regional organisations, multilateral negotiations, institutional design, international norms, legalisation and compliance, and small states, as well as EU Politics and European Integration. Diana Panke has published in peer-reviewed journals, including the Journal of European Public Policy, the Journal of Common Market Studies, the Review of International Studies, Comparative Political Studies, West European Politics, the European Journal of International Relations, the Journal of European Integration, International Politics and European Political Science. She also wrote monographs The Effectiveness of the European Court of Justice: Why Reluctant States Comply (Manchester University Press, 2010), Small States in the European Union: Coping With Structural Disadvantages (Ashgate, 2010) and Unequal Actors in Equalising Institutions: Negotiations in the United Nations General Assembly (Palgrave, 2013). Christoph Honnige is Professor of Comparative and German Politics at Leibniz University Hannover. He was previously Professor of German Politics at the University of Gottingen, Assistant Professor of Comparative and German Politics at the University of Kaiserslautern. He received his PhD from the University of Potsdam and his MA from the University of Konstanz. His research interests include legislative politics in Europe, constitutional courts in comparative perspective, administrative reforms in Germany, and comparative public policies. He specialises in the analysis of the impact of preferences and institutional rules on individual and group behaviour as well as policy outcomes. His peer-reviewed publications include the Journal of Common Market Studies, West European Politics, European Political Science, Regional and Federal Studies, and German Politics. He has won several research grants and is convener of the ECPR Standing Group on Law and Politics. Julia Gollub is program manager at the Stifterverband. Previously, she has worked as program manager at the Volkswagen Foundation and as research associate at the University of Gottingen. She studied European Studies and International Relations at Maastricht University, Aristotle University Thessaloniki and the University College Dublin.
