The higher the position of an Holder of Public Office (HPO), the stricter the policy, regulations and codes and the more transparency is required. For example, whereas Members of Government are often required to avoid or withdraw from activities, memberships, financial interests or situations that would place them in a real, potential or apparent conflict of interest, legislators are often allowed to take part in professional activities unless these activities are likely to give rise to a conflict of interest.

There are three basic principles of legislative ethics, aimed at guiding legislative behaviour in ways that promote the integrity of legislators and the legislative process:

Public policy advocacy is an acceptable and normal part of our society and in many cases is a part of a healthy democratic process. Decision-makers can be provided with valuable information during the public policy advocacy process. Public policy advocacy covers a wide variety of activities. Generally it involves the making of representations to EU  public officials on particular issues by special interest groups, individuals and professional advocates acting on behalf of others.

AALEP Institutional Membership is all inclusive and refers to Higher Education Institutions and Academic Staff; Professional Societies of Lobbyists; Corporations; Law Firms; Consultancies; Non-Governmental Organizations.

Our aim is to contribute to the development and improvement of public policy advocacy education and to enhance the status of both public policy advocacy education and professional public policy advocates in society.

The  APPC is the self-regulatory body for UK public affairs practitioners. As well as its traditional membership base of consultancies, APPC membership is now available to trade associations, in-house PA teams and individuals.

The APPC has three main roles:

The UK Public Affairs Council (UKPAC) was created by three industry bodies: the Association of Professional Political Consultants (APCC) and the Chartered Institute of Public Relations (CIPR) and the Public Relations Consultants Association (PRCA). Other bodies may join UKPAC if they wish. The purpose of UKPAC is to promote and uphold effective self-regulation for those professionals engaged in public affairs.

There are four key roles for UKPAC:

Here below are the Executive Board Members of DIGITALEUROPE:

ECAS-  (European Citizen Action Service) is organizing a brainstorming seminar on 'Civic Participation and the EU'. This seminar will take place at the Representation of Saxony-Anhalt to the European Union on 2 December 2013.

The Worl Bank has just released its latest 'Doing Business Report' that ranks all economies of the world up to June 2013. For each economy the ranking is calculated as the simple average of the percentile rankings on each of the following topics: 1. Starting a business; 2. Dealing with construction permits; 3. Getting electricity; 4. Registering property; 5. Getting credit; 6. Protecting investors; 7. Paying taxes; 8. Trading across borders; 9. Enforcing contracts and 10. Resolving insolvency.

Like most professional associations AALEP competes for resources for individual memberships with other organizations at EU and member state level. Today everyone is demanding a return on their membership investment. Many associations like to trumpet their benefit as networking opportunities or a listing in their directory. But what professional people are looking for are outcome-based membership benefits i.e. business contacts that can result in new business opportunities.