Thanks to a new set of rules, lobbyists registered with the French National Assembly will be required to disclose more information about their lobbying activity, including their objectives, clients, and lobbying budget. More robust disclosure regarding the activities of lobbyists is a welcome development, and one that has been fought for by groups like Transparency International and Regards Citoyens.

The quest for coherence is not easy. The EU has to accommodate many diverse and legitimate sectoral and national interests. Its decision-making system is moreover complex and involves the various institutions of the EU through a variety of ways. This diversity in decision-making filters through to the level of implementation so that existing information and machinery for concerted action, vital to achieve a degree of coherence, are frequently inadequate.

What is Coherence?

Founded in 2000, Fipra - Finsbury International Policy & Regulatory Advisers – is today, Europe’s leading and most extensive public affairs consultancy network advising clients on a range of government relations and regulatory policy issues. Over the last 13 years, Fipra has expanded across the globe and now operates in over 50 countries both in Europe and Internationally.

The Association of Public Affairs Agencies (APAA) was launched in May 2012. Individual companies participating in the association are convinced of the usefulness of this field and the necessity of high professional standards in the conduct of such activities. In the Czech Republic there are quite a high number of companies dealing with public affairs activities either directly or as part of other activities. The key objective of the association is to reach higher transparency and professionalism on the market.

APAA's Objectives and Activity Focus:

Policy requires shaping and managing people’s behaviour, so understandably those groups of persons affected by policy either positively or negatively are important actors to be consulted in the policy formulation process. Policy actors can be categorized broadly into three sectors of society: State, Market and Citizen.

Policies are made i.e. they are formulated by a wide range of players i.e. elected officials and their appointees. In the private sector, policy makers are CEOs, Boards of Directors and other top ranking corporate officials.

The research here below was produced by Tim LaPira, an Assistant Professor of Political Science at James Madison University, and a Sunlight Foundation Academic Fellow.

The notion of political representation of interest groups is clearly related to functional rather than territorial representation. Interest groups are generally defined as organisations that are separate from government that attempt to influence public policy. They provide institutionalized linkage between the government or the state and major interests in society.

Public Policy Advocates communicate with government representatives, officials and legislators on behalf of clients and causes. Public Policy Advocates represent a variety of entities, including individuals, companies, trade and professional associations, foundations, NGOs etc.

Public Policy Advocates may attempt to persuade government officials through direct contact or by organizing grassroots efforts to encourage citizens to communicate with their elected officials about selected topics.

The European Commission has a two-fold incentive to support European Civil Society: input legitimacy in the policy making process, and the creation of a vibrant polity or social sphere for social cohesion and policy entrepreneurship. In fact, this desire might be even more acute in the Commission which has had to continually fight for legitimacy in the face of member state governments. The Commission hopes that NGOs can construct a transnational civil society, or European social sphere, and in so doing, enhance the legitimacy and saliency of the EU with the European public.

Grassroots Activities in the United States which are generally described as efforts to stimulate “grassroots” lobbying are communications which are directed at members of the general public, or at more selected persons on mailing lists of organizations or other entities, which take specific positions on legislative matters pending before or public policy issues to be considered by the legislature, and which contain a so-called ‘call to action”.