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Eurogroups, clientela, and the European Community

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 May 2009

William Averyt
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Abstract

A new approach is suggested to analyze the relations between the EC and national administrations on the one hand and the EC and national interest groups on the other. Drawing from research in comparative politics and public administration, the essay examines the working relationship between a government agency and an interest group in order to see what functions each performs. Under certain conditions, there arises a situation called clientela, a close relationship between agency and group. When studying the EC, a crucial question concerns the reasons why an interest group would forsake a productive national relationship for a new one at the Community level. One conclusion suggests that the extent of national clientela will determine both the development of Community-level interests groups as well as the strength of EC-national interest group linkages.

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Articles
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International Organization , Volume 29 , Issue 4 , Fall 1975 , pp. 949 - 972
Copyright
Copyright © The IO Foundation 1975

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References

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8 The importance of the European Parliament, rather, lies in the possible expansion of its powers in the future. Federalists and Socialists decry the lack of democratic mechanisms linking the European electorates to the EC institutions and urge direct elections and expanded powers for the European Parliament. See Warnecke, Steven Joshua, “The European Community After British Entry: Federation or Confederation?” in Warnecke, , ed., The European Community in the 1970's (New York: Praeger, 1972), p. 5Google Scholar; Dahrendorf, Ralf, Guardian (Manchester), 08 3, 1971, p. 2–GGoogle Scholar. For the complex details of plans to increase the European Parliament's budgetary powers, see: Coombes, David and Wiebecke, Iika, The Power of the Purse in the European Communities (London: Chatham House, 1972)Google Scholar.

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15 But the political culture may view pressure on certain issues as improper; see Brenner, chap. 2.

16 Sometimes the government structure may be so byzantine that even the most savvy lobbyist is at a loss to know whether or not a government official actually did fulfill his promise of support; see Dexter, Lewis, “The Job of the Congressman,” in Wolfinger, Raymond, ed., Readings on Congress (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice Hall, 1971)Google Scholar; pp 69–89.

17 Time, money, and energy are, of course, rarely evenly distributed.

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35 Lindberg, Leon and Scheingold, Stuart, Europe's Would-Be Polity (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice Hall, 1970)Google Scholar, chap. 5.

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43 I am indebted for this point to LaPalombara. One of the benefits of adapting theories of national interest groups to the EC is that it makes explicit certain assumptions which remain implicit for analyses of national systems, e.g., that all national ministries do in fact possess power to affect interest groups significantly. Interview, New Haven, Conn., May 1974.

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45 The descriptive phrases for the agency and group variables aie taken from LaPalombara, Interest Groups in Italian Politics chap. 8.

46 European Trends, 35 (May 1973): 10–11.

47 LaPalombara, p. 273.

48 For a description of Eurogroups and their attitudes toward EC regulation, see Friedrich, p. 307; Muth, passim. The DBV's policy is set forth in Willis, F. Roy, France, Germany, and the New Europe, 1945–1967 (London: Oxford University Press, 1968), pp. 288 ffGoogle Scholar.

49 LaPalombara, ibid., p. 274.

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54 Helen Feldstein, interview, Providence, R.I., March 1974.

55 Ehrmann points out that if an agency must deal with fragmented clienteles, it may be able to play one off against another and obtain considerable freedom of action. Ehrmann, Henry, “French Bureaucracy and Organized Interests,” Administrative Science Quarterly V (03 1961), p. 548Google Scholar.

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