The Institutional Shaping of EU-Society Relations: the Role of the European Commission

Abstract

The panel will focus on the concepts and instruments the European Commission employs in order to involve different societal actors into its politics. We aim at an analytical and normative assessment of the impact these instruments have on the structure of the European intermediary space (assuming that a European intermediary space unfolds from the interaction between the Commission and different types of societal actors, such as private and public interest groups, advocacy networks etc.). In this context, we would like to invite contributions on 1. broader concepts and ideas governing the Commission’s approach to "civil society involvement", 2. the implementation of these concepts by different General Directorates and their variations across policy areas, 3. the responses of different (types of) societal actors to the institutional offers of the Commission 4. effects the offers and provisions of the Commission have on the structure of a European intermediary space and the emergence of a European" civil society", for example in respect to (a) the unequal empowerment of different types of societal actors, and to (b) national biases. We would also like to encourage paper proposals which consider the role of new information and communication technologies as employed in the Online Consultations of the Commission and explore their effects on the Europeanization of EU-society relations, the changing role of intermediaries and the restructuring of the European political space.

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