Following nearly eight years of controversy and failed referendums, the Lisbon Treaty finally enters into force today. The treaty had been sold as necessary in order to address the internal challenges facing a significantly expanded European Union. With its implementation we should expect greater efficiency in the decision-making process, more democracy as a consequence of the European Parliament’s increased importance and enhanced coherence and credibility in terms of external affairs.
While a set of rules designed for 27 instead of 15 member states should help to increase efficiency, the ability of the European Union to speak with a single voice is something up for debate. The new High Representative, Catherine Ashton, is meant to strengthen coherence in terms of external action, though she will not decide a single European policy, which will continue to be based on the unanimous agreement of all 27 member states. In one sense the High Representative can be considered a ‘super ambassador’ for the EU, though just how political the office will come to be remains to be seen.
But what I am most interested in is the Union’s journey towards greater democracy and transparency and its attempts to bring ‘Europe’ closer to its citizens. In particular, the treaty’s attempt to increase participatory democracy will be very interesting to monitor. The Lisbon Treaty aims to give citizens a direct say in European matters through the introduction of a Citizens’ Initiative, “whereby one million citizens, from any number of member countries, will be able to ask the Commission to present a proposal in any of the EU’s areas of responsibility.” Importantly, the practical details of this initiative have not yet been decided upon and will only be discussed once the Lisbon Treaty comes into force (so I’m waiting with anticipation from now!).
The Citizens’ Initiative will be even more interesting in light of Switzerland’s referendum (citizen initiated) over the weekend in which 57% of voters approved a ban on the construction of Muslim Minarets. The referendum was held following the Swiss People’s Party’s (SVP) successful campaign to collect 100,000 signatures to hold a referendum on the issue. With a population of just over 7.5 million, this works out at a ration of 1/75. Now compare this with the population of the European Union, which will mean that a citizens’ initiative will require only 1/500 citizens to sign. These citizens’ initiatives will allow citizens to petition the European Commission to bring forward new policy proposals and while they do not appear to be binding there should be concern about the types of citizens’ initiatives that may be brought forward in the near future. With the rise of the BNP in the UK and the Geert Wilders phenomenon in The Netherlands, we should expect that the citizens’ initiative will open up a new door for far-right (far-left and whatever other extremist) groups to put pressure on the European Institutions – all in the name of democracy.
With only one million signatures required, I can only hope that the citizens’ initiative will not become the domain of extremist or nationalist views and pointlessness. I’ll keep holding my breath until the details emerge…
The UK Labour Party has delivered a spectacular victory in the Glasgow North East by-election by securing just under 60% of the vote. The Scottish National Party came in second with 20% of the vote, while the Conservatives trailed in third place on 5% (with the BNP dangerously close in 4th).
But was this victory really spectacular? Well the majority of the electorate were not really up to much with turnout a mere 33%. And in 2005 the Conservatives came in 5th place with about 4.5% of the vote, while the Liberal Democrats didn’t even run a candidate!
The latest Populus poll shows the Conservatives with a 10% lead over the Labour Party. The percentages are Conservatives 39, Laboour 29, Liberal Democrats 18. Compare that with the results from the by-election in Glasgow last night: Labour 60, Conservatives 5, Liberal Democrats 2. Something doesn’t add up here.
It’s pretty easy to figure out what’s going on. The Labour Party managed to secure victory in a fairly safe seat. So I think that we can safely dismiss Willie Bain’s claim that the result was also a rejection of David Cameron – besides the constituency of Glasgow North East in any case. But then I don’t think Mr Cameron’s expectations for his party in this constituency were very high. Any Labour Party supporter who thinks this victory will provide the momentum required to launch an offensive on the Conservatives poll lead is delusional – this means you Jim Murphy.
Likely effect of this by-election on the general election result – Nada!
Suicide in the Trenches
I knew a simple soldier boy
Who grinned at life in empty joy,
Slept soundly through the lonesome dark,
And whistled early with the lark.
In winter trenches, cowed and glum
With crumps and lice and lack of rum,
He put a bullet through his brain.
No one spoke of him again.
You smug-faced crowds with kindling eye
Who cheer when soldier lads march by,
Sneak home and pray you’ll never know
The hell where youth and laughter go.
- Siegried Sassoon
It is widely accepted that lobbyists have a bad reputation. This perception appears so widespread that even those who practice lobbying as their profession tend to use anything but “lobbyist” to describe what they do. Furthermore, many organisations will not even accept that what they do is lobbying. From my own experience working within the ‘Communications and Advocacy Division’ of a highly influential international non-governmental organisation I witnessed this to be the case. In that organisation we did not lobby but advocated, promoted, campaigned, influenced, persuaded, convinced and any other word except lobbied.
As a practice, lobbying is accused of being anti-democratic as it frustrates the “will of the people”, favours the wealthy and consists largely of privileged access to important decision-makers, which has to be paid for. In truth, lobbying plays an essential and legitimate role in the democratic process and forms an integral role in the process of policy formulation. It facilitates two-way communication between decision-makers and all interest groups in civil society. This is not to discount that bias does exist in the interest group system and most academic scholars believe an inherent bias persists, which is likely common to all liberal democracies. In reality, interest groups do not represent all segments of society and resources – mainly money – do matter, while extensive resources mean certain interest groups can exert power out of all proportion to the number of their members. There have been attempts to create legal solutions to these issues through regulation of lobbyists in some settings and laws dealing with the lobbied in others. It is naïve to think that a level-playing field can be created for all interest groups. However, an imperative exists to ensure access is more equitable and that influence faces greater regulation, such that it is not perceived as corrupt.
To date, only a small minority of political systems have opted to enact legislation to regulate lobbying activity [United States of America (federal and state levels, except for Pennsylvania), Australia, Canada (federal level and in several provinces), Hungary, Georgia, Germany (federal and state levels), Lithuania, Poland, and the European Parliament]. Stronger lobbying regulations increase both transparency and accountability (which, most people will agree, are a good thing). Incentives to commit to self-regulatory systems tend not to be very strong and they are usually very weak on enforcement. The European Commission recently conceded that its rules on financial disclosure were not working and has ruled out making sign-up to its ‘lobby register’ mandatory. It is in the interest of both lobbyists and politicians to introduce lobbying regulations to further the goal of good governance. Public confidence can only increase if regulations are introduced (and seen to be effective). And with that increased confidence in our political system we might even witness a greater understanding of the democratic role that lobbying plays.
It’s time for lobbyists to come out of the closet.
No matter where an election is taking place you can be guaranteed that those contesting will fight tooth and nail to win. So it often baffles me that candidates and those advising them don’t explore every means possible to win votes. Of course, in the heat of a campaign it may not always be so easy to step back and identify where opportunities exist. But that’s no excuse for the lack of innovation that many political consultants offer.
Political advertising on television in the US has reached a fine art (not least due to the amount of money spent on producing these advertisements). Political advertisements have been shown to play a definite role in persuading the electorate (Study 1 – Study 2).
So given that political advertising can be so influential, why is their use by political parties outside the US not widespread? The answer is simply because political advertising on television is banned in many countries.
The solution is even simpler – Take Your Advertising Online! It’s where an increasing number of voters are to be found and a potentially untapped market of younger voters can be won. And what makes this an even better idea is that the costs of disseminating your message online are minimal compared to television advertising.
And social media networks can help spread your message even further. The single greatest advantage for political advertising provided by social media is its ability to precisely target and segment individuals and groups. Social media tools such as Facebook allow advertisers to engage in nano-targeting in a way that allows you to reach a potential audience with comparatively inexpensive advertising, where traditional media marketing is both expensive and non-targeted. It is this ability to reach niche markets with inexpensive targeted messages that holds the greatest potential for the development of political marketing.
So if you are planning a campaign (political or otherwise) and you have the resources to produce an advertisement that can be placed online then make sure you do it! The UK Conservative Party have made their first significant move into the world of online advertising with their Spotify campaign. I suggest that you do likewise and make sure that you are not ignoring your opportunities online.
If you are looking to read in more detail about best practices for political advertising online then I would suggest checking out this publication from the Graduate School of Political Management at GWU.
I managed to ensure that my first blog post was not a ‘Welcome to my Blog’ post! Err…welcome to the blog!
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