Religious Communities as Interest Groups
- Year of publication: 2003
- Source: Show
- Pages: 143-162
- DOI Address: http://dx.doi.org/10.15804/ppsy2003011
A Good Start, but Still Far from the Podium. About the First Statutory Lobbying Regulations in Germany at the Federal and National Level
On January 1, 2022, two German laws on the regulation of lobbying entered into force. While the Bavarian law is the third regulation of this type adopted in the Länder, the German-wide statutory lobbying regulation is a novelty. The aim of this article is – apart from presenting the latest German lobbying regulations, which have not been described so far in the Polish scientific literature – to answer the question about their assessment against the background of the standards developed in the legislative and scientific achievements in the world. Do the latest German lobbying regulations meet these standards or, on the contrary, do they duplicate the errors repeatedly described in the literature? Or maybe these regulations also contain innovative solutions that should be copied in the lobbying regulations of other countries? Finally, do Länder laws differ from federal laws and how? The assessment of the German lobbying laws is ambiguous. On the one hand, it looks like their authors got acquainted with the literature on the subject, in which the model of optimal regulation was formulated, and German laws contain even innovative solutions. On the other – the shortcomings of the regulation outweigh its advantages – which was already signaled at the stage of legislative works. The laws deserve revision, but are a good start on the way to effectively regulate and scrutinize lobbying activities in Germany.
From the very beginning of human civilization, the ones in power were impacted by the others, who tried to gain from a more favorable decision. In order to achieve that, one could have used the correct arguments based on rationality, which, for instance, could have had an economic background. That demands much effort, meaning we should know the person we are trying to convince, learn about the situation, and gather opinions, evidence, and all sorts of data that could be useful. Others could try something risky and illegal – all sorts of corruption, including bribes, embezzlement, nepotism, extortion, kickbacks, etc. The distinction between the two seems straightforward, but only on the surface. If we get deeper into the issue, things get way more complex, and we might find it difficult to draw a clear line since the gray zone keeps growing. The paper concentrates then on the joint history of corruption and lobbying to give us a broad picture of the issue. Secondly, various concepts of the definition are analyzed to understand where we are in terms of the search between the two phenomena. The article ends with conclusions and further research suggestions.
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