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Reputational theory holds that an agency's reputation is a valuable political asset. However, since Daniel Carpenter's influential contributions, reputational studies have focused on reactions to reputational threats, rather than on reputation as such. Therefore, there is a curious lacuna at the heart of reputation studies: A lot is known about reactions to reputational threats, but fundamental questions about reputation per se are left unexplored. This paper investigates the dimensionality of the reputational concept, its variation across types of audiences, and its consistency across agency subunits. This is done in the context of the EU Commission, the core executive institution of the European Union. While this case is interesting in itself, its main value is to suggest what a research agenda focusing on the core building blocks of reputational theory might look like. Our survey of actors in the EU's Transparency Register provides mixed, but mostly supportive evidence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article argues for the inclusion of regulations in studies of EU policy implementation and compliance. Although both EU directives and EU regulations are to be implemented by the member states, the literature has devoted almost exclusive attention to directives. This is because, first, directives are considered more important than regulations. Second, the notification of the transposition of directives provides a convenient way to compare implementation records. Third, the transposition of directives allegedly introduces an extra implementation step. However, upon closer inspection all three reasons are flawed. Regulations – like directives – often require national rules to enter into effect, a fact long accepted by the European Court of Justice. This creates a situation remarkably similar to the transposition of directives. By analysing two case studies, we contribute by detailing this politico-legal situation, demonstrating its empirical relevance and sketching a new research agenda on the supplementation of EU regulations with national rules. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Governmental entities such as the EU Commission regularly consult societal stakeholders. In such consultations, a variety of different tools are used ranging from open online consultations over stakeholder conferences to discussions in closed policy fora. Recent research has demonstrated how the range and diversity of the consulted actors vary across these consultation formats. Yet, we know little about the value societal stakeholders attach to their participation in consultations. In this paper, we argue that some consultation formats facilitate an insider match between the motives of societal stakeholders and the Commission with clear potential for also affecting Commission initiatives. Other consultation instruments are more likely to facilitate an outsider match where stakeholders may draw public attention to their views and the Commission enhance the perceived legitimacy of its decisions. We find support for these expectations based on data from a survey administered to stakeholders registered in the EU transparency register. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To authenticate to the full-text of this article, please visit this link: http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9299.2010.01819.x Byline: GIJS JAN BRANDSMA (1), JENS BLOM-HANSEN (2) Abstract: The literature on comitology has largely ignored the European Commission's actual behaviour in the daily workings of the numerous comitology committees that were designed to control it. On the basis of survey data of Danish and Dutch representatives on nearly all comitology committees, this paper investigates the Commission's role in the system. We find that the Commission acts both as a mediator and as a policy advocate, but to varying degrees. We take a first step towards understanding this behaviour by an inspection of four arguments found in the literature on comitology and the Commission: the constraining or enabling impact of the comitology procedures; the institutional position of the responsible Directorate-General; the nature of the cases dealt with by the committees and, finally, the intensity of the member states' preferences in relation to the committees' cases. In comitology, each of these arguments shapes the mediating or the advocating behaviour of the Commission. Author Affiliation: (1)Gijs Jan Brandsma is in the Utrecht School of Governance, Utrecht University. (2)Jens Blom-Hansen is in the Department of Political Science, University of Aarhus. Article History: Date received 12 March 2008. Date accepted 1 December 2008.

To authenticate to the full-text of this article, please visit this link: http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-5965.2009.02002.x Byline: JENS BLOM-HANSEN (1), GIJS JAN BRANDSMA (2) Abstract: Abstract Two images exist of the day-to-day practice of the EU comitology system. The first claims that comitology is deliberation by policy experts in which informal norms, deliberation and good arguments matter more than economic interests and formal voting rules. The second image portrays comitology as an arena for intergovernmental bargaining designed by the Member States to control the Commission. The article systematically investigates these images based on survey evidence from a questionnaire to the Danish and Dutch national representatives on nearly all comitology committees in 2006. The evidence suggests that both images hold and that their relative importance is determined by the nature of the issues dealt with by the individual comitology committees. Author Affiliation: (1)University of Aarhus (2)Utrecht University Article note: Jens Blom-Hansen, Department of Political Science, University of Aarhus, Denmark, email jbh@ps.au.dk , Gijs Jan Brandsma, Utrecht School of Governance, Utrecht University, The Netherlands, email G.J.Brandsma@uu.nl

To purchase or authenticate to the full-text of this article, please visit this link: http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9299.2007.00655.x Byline: KUTSAL YESILKAGIT (1), JENS BLOM-HANSEN (2) Abstract: The partnership principle in EU cohesion policy was introduced in order to involve subnational authorities and interest organizations in policy formulation and implementation. In this article we examine how the member states have reacted to this call for a new way of making public policy. We argue that the multi-level governance literature and the critics of the multi-level governance framework have not examined implementation structures properly, but have focused on regional influence. We conduct a comparative analysis of the Dutch and Danish implementations of the European Social Fund and the European Regional Development Fund. Our findings show that when examining implementation structures it becomes clear that member states are in full control of the re-allocation of EU funds. They show that Denmark and The Netherlands have been able to absorb EU cohesion policy within already existing national implementation structures of labour market policies and regional development. One central theoretical implication of our study is that the focus of studies of any fundamental re-allocation of power resources in cohesion studies should comprise the entire network of implementation rather than the strategies of its individual component actors. Author Affiliation: (1)Kutsal Yesilkagit is in the Utrecht School of Governance, University of Utrecht. (2)Jens Blom-Hansen is in the Department of Political Science, University of Aarhus. Article History: Date received 23 November 2005. Date accepted 28 April 2006.