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Is collaborative governance “democracy-enhancing” and does it generate legitimacy? Drawing from the literatures on administrative burden and policy feedback and a positive approach to legitimacy, this theoretical article studies how the institutional design of collaborative governance impacts on the legitimacy citizens grant the state and the bureaucracy. It argues that three legitimacy-enhancing effects based on targeting, deliberation and exposure are likely, providing that a specific set of institutional features is present. This article invites scholars and practitioners to reflect not only on the direct consequences of collaborative governance but also on its broader democratic outcomes.

Feedback studies on mass publics revolve around the idea that “new policies create a new politics” (Schattschneider, 1935). The scholarship has researched how single policy experiences feed back into policy recipients’ specific policy attitudes and behaviours. Recently however, an emerging line of work offers a different take on Schattschneider’s oldsaw and, by getting closer to citizens’ multiple policy encounters in the course of their daily life, they suggest that specific political attitudes are grounded in citizens’ policy experiences and perceptions. In this article, we expand these initial results and ask: how do European citizens’ policy experiences and perceptions serve as anchors of their political discussions? We conduct a qualitative secondary analysis of four primary datasets composed of interviews and focus-groups with participants from different socio-economic backgrounds and political leanings collected in Belgium, France and the United Kingdom in 4 different points in time (1995-2019). By adopting an innovative research design, this article contributes a broader analysis of how citizens’ policy experiences and perceptions are tied to their understanding of the core components of politics, not only specific political attitudes, but their beliefs about their political world, the boundaries of their political community and what is to be understood as ‘political’.

Cet article traite du concept de portes tournantes (plus connu dans sa version anglophone de « revolving doors ») qui fait référence à des trajectoires professionnelles qui amènent des individus à circuler entre le secteur public et le secteur privé pour exercer des activités de représentation d’intérêt. Ainsi, certains titulaires de charges publiques — qu’ils ou elles soient des mandataires élus ou des membres de cabinet exécutifs ou de la haute fonction publique — choisissent de partir travailler dans des entreprises ou des groupes d’intérêt de secteurs d’activité dont ils et elles étaient responsables lors de leur mandat public. Dans l’autre sens, des professionnels précédemment actifs dans certains secteurs d’activités poursuivent leur carrière en occupant des mandats publics en lien avec leurs activités passées. L’article illustre d’abord ce concept par le truchement du récit de l’affaire « Barroso - Goldman Sachs » pour ensuite offrir un aperçu des recherches scientifiques qui traitent du sujet dans l’Union européenne.

Ce chapitre, destiné à un public large (étudiantes et étudiants, titulaires de charges publiques, …), offre une introduction aux notions de représentation d’intérêt, de lobbying et de groupes d’intérêt. Sa première partie introduit la discussion sur la représentation organisée d’intérêts – le lobbying organisé – et examine les différents types des groupes d’intérêt (lobbies). Une deuxième section est consacrée à la notion d’influence et les questions qui l’entourent. La troisième section propose un aperçu des travaux qui étudient la légitimité démocratique des groupes d’intérêt. Le chapitre se clôt sur les différents modes de participation des groupes d’intérêt dans le processus de prise de décisions des institutions de l’Union européenne.

The article intends to advance the study of e-participation in renewed directions by focusing on a category of actors that has long been overlooked: elected politicians. It zeroes in on legislators who while key actors of representative democracy chose to be involved in an e-participation initiative. This article generates theoretical propositions on how they make use of e-participation platforms in their work as parliamentarians. Based on a qualitative analysis of interviews about the main e-participation platform in France, Parlement & Citoyens, the article shows that parliamentarians’ usages of such participatory tools tend either towards a policy-oriented logic or a vote-seeking purpose. These usages can also be categorized as tending toward either a representative or a participatory democracy logic. The article concludes that if platforms are originally designed as online participatory alternatives to conventional legislative processes, they are chiefly used as adjuvants to traditional political representation practices.

Alors que certains auteurs soutiennent que le concept de légitimité est fallacieux et ne devrait pas être utilisé en sciences sociales, d’autres l’identifient comme l’enjeu central de tous questionnements de science politique. Dans le champ de l’étude des groupes d’intérêt, le concept de légitimité est peu exploité, contrairement par exemple au concept d’influence, pourtant lui aussi sujet à controverse. Si la littérature sur les groupes d’intérêt s’intéresse aux stratégies d’influence des groupes d’intérêt et leurs effets sur les décisions publiques, elle examine rarement la légitimité de ces mêmes groupes lorsqu’ils revendiquent la représentation de telle ou telle composante de la société. Cette faible mobilisation du concept de légitimité dans le champ de l’étude des groupes d’intérêt tient notamment à l’absence de cadre analytique clair le concernant. L’objectif de ce chapitre est de contribuer à établir un tel cadre en proposant deux approches analytiques pour étudier la légitimité des groupes d’intérêt. Des approches complémentaires sont présentées pour étudier ce même objet de recherche : une approche subjective et une approche guidée par les normes. Chacune de ces approches est illustrée par des exemples d’analyses tirés de la littérature. En amont de ces développements, le chapitre cadre d’abord la notion même de groupe d’intérêt et ses différentes acceptions. La première partie détaille également les implications de ces différents types de définitions pour l’étude de la légitimité des groupes d’intérêt.

Is collaborative governance “democracy-enhancing” and does it generate legitimacy? Drawing from the literatures on administrative burden and policy feedbacks and a positive approach to legitimacy, this theoretical article studies how the institutional design of collaborative governance impacts on the legitimacy citizens grant the state and the bureaucracy. It argues that three legitimacy-enhancing effects based on targeting, deliberation and exposure are likely. This article invites scholars and practitioners to reflect not only on the direct consequences of collaborative governance but also on its broader outcomes in terms of citizens’ assessments of the legitimacy of the state and the bureaucracy.

A key issue of scholarly debates on democratic innovations is why elected politicians engage in innovative decision making, in particular in the form of participatory democracy. Scholars have highlighted different usages of participatory tools by political representatives, but further investigation is needed to account for the political conditions under which politicians resort to participatory instruments. This article confronts the case of French legislators to the literature on the uses of participatory tools by elected representatives. The research question structuring the paper is the following: why do some legislators – key actors of representative democracy – use an online e-participation platform? The French case is an extreme case of citizens’ mistrust towards the (political) elites as evidenced by the Yellow Vests. In this respect, the French case magnifies the issues of elected politicians’ usages of participatory tools. To answer the research question, we selected the case of a French e-participation platform: Parlement & Citoyens (Parliament & Citizens, P&C). P&C is an online platform “enabling citizens and legislators to work together to find solutions to [France's] problems”. P&C is a private initiative established as a non-profit organization. It has been running since 2013, and thus far 17 Senators and MPs have conducted 24 consultations. Legislators are invited to upload (ideas about, or elements of) draft laws on the platform that are open to comments, arguments and votes of citizens and organizations. Data collection consisted of six interviews with MPs or Senators who used P&C. The interview sample also includes citizens who participated in consultations, and with the founder and president of P&C. Among six types of legislators' usages of the platform identified through a thematic analysis of interviews, two types tend to respond to a participatory logic, while four of them tend towards a logic of representation. The platform is thus more used a

Lorsque les citoyens souhaitent obtenir un passeport, voter, ou bénéficier d’une aide sociale, ils entrent en interaction avec l’État. Ces interactions impliquent des « fardeaux administratifs » (administrative burden) qui incombent aux citoyens. De manière générale, toutes les situations où l’État régule les comportements privés ou structure la manière dont les citoyens sollicitent des services publics engendrent des interactions qui sont vectrices de fardeaux administratifs. L’objectif de l’ouvrage de Pamela Herd et Donald Moynihan, tous deux professeurs à l’Université de Georgetown à Washington, est de développer un cadre conceptuel pour étudier ces fardeaux administratifs afin de faire avancer les connaissances portant sur les interactions entre l’État et les citoyens. Le livre étudie la nature des fardeaux administratifs, leurs origines politiques, la manière dont ils affectent les citoyens et comment les gouvernants peuvent les réduire ou les renforcer. Les auteurs développent et illustrent leur cadre conceptuel en s’appuyant sur l’analyse des fardeaux administratifs liés à différents services publics dans le contexte états-unien.

Dans son ouvrage À l’école des eurocrates. La genèse de la vocation européenne, Sébastien Michon – chercheur au CNRS, membre du laboratoire SAGE (Sociétés, acteurs, gouvernement en Europe) à l’Université de Strasbourg – présente les résultats d’une enquête sur la formation des aspirant·e·s aux métiers de l’Europe politique. L’auteur remonte le fil des carrières d’un groupe large de professionnel·le·s de l’Europe qui comprend à la fois des agent·e·s des institutions de l’Union européenne (UE), des chargé·e·s de mission « Europe » de collectivités territoriales ou d’administrations nationales dans les États membres, du personnel de cabinets de relations publiques, d’entreprises, de fédérations professionnelles, d’associations, de syndicats, ou d’autres groupes d’intérêt qui traitent de politique européenne. L’ouvrage propose de retracer les trajectoires sociales et professionnelles des personnes qui se destinent à ces carrières liées à l’UE lors de leurs études et qui occuperont, ou non, ces postes à l’issue de leur parcours universitaire.

Recent scholarship has focused on how coordination mechanisms are implemented by public sector organizations, thereby paying attention to coordination as a process. This article studies the coordination process that resulted in the implementation of the interministerial financial information system of the French central state—named Chorus. Chorus is a case of an unlikely coordination process rolled out in the non-conducive context of the French Napoleonic Administration. Chorus aimed at connecting all ministries’ administrative services to a shared information system, while ministries were previously using their own systems and applications. Based on the literature on mechanisms of coordination, and focusing on the role of existing institutions and the actors involved in the coordination process, the analysis has two main results. First, AIFE—“Agence pour l’informatique financière de l’État”, the agency in charge of the implementation of Chorus—steered the process by developing a stepwise network-based interministerial strategy. Second, the coordination steered by AIFE resulted in a transformative change of the French state's financial and accounting structures through a layering process of change. Thereby, the article contributes to the empirical analysis of public administrations’ recent changes toward increased coordination at the central level by studying recent reforms in France and their outcomes.

Is collaborative governance “democracy-enhancing” and does it generate legitimacy? This theoretical article studies how the institutional design of collaborative governance impacts on the legitimacy citizens grant the state and the bureaucracy. Drawing from the literatures on administrative burden and policy feedbacks and a positive approach to legitimacy, a two-step explanation is derived: first, collaborative governance’s specific institutional features shape citizens’ experiences in a way that alleviates the psychological, learning and compliance costs of state-citizens interactions; second, these experiences generate cues that feed back into citizens’ assessments of the legitimacy of the state and the bureaucracy through three main mechanisms: the interpretive mechanism based on the definition of the target population, the visibility-of-state-action mechanism and the collaborative-process-based interpretive mechanism. This article invites scholars and practitioners engaged in collaborative governance to reflect not only on the direct consequences of this type of decision-making instruments but also to their broader outcomes in terms of citizens’ assessments of the legitimacy of the bureaucracy and the state.

Cet article examine les dynamiques d’organisation et d’action des groupes d’intérêt dans un contexte caractérisé par le développement de plus en plus important d’un mode particulier d’action publique : la gouvernance-multi-niveaux. Cet état des lieux des recherches sur la question s’appuie sur la littérature traitant des effets de l’européanisation sur les groupes d’intérêt mais aussi sur les travaux (plus rares) portant sur la régionalisation de la représentation d’intérêts. L’article présente les connaissances existantes et fait le constat de connaissances fragmentées à propos des effets de la gouvernance multi-niveaux sur la représentation d’intérêts. Des pistes de recherche sont développées et visent une compréhension intégrée de l’action et de l’organisation des groupes d’intérêt dans un contexte marqué par l’interpénétration des niveaux de pouvoir. La proposition centrale est de dépasser les analyses entre niveaux « régional–national » d’un côté, et « national–européen » de l’autre, pour les articuler afin d’étudier les dynamiques « régional–national–européen ».

The paper submits to advance the study of policy making through e-participation platforms by analyzing how legislators make use of online e-participation platforms in the process of designing policies. Our approach emphasizes their agency while also recognizing that they are embedded in institutional (parliament vs executive) and party political contexts (majority or minority parliamentary groups) that may constrain their action. We thereby provide an analysis that goes beyond the technical features of e-participation platforms to study how key actors of such platforms actually use them. To answer the research question, we investigate the case of a French e-participation platform. The French case is an extreme case (Lijphart, 1973) of citizens’ mistrust towards the (political) elites as evidenced by the Yellow Vests. In this respect, the French case magnifies the issues of elected politicians’ usages of participatory tools. The platform under study is called Parlement & Citoyens (P&C). It is a private initiative established as a non-profit organization. P&C is an online platform “enabling citizens and legislators to work together to find solutions to [France's] problems”. It has been running since 2013, and thus far 17 Senators and MPs have conducted 24 consultations. Legislators are invited to upload draft laws on the platform that are open to comments and votes of citizens and organizations.

The aim of this paper is to identify how national interest groups (NIGs) legitimise European interest groups (EIGs) representing them at the EU-level. As a response to the EU legitimacy crisis, the European institutions strive to increase the legitimacy of the EU by including civil society in the decision-making process. For years, EU institutions have informed, consulted and worked with European interest groups which gather together national interest groups. During the last decade, the EU shifted its EU-society relations model from the promotion of consultations with European groups (partnership model) to a system where citizens and national groups should play a more important role (participatory model). This shift constitutes a challenge for EIGs, which see their position of privileged interlocutors of institutions threatened. At the same time, we observe disconnections between NIGs and EIGs. National groups are not always involved in EIGs’ internal structures and some are rather ignorant about their European representative organisations’ activities. Overall, we know little about the perspective of NIGs themselves: how they perceive their European organisations, and how they legitimise their EU representatives. In an empirical and bottom-up perspective, this article explores the perceptions of NIGs by asking the following question: how do national interest groups assess the legitimacy of their European representative organisations? The role of national groups within EIGs has been little discussed by EU studies. Nevertheless, addressing the perceptions national members have of their European umbrellas is crucial to put the official discourse of the EU institutions and (negative) conclusions of previous normative studies on the subject into perspective. The aim of this empirical analysis of organisational legitimacy is to assess the role of intermediary of EIGs, from the point of view of national groups. Through a thematic analysis of 79 interviews with staff member

Following the current debate (and political propositions) about the opportunity to push forward a differentiated integration, this paper addresses the mass-elites (in)congruence in terms of preferences regarding European integration and in particular policy-making preferences. We propose in this paper to address the mass-elites gap by investigate how EU integration is perceived by political elites and citizens in times of crisis. Adopting a qualitative approach, this paper analyses candidates and voters preferences towards European integration (the Belgian Candidate Survey and Belgian Voter Survey 2014). Based on the qualitative analysis of an open question on EU integration, the paper concludes to the need to introduce public policy preferences as an additional determinant of candidates’ and voters’ attitudes towards European integration in particular in a context where the future of differentiated integration is largely debated. Our results show that while Belgian elites are committed to further integration in terms of policy transfer to the European level most Belgian citizens are not because of the negative policy effects this could generate.

This article identifies how Belgian civil society organisations (CSOs) legitimise their European networks (ENs). European networks are understood as European umbrella associations gathering together national CSOs and representing them at the EU level. This article unpacks the concept of organisational legitimacy by empirically analysing Belgian CSOs’ discourse about their ENs. EU institutions consider ENs as appropriate organisations to link the European policymaking process to the requests and opinions expressed by national CSOs and their constituents. Existing studies draw negative conclusions about the transmitter role of ENs and highlight the malfunction of the accountability channel and an unfair representative balance among members. This empirical analysis qualifies these two arguments. The results show that Belgian CSOs legitimise their ENs in two ways: the function they hold in Brussels and their efficiency. ENs are thus not legitimised as accurate transmitters between national CSOs and European officials but as efficient champions of general political objectives, to which Belgian CSOs broadly adhere. These results are based on an inductive qualitative analysis of interviews with staff from five Belgian environmental CSOs.

On the 12th of December 2016, the European Commission declared the Birds and Habitats directives ‘fit for purpose’. This decision followed a public consultation conducted by the Commission. “The purpose of the consultation was to gather opinions on current EU nature conservation legislation (the Birds Directive and the Habitats Directive) and its implementation to date, as part of the 'fitness check' that the European Commission is carrying out under its Regulatory Fitness and Performance Programme (REFIT)”. These directives are part of European Union’s nature protection laws and support the implementation of the Natura 2000 network of conservation sites. The Commission’s declaration was welcomed by Environmental interest groups, which considered it as a political victory ensued by the Nature Alert campaign they conducted in 2015 during the public consultation. This environmental groups’ lobbying success resulted from an unprecedented citizens mobilisation on an EU policy issue. This paper aims to explain this citizens mobilisation conducted by environmental interest groups during the fitness check for the Birds directive and the Habitats directive by relying to this research question: why environmental interest groups have succeed to mobilise citizens during the fitness check for EU nature legislation? The Fitness Check for EU nature legislation is an interesting case to analyse and explain citizens mobilisation and lobbying success (of environmental interest groups). How environmental groups get so many citizens involved? Which element was determinant to explain the success of the Nature Alert campaign? This case study uses the method of process tracing to identify the elements explaining environmental interest groups’ success and consequently allows a better understanding of interest representation at the EU-level and the effects of the ‘participatory turn’ observed at the EU-level

As a response to the so-called legitimacy crisis, European institutions strive to increase the legitimacy of the EU by including civil society in the decision-making process. For years, institutions have informed, consulted and worked with European interest groups (EIGs), which gather together and represent national interest groups (NIGs). However, we observe disconnections between NIGs and EIGs. National groups are not always involved in EIGs’ internal structures and some are totally ignorant about their European representatives’ activities. This puzzling disconnection between national interest groups and European interest groups lies at the core of the dissertation. The research aims to investigate the relations between NIGs and EIGs through the prism of organisational legitimacy. For that purpose, the research sets out to unpack this concept by means of two research questions corresponding to two empirical analyses of European groups’ legitimacy. The two research questions structuring the dissertation are the following: (RQ1) What are the perceptions of “European interest groups legitimacy” by national interest groups? (RQ2) Under which conditions do national interest groups perceive their policy positions as congruent (or not congruent) with the policy positions of their European interest groups? Concerning data collection, a total of 111 interviews with NIGs’ staff members were conducted in five EU member states. On the one hand (RQ1), a conceptual thematic analysis conducted on transcripts of interviews reveals that European groups are legitimised by national groups as trusted champions of political objectives to which these national groups broadly adhered. The latter do not legitimise their European groups as faithful transmitters of their national positions. On the other hand (RQ2), a Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA) identifies the most significant conditions explaining why some national groups perceive the positions of their European groups as congrue, L’inclusion des groupes d’intérêt européens dans le processus de décision de l’Union européenne est une des réponses apportées par les institutions à la crise de légitimité qu’elles traversent. La fonction principale des groupes européens (organisés en associations parapluie) est de faire entendre à Bruxelles les avis et les demandes de leurs organisations membres, les groupes d’intérêt nationaux. Néanmoins, on observe une déconnexion entre les groupes européens et les groupes nationaux (ignorance sur les questions européennes, manque d’implication…). Cette thèse part de ce constat et vise à répondre à deux questions de recherches établies chacune à partir d’une approche particulière de la légitimité des groupes d’intérêt. Q1 : Comment les groupes nationaux évaluent-ils la légitimité de leurs groupes d’intérêt européens ? Q2 : Sous quelles conditions les groupes d’intérêt nationaux perçoivent-ils leurs positions politiques comme congruentes (ou non congruentes) avec les positions de leurs groupes d’intérêt européens ? La thèse répond à ces questions en s’appuyant sur des données récoltées lors de 111 entretiens et l’analyse de 84 cas (relations groupe national-groupe européen) au moyen de deux méthodes. D’une part, une analyse thématique conceptuelle (Q1) révèle que les groupes européens sont légitimés par les groupes nationaux en tant que défenseurs d’objectifs politiques auxquels adhérèrent, dans les grandes lignes, ces groupes nationaux. Ces derniers ne légitiment donc pas leurs groupes européens en tant que fidèles émissaires de leurs positions nationales. D’autre part, une analyse qualitative comparée (Q2) identifie notamment les conditions les plus significatives expliquant pourquoi certains groupes nationaux perçoivent les positions de leurs groupes européens comme congruentes avec les leurs. On notera notamment que les conditions liées aux ressources des groupes nationaux ainsi que leur niveau d’activités européennes expliquent mieux la congruence des positi, (POLS - Sciences politiques et sociales) -- UCL, 2018

L’analyse secondaire de données qualitatives en sciences sociales s’est d’abord développée dans le monde anglo-saxon. Plus récemment, le monde francophone s’est également ouvert à ce mode d’exploitation des données, en France notamment avec le projet « Réanalyse ». Cette communication propose de revenir sur les opportunités et les limites de la réanalyse d’entretiens semi-dirigés en tirant les conclusions d’une expérience de réinterprétation de données récoltées lors d’une thèse de doctorat sur les coalitions d’influence au Québec (Yates, 2010). L’analyse secondaire de données qualitatives peut être au service de nombreuses finalités : confirmer ou généraliser des résultats de recherche, effectuer des comparaisons diachroniques, faire émerger des questions de recherches… L’objectif de la réutilisation de ces entretiens réalisés dans le cadre de l’étude des coalitions d’influence est de réinterpréter les résultats obtenus par une démarche déductive et ancrée dans les théories rationalistes en effectuant une réanalyse des entretiens par un second chercheur dans une démarche inductive, sans a priori théorique. À la lumière de cette expérience, l’objectif de l’article est d’exposer les avantages et les difficultés liés à la réutilisation de données qualitatives récoltées par une chercheuse primaire et réanalysées par un chercheur secondaire. Encore souvent méconnue des chercheurs en sciences sociales, la réutilisation des données qualitatives ouvre de nombreuses de possibilités pour les projets de recherches contemporains. Il nous semble donc que discuter des opportunités et des limites de la réanalyse des données permettra en effet d’enrichir la boîte à outils méthodologiques des chercheurs en sciences politiques.

The aim of this paper is to identify how national interest groups (NIGs) legitimise European interest groups (EIGs) representing them at the EU-level. The paper proposes to unpack the concept of organisational legitimacy by processing an empirical analysis of European interest groups’ legitimacy. Analysing the structural arrangement between NIGs and EIGs is crucial to acquire a more comprehensive picture of the role and the input of national groups in the policymaking process of the European Union (EU). On one hand, the EU official discourse supports the view that EIGs endorse the role of legitimate transmitters of the opinions expressed by national groups. On the other hand, the normative literature asses negatively the intermediary role of EIGs. However, we know little about the views and perceptions of the members of these EIGs and if their opinion responds to the discourse of EU institutions or the conclusions of normative analysis. Therefore, in a bottom-up perspective, this article explores the perceptions of NIGs by asking the following question: which conceptions of “European interest groups legitimacy” do national interest groups have? Through a thematic analysis of interviews with staff members of NIGs from four EU Member-States, this article identifies the different elements in the discourses of national groups that legitimise EIGs. These discourses appeared to be not totally in line with the discourse of the EU nor with the output of normative research. In fact, if EU institutions assume that EIGs are ‘super-conducting transmitters’ between national groups and European officials, it appears that is not the role assigned to European umbrellas by their national members.

The aim of the paper is to understand why Belgian Civil Society Organisations (BCSOs) do perceive European interest groups (EIG) as legitimate and what for. European interest groups are understood as European umbrella associations – gathering together national or regional CSOs – representing their membership at the EU level. The paper proposes to explore legitimation channels mobilised by BCSOs to legitimate European umbrella organisations. The research objective is more exploratory than explanatory since the ambition is to open a path towards an innovative approach of legitimacy. This analysis of legitimacy is based on an empirical or ‘positive’ approach, as opposed the normative approach usually mobilised by interest groups studies. The exploratory findings are based on qualitative analysis of comprehensive interviews with key players of 17 Belgian organisations member of EIG – selected on the basis of the stakeholders consultation of the 'fitness check' of the Nature Legislation driven by the European Commission during spring 2015.

Recently, Rose and Borz underlined the theoretical and empirical need to distinguish between static support as it is now from dynamic support for further integration (2015). From this perspective Europeans can endorse the EU as a good thing today, and at the very same time not endorse further integration. This text builds on this argument in order to offer a renewed interpretation of the gap between elites1 and ordinary citizens. In a multi-method approach, this chapter analyses the determinants of these dynamic attitudes. This paper focuses on the case of Belgium by mobilizing Belgian Candidates Survey and Belgian Voter Survey (PartiRep) 2014. It begins with a qualitative analysis of the open-questions that were present in both surveys (open question following the scale 10 points scale (gone too far – not far enough): “Could you explain why you have chosen this option?”). The aim of the first section is to generate new hypotheses. In particular, this qualitative section concludes to the need to introduce public policy preferences as an additional determinant of candidates and voters attitudes towards European integration as well as the question of EU democracy. Then the rest of the paper mobilizes multinomial logit regressions in order to explain candidates’ and voters’ attitudes towards further European integration, by introducing public policies preferences in the explanation. While candidates are committed to further integration in terms of policy transfer to the European level – in particular regarding social and welfare policies as well as environment and immigration – most Belgian citizens are not.

Literature on interest groups usually analyzes European interest groups' politics focusing mostly on the strategies used by the groups in question in order to influence decision-making both at the EU and at the Member States level. In this paper we would like to propose a new research agenda regarding EU interest groups, focusing this time on decision-making strategies in the interior of these groups when it comes to internal governance and adoption of positions. In that context we would like to put emphasis on the role of individual delegates of members' of "umbrella" type interest groups in the politics of the latter, thus opening a path towards individual-centered analysis of lobbying activities in Brussels. We feel in fact that at each stage of the representation process, from grassroots members and volunteers to professional lobbyist working in Brussels, the individual dimensions of lobbying matter. A focus on this micro-level has the ambition to shed a new light on the existing findings on organized interests’ representation at the EU level. Interest representation should no more be defined only as aiming at exercising influence but also as a process of various levels of interactions amongst individuals. This paper proposes an original research agenda for a comprehensive understanding of the full dimensions of the role of individuals within European interest groups. This proposal follows the observations of European professional associations to which the authors are enjoying a privileged access.

Cet ouvrage, auquel ont contribué plus de vingt politologues issus de plusieurs pays et de différentes générations, est porté par une double ambition. D'une part, il examine les évolutions intervenues, depuis les années 1970, dans cinq champs de la science politique : l’étude du système politique « Belgique » ; les études électorales, les systèmes électoraux et les enquêtes d’opinion ; les questions d’identité et de légitimité politiques, en Belgique mais aussi dans le contexte de l’intégration européenne ; la politique comparée et les méthodes comparatives ; et la polémologie et l’étude des conflits. Ce faisant, il s’interroge aussi sur la manière dont la science politique s’est structurée au cours des dernières décennies. D’autre part, il analyse la contribution spécifique d’André-Paul Frognier dans la construction de la légitimité de la science politique depuis les années 1970, dans son rôle de chercheur-entrepreneur dépassant les clivages disciplinaires, méthodologiques et nationaux.