Multilevel Strategies for Political Influence: How and Why Do Domestic Civil Society Organisations Seek Political Influence at National and EU Levels?

Abstract

This article addresses domestic civil society organisations (CSOs) and their multilevel strategies for gaining political influence in the European Union. Drawing on a theoretical framework identifying different ‘routes’ that CSOs can take in a multilevel system of EU governance, this article analyses which routes or combination of routes CSOs take and investigates what organisational factors can explain similarities and differences among domestic CSOs’ multilevel strategies for political influence. Factors like type of organisation, organisational resources, level of activity and perceived relevance of national and EU political levels are combined. The article shows that CSOs tend to choose a combination of routes and that most of them also participate at the national level when trying to influence EU policy. The article furthermore finds that domestic CSOs seek to influence EU policies above all when they organise around issues that face potential conflicts between national and EU policies, illustrating the analytical significance of how CSOs perceive different political levels.