One of the greatest challenges you’ll face as a lobbyist is ignoring the signs of upcoming legislative, political, policy or regulatory action.
When the proposal/announcement comes out, you won’t have enough time to get prepare and respond.
The harbingers that all is quiet and that there is nothing to see here will go to amazing ends to deny something obvious to many is going to happen.
Even the mention of an initiative will be see as an act of betrayl.
Reading the Signs: What Can You Do
Read, watch and listen to the obvious sources:
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Mention in the political guidelines of the new Commission
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Mention in the European Council’s Strategic Agenda
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Mention in the draft Mission Letter for the Commissioner-designate
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Mention in the Mission Letter for the Commissioner
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Reference in the Work Programme (coming in the February 2025)
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Mention by Commission Officials working on the finalisation in the planning entry
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Mention of the initiative by the Commissioner in charge
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Mention by the President of the Commission
Most of the signs are hiding in plain sight.
6, 7, 8 will be given up in bilateral conversations or in articles/speeches.
When you know something is coming out of the door, the best thing is to get ready.
Signs that You Believe that “Mystical” Powers will step in and save you
All to often, many will embark on a wailing and gnashing of teeth and claim the words are miss-quoted or are heresies.
Some believe that in mystical forces, and that if an initiatives name is mentioned, the initiatve you don’t want will appear. They then just ban any reference to it being made.
Many believe that all that needs to happen to stop the the “nightmare appearing”, is to say “no”, loudly, often, and in many languages.
A popular view is that some higher power, usually in the form a marginal political influencer, say similar to the likes of Roger Helmer MEP, will like the ark angel, sweep down, and stop what you do not want.
A deal with reality approach : Following Kingdon
I’ve preferred a less “mystical” approach. One more accepting of political reality than most.
And, it won’t take you as long to prepare than Noah had to prepare the Ark.
I’d always recommend being prepared. That means having the evidence and solutions ready in place for when the proposal comes out the door. John W. Kingdon mentions having your preferred approach filed away in the filing cabinet for when your issue comes up in the policy cycle. When the policy window opens, all you need to do, is take the cobwebs off your paper, check the evidence, solutions and recommended public policy/legislative language. And, after 27 years, I’ve yet to come across any legislative file where the issues on the agenda were not well know for many years before. Feignng surprise tends to be met with concern about your earlycognitive decline. So, there is no reason not to follow Kingdon’s recommendation.
Of course, one can constructively feed into the system before a proposal comes out the door.
As any final proposal adopted into law bears are striking resemblance to the Commission’s proposal this makes most sense. As a rule of thumb, I estimate that the Commission’s proposal remains about 95% in tact.
Now the pathway the Commission follows to prepare a proposal is well trodden. The sign posts on when to step in, with whom, and with what is well known. I have a series of detailed checklists spelling this out in anally retentive detail.
And, it my cursory 27 years campaigning, lobbying, and law-making, the best way to get the proposal you want, or don’t want, is not to say no, but is to step in at this stage, and make your case with a well reasoned position, evidence and solution.