Power and transparency in political negotiations

Abstract

Who gains legislative influence in early agreement negotiations (trilogues) between the European Parliament and the Council of the European Union? Practitioners from both institutions suspect that it is the other side. Meanwhile, critics point at trilogues’ lack of transparency. This article proposes that legislative power and institutional transparency are inversely related: Opacity makes an actor more influential in political negotiations. The argument is tested on a matched sample of legislative files from the 1999–2009 period. The findings suggest that the European Parliament became more influential in early agreement negotiations – where it became opaque vis-à-vis the Council. In such negotiations, the relative influence of the European Parliament substantially increased; by contrast, the European Parliament did not gain influence in negotiations where it remained transparent.