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The course remains popular among students and also attract students on Erasmus Exchange. It's a fairly demanding course, not so much in the amount of preparation required (2 articles) but in terms of the amount of information students need to acquire in order to perform well in the mid-term assignment (group lobbying strategy) and the end-of-term assignment (an individual research paper). The course coordinator tries to provide time for questions throughout the lecture and to interact with students and time at the end for group discussion. Some groups make good use of this time at the end of the lecture, others struggle more, though this is often dependent on the extent to which students come prepare for class. All mandatory readings are on Bb and thus easily accessible. The lobbying strategy has always been a popular assignment among students in the past. In that context, the complaints mentioned by the reference group reports about the lobbying strategy are a bit puzzling. The course manual mentions explicitly a list of questions that the students are to address in the lobbying strategy and which can also help to structure the strategy. There is a 2-page annex that details various aspects and questions that can or should be addressed. The lobbying strategy assignment is prepared by lectures covering key issues (potential lobbying venues, lobbying channels and tactics) to be addressed, with explicit reference to the need to refer to those in the lobbying strategy. Students also have had ample opportunities to ask questions during lectures. There is also a sample lobbying strategy that is accessible on the course Bb page. The directive dates back from the late 2000s, which is perhaps not seen as recent enough by students. On the other hand, this ensures that a broad variety of documents (from public consultations to literature) is available to students for the preparation and elaboration of the lobbying strategy.

The course adopts an interdisciplinary, actor-centered perspective to examine the changing role of a variety of societal/non-state actors in EU politics over time up to the present day. The first part of the course introduces students to the varieties of non-state actors and their role and functions in EU politics. This part is also designed to help students find a societal actor for their research paper. The second part of the course then deals with interest representation in the EU to explore the actual involvement, strategies, and influence of societal actors in lobbying the EU and gives students a detailed knowledge of interest representation, lobbyism, and lobbying strategies and tactics carried out by these actors. It also give students comprehensive insights into the lobbying process that they can apply to the course's obligatory activity, the lobbying strategy. For this assignment, students write a concrete lobbying strategy and reproduce the lobbying process. The third part focuses on important normative questions raised in contemporary debates by societal actors’ involvement in EU governance and lobbying. Lectures include when appropriate and relevant theoretical and methodological considerations on the study of societal actors' and interest groups' activities in the EU. Students can then operationalize these theories and methods in their own research paper, and thereby participate in empirically and theoretically informed debates on the EU and Lobbying. In their research paper students are also asked to draw upon the course literature and expand it with literature relevant to their own specific societal actor and topic. The more interactive activities are designed to hone in student's critical assessment of different types of sources (e.g. documentary review, lobby fact of the day that discusses an online newspaper article, etc.).

NTNU:TIA:REST

Institutt for historiske og klassiske studier

Department of Historical and Classical Studies

Engelsk

Mer om vurdering

Individual term paper (graded). In the event of a legitimate absence or a failed exam, students can apply to the Department of Historical Studies for re-sitting the examination the following semester. Students who have obtained a passing grade but wish to improve their grade have to register for class and sit the ordinary exam when the course is taught. Compulsory activities from a previous semester may be approved by the department. It is expected that compulsories and examinations must be completed in English. Exceptions must be clarified with the lecturer responsible for the course.

Anbefalte forkunnskaper

Bachelor's degree in European Studies and Foreign Languages or equivalent approved.

Forkunnskapskrav

Faglig innhold

Who governs Europe? What other actors, beyond the EU member states and institutions, are involved in day-to-day policy-making in Brussels? Who lobbies the EU and its institutions? Why, how and under which conditions are these societal/non-state actors able to influence EU law and policies? What normative questions does their involvement into the European legislative process raise with regards to transparency and democracy in the EU? Should the activities of lobby groups be regulated? The course adopts an interdisciplinary, actor-centred perspective to examine the changing role of a variety of societal/non-state actors in EU politics over time up to the present day. The course first focusses on the growth and role of various societal actors such as political parties, business groups, trade unions and interest groups. It then deals with interest representation in the EU. It explores in particular the actual involvement, strategies and influence of societal actors in lobbying the EU.

Kursmateriell

Læringsutbytte

Successful candidates are expected to have acquired the following knowledge and skills:KnowledgeCandidates have<ul><li>basic knowledge of the varieties of non-state actors and their role and functions in EU politics</li><li>detailed knowledge of interest representation, lobbyism and lobbying strategies carried out by these actors</li><li>good understanding of the lobbying process</li><li>basic knowledge of the theoretical and methodological approaches to the study of societal actors in the EU</li><li>good understanding of key normative issues raised in contemporary debates by societal actors involved in EU governance and lobbying</li></ul>SkillsCandidates are able to<ul><li>describe and explain how and why societal actors are involved in EU politics</li><li>theoretically and methodologically analyse how different actors carry out their activities in the EU</li><li>to participate in empirically and theoretically informed debates on the EU and lobbying</li><li>to write a concrete lobbying strategy and reproduce the lobbying process</li></ul>

Læringsformer og aktiviteter

Lectures, with active student participation. In groups: Students must submit and pass the lobbying strategy paper. It is expected that compulsories and examinations must be completed in English. Exceptions must be clarified with the lecturer responsible for the course.

Lobbying strategy (group assignment)

Governing Europe: Societal Actors, Networks and Lobbying

Europastudier

European Studies (Master's Programme)

Europastudier - masterprogram

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Web/Lists(guid'8b698a2d-6ad0-4f7d-b3be-219cc1979f02')/Items(19114)/FieldValuesAsText

The course is usually appreciated by students, who particularly enjoy the lobbying strategy as an applied assessment. The course manual and the lectures are reviewed annually and updated to incorporate the most recent developments, literature, and use new teaching tools to facilitate student engagement (e.g. Mentimeter). The course format was hybrid at the beginning of the semester so that students who were contact persons or ill could still follow the lectures (despite the technical limitations of the classroom). It then moved to physical once covid restrictions were eased. Re.: hybrid teaching forms, it would be useful to recommend that more classrooms are equipped with zoom room so as to facilitate the involvement of external speakers/practitioners -- currently only Blink has such a room and refused to lend it when I invited a practitioner, Massimo Busuoli, to speak of his lobbying experience in one of the lecture. As a result, we had to move the entire lecture online because prior tests of hybrid forms in our regular classroom had not been successful. Although this is not a course-specific problem, a major challenge this year has been to engage the students in class activities (from finding volunteers for the reference group to class activities). This has been discussed during the regular meetings with the reference group, which also experienced similar difficulty in e.g. collecting feedback from students. The very low participation of students in the poll on the workload, though this was an issue they had raised to the reference group, is just an expression of the problem. The course coordinator tried several, innovative alternatives (e.g. using Mentimeter, group activities/assignments) with few concrete results, alas. This lack of engagement is probably linked to several conflated issues such as internal dynamics of this year's student group, a lack of familiarity with active participation in discussion, a lack of preparation for at least some students (although based on a past reference group feedback the number of mandatory readings had been reduced from 3 to 2 a few years ago to ensure that students would have more time to prepare in-depth). A suggestion of the reference group is to include more group discussions which is a possibility, though not a magic solution, it can only function if students come sufficiently prepared to class, i.e. read the mandatory literature. The addition of concrete questions, which had been a suggestion of a prior reference group, was designed to help students prepare so that discussion could be informed. Dividing the class into 2-3 smaller groups was also made more impracticable due to the need to maintain social distancing (need to reorganize table) and the low attendance (sometimes only 6-8 students in the class) towards the end of the semester. The issue of the workload was mentioned. To get a clearer idea of the problem, the course coordinator distributed a poll (cf. attachment) but only a handful of students answered it (6 out of over 20 students enrolled), voiding its representativity.

the first part of the course introduces students to the varieties of non-state actors and their role and functions in EU politics. This part is also designed to help students find a societal actor for their research paper. The second part of the course then deals with interest representation in the EU to explore the actual involvement, strategies, and influence of societal actors in lobbying the EU and gives students a detailed knowledge of interest representation, lobbyism, and lobbying strategies carried out by these actors. It also give students comprehensive insights into the lobbying process that they can apply to the course's obligatory activity, the lobbying strategy. For this assignment, students write a concrete lobbying strategy and reproduce the lobbying process. The third part focuses on important normative questions raised in contemporary debates by societal actors’ involvement in EU governance and lobbying. The course adopts an interdisciplinary, actor-centered perspective to examine the changing role of a variety of societal/non-state actors in EU politics over time up to the present day. Lectures include when appropriate and relevant theoretical and methodological considerations on the study of societal actors' and interest groups' activities in the EU. Students can then operationalize these theories and methods in their own research paper, and thereby participate in empirically and theoretically informed debates on the EU and Lobbying. In their research paper students are also asked to draw upon the course literature and expand it with literature relevant to their own specific societal actor and topic.

The course coordinator makes an effort to make the mandatory reading for the course accessible on Bb. Yet, it is striking that the reference group reports points out that only a few chapters of the Greenwood textbook were available on Bb, although the textbook (in fact several editions), like most other textbooks listed in the course manual, could be easily borrowed from the library. It is clearly problematic (and worrying) that some 1st year MA level students do not apparently know how/when to use the library resources.

Successful candidates are expected to have acquired the following knowledge and skills:KnowledgeCandidates have<ul><li>basic knowledge of the varieties of non-state actors and their role and functions in EU politics</li><li>detailed knowledge of interest representation, lobbyism and lobbying strategies carried out by these actors</li><li>good understanding of the lobbying process</li><li>basic knowledge of the theoretical and methodological approaches to the study of societal actors in the EU</li><li>good understanding of key normative issues raised in contemporary debates by societal actors involved in EU governance and lobbying</li></ul>SkillsCandidates are able to<ul><li>describe and explain how and why societal actors are involved in EU politics</li><li>theoretically and methodologically analyse how different actors carry out their activities in the EU</li><li>to participate in empirically and theoretically informed debates on the EU and lobbying</li><li>to write a concrete lobbying strategy and reproduce the lobbying process</li></ul>

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The students generally like the course, which has received positive evaluations on both its content and delivery. It went online this year due to COVID regulations. Students particularly valued the opportunity to received feedback at different stage of the writing of the research paper (two mandatory submission deadline at the start and mid-semester and one optional before the final submission deadline). Attendance of the course was generally good, with a core of engaged and active students. The reference group provided valuable, constructive feedback throughout the semester.

The learning outcomes are communicated to students through the <a href="https://www.ntnu.edu/studies/courses/EUR3413/2019/1#tab=omEmnet" target="_blank">course webpage</a>, the course manual and in the first lecture of the course. The learning outcome were revised in 2017 and are up to date. The courses is organized around three thematic focal points. The first part of the course focuses on the variety of societal actors that seek to play a role in EU governance, the second part provides in-depth explanation of the process, strategies, venues and channels of lobbyings. The third part touches upon key normative issues pertaining to the involvement and lobbying activities of societal actors in EU governance.The course's learning outcomes are geared towards complementing or and honing in skills (e.g. critical thinking, writing, analytical, presentation, team and individual work) that are also addressed in other parallel courses in the first year, building up towards preparing students for writing their MA thesis in the spring semester of year 2.

The course manual was substantially revised to reflected past student feedback, the instructor's own assessment of learning activities and the new digital format. A number of new learning activities (e.g. lobby fact of the week, documentary review, guest speakers, class discussion with a question communicated to students prior to the session, and use of polls during lectures) were added to ensure greater teacher-student and student-student interaction. The instructor takes on board the reference group's suggestion to have a class discussion on the documentary as opposed to group presentation and make more use of break-out rooms to facilitate discussion among students. Some additional guidance can be added in the course manual on the lobby fact of the day. At the same time is this a graduate -- not an undergraduate -- course and students are expected to learn to work with a certain level of independance, which also includes the ability to work with a maximum word count and different course requirements.It would be difficult to have the obligatory actitivy (the mid-term assignment) be either a group or individual assignment for various reasons, including equal distribution of work among all students. In addition to that, the two forms of assessments are geared towards developing different kind of skills: team and collaborative work skills for the lobbyuing strategy (which are also sought-after skills on the professional job market) and individual, independant, research and writing skills for the research paper, which also functions as a preparation for the MA thesis.

The applied assignment, the lobbying strategies, allows students to operationalize the knowledge acquired on societal actors as well as lobbying strategies and channels and hone in their presentation skills. It also enable them to reproduce a lobbying process empirically. The lobbying strategy has been consistently assessed positively by students. Although digital presentation can present some challenges, they also are an opportunity for students to hone in their digital literarcy as joint digital presentations are likely to become a new professional normal, even after the covid pandemic.In the term assignment, which takes the form of a research paper, students are asked to focus on one or several societal actors in Europe or the EU, draw upon relevant scholarly literature and theoretical approaches discussed in class. In the paper, students are expected to describe and explain how/why societal actors are involved in EU policy and law making and analyse, through relevant theoretical and metholdological lenses, how they carry their lobbying activities.These formative and summative assessment forms comply with the course's learning outcome.

Individual term paper (graded).

In the event of a legitimate absence or a failed exam, students can apply to the Department of Historical Studies for re-sitting the examination the following semester. Students who have obtained a passing grade but wish to improve their grade have to register for class and sit the ordinary exam when the course is taught. Compulsory activities from a previous semester may be approved by the department.

It is expected that compulsories and examinations must be completed in English. Exceptions must be clarified with the lecturer responsible for the course.

Who governs Europe? What other actors, beyond the EU member states and institutions, are involved in day-to-day policy-making in Brussels? Who lobbies the EU and its institutions? Why, how and under which conditions are these societal/non-state actors able to influence EU law and policies? What normative questions does their involvement into the European legislative process raise with regards to transparency and democracy in the EU? Should the activities of lobby groups be regulated?
 
The course adopts an interdisciplinary, actor-centred perspective to examine the changing role of a variety of societal/non-state actors in EU politics over time up to the present day. The course first focusses on the growth and role of various societal actors such as political parties, business groups, trade unions and interest groups. It then deals with interest representation in the EU. It explores in particular the actual involvement, strategies and influence of societal actors in lobbying the EU.


Lectures, with active student participation.

In groups: Students must submit and pass the lobbying strategy paper.
It is expected that compulsories and examinations must be completed in English. Exceptions must be clarified with the lecturer responsible for the course.


Successful candidates are expected to have acquired the following knowledge and skills:

Knowledge:
Students have
- basic knowledge of the varieties of non-state actors and their role and functions in EU politics
- detailed knowledge of interest representation, lobbyism and lobbying strategies carried out by these actors
- good understanding of the lobbying process
- basic knowledge of the theoretical and methodological approaches to the study of societal actors in the EU
- good understanding of key normative issues raised in contemporary debates by societal actors involved in EU governance and lobbying

Skills:
Students are able to 
- describe and explain how and why societal actors are involved in EU politics
- theoretically and methodologically analyse how different actors carry out their activities in the EU
- to participate in empirically and theoretically informed debates on the EU and lobbying
- to write a concrete lobbying strategy and reproduce the lobbying process

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Governing Europe: Societal Actors, Networks and Lobbying - EUR3413