Lobby control

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LobbyControl - Initiative for Transparency and Democracy
logo
legal form registered association
founding 2005
Seat Am Justizzentrum 7, 50939 Cologne
motto Active for transparency and democracy
main emphasis Transparency and democracy
Chair Heike Dierbach, Lea Hartung, Leonce Röth, Arne Semsrott
Managing directors Heidi Bank, Imke Dierßen
sales 1,464,268 euros (2019)
Employees 14, as well as 4 assistants, 2 interns and 7 city guides (2019)
Members 5967 supporting members (2019)
Website www.lobbycontrol.de

Lobbycontrol - Initiative for Transparency and Democracy eV ( own spelling LobbyControl ) is a non-profit registered association based in Cologne , which according to its own information wants to “clarify about power structures and influence strategies in Germany and the EU” and “for transparency, democratic control and clear Barriers to influencing politics and the public ”by interest groups .

The Union

Working method

The association conducts research on current topics, background analyzes with a scientific claim and public campaigns. The association would like to report on think tanks , business-oriented campaigns and distorted representations in the media as well as on networks and coordinated lobbying behind the scenes. The aim of this research and information is to expose covert influences and to help citizens recognize them and make their own positions heard. In campaigns, Lobbycontrol would like to take up outstanding connections and grievances in order to end them directly or to implement new protective measures against unilateral influence. These include, for example, stricter rules for ancillary income for MPs or registration and reporting obligations for lobbyists.

Lobbycontrol operates the LobbyFacts portal together with Corporate Europe Observatory and Friends of the Earth Europe . There, the data from the EU transparency register on lobbying activities by companies , associations , agencies and non-governmental organizations are made available in an understandable manner.

Emergence

According to its own statements, the association emerged as a successor to the Congress Guided Democracy? , which took place in 2004 in Frankfurt. The event with 180 participants dealt with the influence of neoliberal and economic elites on politics and the public.

The Internet blog Lobbycontrol.de has existed since May 2005 and the Lobbycontrol association since the beginning of 2006. In the beginning, it was represented in public by a four-person executive board consisting of Thomas Dürmeier (economist, founder of the "Working Group Postautistic Economy", Attac Speaker), Heidi Bank (political scientist), Ulrich Müller (political scientist, organizer of the above-mentioned congress) and Dieter Plehwe (political scientist, Berlin Science Center for Social Research , co-founder of the group "Buena Vista Neoliberal?"). The association now also consists of a management team that is separate from the board of directors and several campaigners. The current four-person board consists of Heike Dierbach (graduate psychologist and trained journalist), Lea Hartung (head of community projects in the Central and State Library Berlin ), Leonce Röth (political scientist at the Cologne Center for Comparative Politics) and Arne Semsrott ( Project manager of the FragDenStaat.de portal at the Open Knowledge Foundation , freelance journalist for Le Monde diplomatique and netzpolitik.org and member of the advisory board of the whistleblower network (as of August 2020).

financing

The association is financed with donations, membership fees and the sale of its own publications such as the LobbyPlanet Berlin city ​​guide published at the end of 2008 . With a total of 40,000 euros as start-up funding, he received the majority of the budget from the movement foundation between 2006 and 2008 . In the years that followed, the volume and the independence of the financing was significantly improved by multiplying the income from membership fees, donations from private individuals and the sale of goods. In 2016, 963,201 euros were raised, 80% of which came from donations and contributions from supporting members. The association received major support in 2016 from the "long-term sponsor" Olin gGmbH (47,546 euros), which according to its own information is financed by a private foundation of the Hamburg businessman Alexander Szlovák and within the scope of a three-year cooperation with the non-profit organization Campact eV from 80,000 euros.

Initiatives and projects (selection)

Christiansen study

The association became known nationwide with the Christiansen study , in which LobbyControl analyzed the thematic and personal line-up of the television program Sabine Christiansen ( ARD / NDR ) between January 2005 and June 2006. The study provides a lot of evidence to show that the German political talk show with the highest ratings at the time preferred representatives of companies and business associations as guests, while trade unions or social associations were underrepresented and a one-sided range of topics was given. Sabine Christiansen's producer , Michael Heiks, considers the lobby control methods questionable. In response to the allegations against the program, he replied: “A simple assignment to camps and associations is fundamentally nonsensical. What the guests of our discussion programs actually said is completely ignored. "And" Counting fly legs is just not enough. ""

"Revolving door" study

In the short study Fliegende Wechsel - the revolving door circles from November 15, 2007, the new employment relationships of 63 former members of the red-green German government (1998 to 2005) were examined. The study also presented the applicable regulations for changing from political office to the private sector and made demands for new regulations. (See also revolving door effect ).

At the request of former Chancellor Gerhard Schröder , the association was given a judicial warning for reproducing the claim by the magazine Der Spiegel that Schröder was active as an advisor to the Chinese Foreign Ministry .

“No lobbyists in ministries” campaign

In another study in July 2007, the association pointed out that more than 100 employees from companies and associations work in federal ministries. In the No lobbyists in ministries campaign , Lobbycontrol is now calling on the federal government to disclose all information about the previous involvement of lobbyists in ministries. Furthermore, the unilateral access of companies and business associations to the ministries must be ended, as this practice is undemocratic and undermines the principles of plural decision-making. For this disclosure, an appeal for the introduction of a lobby register with the signatures of 8,700 citizens was passed to the Bundestag in 2009 .

Exposure of the PR affair of Deutsche Bahn

The work with the greatest media coverage so far was the research carried out by lobby control on the public relations work of Deutsche Bahn AG . In May 2009 it was revealed that the Deutsche Bahn management, through the lobby agency European Public Policy Advisers GmbH and the Berlin think tank Berlinpolis, had covertly awarded contracts to make positive contributions to the privatization of the railways and against the train drivers' strike in the media. Among other things, media articles were pre-produced for the campaign and letters to the editor, blog posts and surveys were falsified or invented. In addition, an alleged citizens' initiative for railway privatization (Meinebahndeinebahn.de) was founded by the PR agency. According to the lobby control report, the new head of Deutsche Bahn, Rüdiger Grube , confirmed covert PR measures for which DB AG had paid 1.3 million euros.

Biofuel revelations

In July 2009 Lobbycontrol discovered that the Association of the German Biofuel Industry eV had carried out a campaign over several months in 2008 that was intended to improve public opinion on the subject of biofuels . For this purpose, the Berlinpolis agency published one-sided letters to the editor and articles in various media. For example on the website of the Ministry of Economics in North Rhine-Westphalia (www.kreativeoekonomie.de). Positive opinions were also published in the Junge Welt , the FAZ , the Frankfurter Rundschau and on Focus Online . Berlinpolis' client was EPPA GmbH.

Negative awards

The negative Worst EU Lobbying Award was given annually from 2005 to 2010 by Lobbycontrol together with the non-governmental organizations Corporate Europe Observatory , Friends of the Earth Europe and Spinwatch to lobbyists, companies and interest groups who have used manipulative, misleading or other problematic lobbying tactics to To influence EU decisions. The award ceremony took place in Brussels . The winners were determined by public voting on the Internet. After 2010, the award was no longer given.

Prize winners:

In 2007 the special Worst EU Greenwash Award was given. It went to the German Atomic Forum .

In 2011 the Lobbykratie-Medal , the negative price for undemocratic lobbying, was awarded for the first time . The award went to Deutsche Bank and Josef Ackermann.

Lobbypedia

In October 2010, the association started the Wiki -based online lexicon Lobbypedia , which aims to educate people about lobbying. Cases of lobbying are documented in thematically sorted articles. In 2012 the Lobbypedia received the Grimme Online Award for its “careful compilation of lobbyism in Germany”, according to the jury's reasoning .

City tours through Berlin

The association offers two-hour city tours for individuals and groups on the subject of lobbying in Berlin. Company representatives, association offices, PR agencies, other lobbyists and their activities are presented.

criticism

Occasionally there is criticism that lobby control does not accompany all the influence of interest groups on politics in the same critical manner. The journalist Jan Philipp Hein criticizes that there have been very clear cases of conflicts of interest in the field of renewable energies that lobby control ignores. Lobby Control stated that it would concentrate on cases with power imbalances.

Publications

Lobby reports:

  • Lobby report 2013: The lobbyism debate 2009–2013: A balance sheet of the black and yellow government , lobby control
  • Lobby report 2015: Lobby control between progress and standstill: A mid-term review after two years black and red , lobby control
  • Lobby report 2017: Sit out instead of tackling: A balance sheet of four years in black and red , lobby control
  • Lobby Report 2019: What Europe should do against corporate power , lobby control

Studies:

  • Schaubühne for the influential and opinion makers: The neoliberal reform discourse in "Sabine Christiansen" (September 2006), lobby control
  • Convention for Germany - Paving the way for unpopular reforms (March 2007), lobby control
  • Flying changes, the revolving door is circling: Two years later - What is the ex-Schröder II government doing today? (November 2007), lobby control
  • Greenwash in times of climate change - How companies color their image green (November 2007), Lobbycontrol
  • Beyond the public interest. The hidden influence of Deutsche Bahn for privatization (June 2009), Lobbycontrol
  • Secondary employment of members of the Bundestag: Transparency insufficient (September 2009), lobby control
  • The Non Toxic Solar Alliance - questionable creation of a lobby agency (November 2010), Lobbycontrol
  • Lobbying in schools - a discussion paper on influencing teaching and what can be done about it (April 2013), Lobbycontrol
  • Whose representatives? Members of the European parliament on the industrial payroll (June 2015), Lobbycontrol, CEO , Friends of the Earth Europe
  • TTIP study: A dangerous regulatory duet (January 2016), lobby control & CEO
  • Sold democracy: How the rules for protecting investors in CETA could lead to a boom of investors suing Canada and the EU (September 2016), Lobbycontrol, CEO , Transnational Institute, Council of Canadians u. a.
  • From NAFTA to CETA - corporate lobbyism through the back door (February 2017), lobby control, forum environment & development u. a.
  • Captured legislation: When corporations dominate political processes and threaten our rights (September 2018), lobby control & ALTER-EU
  • International regulatory cooperation and the public good (May 2019), Lobbycontrol & Powershift
  • The German EU Council Presidency - Industry in the Leading Role? (June 2020), Lobbycontrol, BUND , CEO , Deutsche Umwelthilfe u. a.

Further publications:

  • LobbyPlanet Berlin - the travel guide through the lobby jungle (3rd edition)
  • LobbyPlanet Brussels - Insight into the lobby jungle in Brussels (3rd edition, September 2012)
  • Bursting the Brussels Bubble (2010), Lobbycontrol & ALTER-EU
  • Ulrich Müller, Sven Giegold , Malte Arhelger (eds.): Controlled Democracy? How neoliberal elites influence politics and the public. VSA-Verlag , Hamburg 2004.

literature

  • Gabriele Goettle: From goats that garden. An afternoon at LobbyControl in Berlin, in: taz, February 25, 2013, p. 15f.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Annual Report 2018/19. LobbyControl, accessed August 13, 2020 .
  2. ↑ a b Annual Report 2019/20. LobbyControl, accessed August 13, 2020 .
  3. ↑ https://www.lobbycontrol.de/initiative/
  4. ↑ Hard facts on Europe's biggest lobbyists revealed for the first time. Corporate Europe Observatory, September 30, 2014, accessed September 19, 2018 .
  5. ↑ Proceedings: Controlled Democracy , Hamburg 2004.
  6. ↑ About us - team and board. Lobby control, accessed on August 14, 2020 .
  7. ↑ sueddeutsche.de: City guide with a horror effect . December 17, 2008, accessed August 14, 2020.
  8. ↑ Own presentation of finances
  9. ↑ Annual Report 2006.pdf
  10. ↑ Annual report 2009 (PDF; 1.2 MB)
  11. ↑ LobbyControl: Annual Report 2016 (PDF). Retrieved August 13, 2020 .
  12. ^ Olin gGmbH: Olin GmbH. Retrieved March 23, 2018 .
  13. ↑ emorm magazine: rnorm magazine, commercial advisory board. Retrieved March 23, 2018 .
  14. ↑ Christiansen study by Lobbycontrol (short version, pdf; 193 kB)
  15. ^ Sabine Christiansen - Schaubühne of the influential and opinion makers in: LobbyControl -Blog
  16. ↑ One-sided Christiansen? in: Zeit online, September 6, 2006
  17. ↑ Schröder sends the lawyer , in LobbyControl , November 30, 2007
  18. ↑ Ex-Chancellor Schröder warns of the weblog in Der Spiegel , December 3, 2007
  19. ^ No lobbyists in ministries ( Memento of December 23, 2007 in the Internet Archive ), study by LobbyControl
  20. ^ List of lobbyists reveals influence in ministries , Der Spiegel , July 26, 2007
  21. ↑ Today we are handing over the lobby register appeal to the Bundestag ; Press release-f Firmenpresse.de: lobby register appeal submitted to the Bundestag , December 17, 2009
  22. ↑ LobbyControl: The hidden influence of the Deutsche Bahn for the railway privatization and against the GDL strike
  23. ↑ Bahn paid millions for deception . In: Handelsblatt, May 29, 2009
  24. ^ Deutsche Bahn again in the twilight ( Memento from May 31, 2009 in the Internet Archive ). tagesschau.de, May 29, 2009
  25. ↑ http://www.lobbycontrol.de/blog/index.php/2009/07/erneut-verdeckte-meinungsmache-heute-biosprit/
  26. ↑ https://www.heise.de/tp/news/Greenwashing-fuer-Biosprit-aufgedeckt-2032551.html
  27. ↑ Official homepage of the award ( Memento from December 23, 2014 in the Internet Archive )
  28. ^ Negative price for German lobby work in tagesschau.de , December 4, 2007
  29. ↑ http://www.lobbycontrol.de/blog/index.php/2011/12/presseecho-lobbykratie-medaille/
  30. ↑ LobbyControl blog entry about the launch of the platform
  31. ↑ Lobbypedia: Making lobbying transparent in Zeit Online's Open Data blog
  32. ↑ Grimme Online Award: Tagesschau app receives audience award in Die Zeit on June 20, 2012
  33. ↑ LobbyControl, lobby critical guided tours of Berlin
  34. ^ Taz, Von Böcken, who gardeners, February 25, 2013
  35. ↑ Emde, Oliver: Cooperation between schools and NGOs for a critical European education - specialist didactic considerations on lobby-critical city tours. In: Eis, Andreas; Moulin-Doos, Claire (Ed.): Critical Political Education for Europe: Europe's Multiple Crisis as a Collective Learning Opportunity? Prolog-Verlag, Immenhausen near Kassel 2018, p. 213-228 .
  36. ↑ Jan-Philipp Hein: Arguable - only briefly save the world. Non-governmental organizations enjoy unrestricted trust for each status, and yet they do represent their own interests. SVZ.de, January 5, 2014, accessed on March 14, 2014 .
  37. ↑ LobbyControl: Lobby Report 2013 (PDF). June 2013, accessed August 13, 2020 .
  38. ↑ LobbyControl: Lobby Report 2015 (PDF). December 2015, accessed August 13, 2020 .
  39. ↑ LobbyControl: Lobby Report 2017 (PDF). June 2017, accessed August 13, 2020 .
  40. ↑ LobbyControl: Lobby Report 2019 (PDF). April 2019, accessed August 13, 2020 .
  41. ↑ LobbyControl: Schaubühne for the influential and opinion makers (PDF). September 2006, accessed August 13, 2020 .
  42. ^ LobbyControl: Convention for Germany (PDF). March 2007, accessed August 13, 2020 .
  43. ↑ LobbyControl: Flying change - the revolving door circles (PDF). November 2007, accessed August 13, 2020 .
  44. ↑ LobbyControl: Greenwash in times of climate change (PDF). November 2007, accessed August 13, 2020 .
  45. ^ LobbyControl: Beyond the public interest (PDF). June 2009, accessed August 13, 2020 .
  46. ↑ LobbyControl: Secondary activities of members of the Bundestag: Transparency insufficient (PDF). September 2009, accessed August 13, 2020 .
  47. ^ LobbyControl: The Non Toxic Solar Alliance (PDF). November 2010, accessed August 13, 2020 .
  48. ^ LobbyControl: Lobbying in schools (PDF). April 2013, accessed August 13, 2020 .
  49. ^ LobbyControl, Corporate Europe Observatory, Friends of the Earth Europe: Whose representatives? (PDF). June 2015, accessed August 13, 2020 .
  50. ^ LobbyControl, Corporate Europe Observatory: A Dangerous Regulatory Duet (PDF). January 2016, accessed August 13, 2020 .
  51. ^ LobbyControl, Corporate Europe Observatory, Transnational Institute, Council of Canadians u. a .: Sold Democracy (PDF). September 2016, accessed on August 13, 2020 .
  52. ↑ LobbyControl, Forum Environment & Development, Corporate EUrope Observatory, CCPA: From NAFTA to CETA (PDF). February 2017, accessed August 13, 2020 .
  53. ↑ LobbyControl, ALTER-EU: Captured legislation (PDF). September 2018, accessed on August 13, 2020 .
  54. ↑ Lobby Control, Powershift: International regulatory cooperation and the public good (PDF). May 2019, accessed on August 13, 2020 .
  55. ↑ LobbyControl, BUND, Deutsche Umwelthilfe, CEO u. a .: The German EU Council Presidency - Industry in the main role? (PDF). June 2020, accessed on August 13, 2020 .
  56. ↑ Lobby control, ALTER-EU: Bursting the Brussels Bubble (PDF). April 2010, accessed August 13, 2020 .