Public-Private Interactions in European Trade Policy Making

In the field of European trade policy-making, public and private actors exchange goods in a multilevel network on the basis of resource-interdependency. These goods may be of different types, such as information about the possible implications of trade policy negotiations, or interest representation, as in trade policy negotiations there are of course interests to be defended. Information and representativeness are resources that the private actors have and that the public actors want. The public actors are able to defend the interests of the private ones, and that is a resource that the latter need. The exchange of goods between public and private actors takes place on the European supranational, national and sub-national levels, and this doctoral dissertation analyzes the influence of network structures on the initiation and formulation of European trade policies through a comparison of the actors involved and their resource-dependent interactions, in European trade negotiations on the one hand and in anti-dumping regulations on the other. This comparative research is based on an analysis of official documents, on secondary sources and on interviews.
The research is divided into five parts. The first chapter reviews the literature on public/private interactions in multilevel networking and gives an overview of European policymaking on trade. The second chapter analyzes the institutional power of public EU actors, the resources of private actors, the intermediary roles played by partner actors, and the types of goods the public and private actors exchange. The third chapter is a literature review, analyzing public/private interactions in European trade negotiations with a focus on the European Commission, Council and Parliament. The EU’s anti-dumping policy as applied against Chinese footwear (2005-2009) is analyzed in the fourth chapter, by tracking the Commission’s official documents and analyzing data from interviews. The conclusion compares the exchange of goods between public and private actors involved in European trade negotiations on the one hand and those involved in anti-dumping legislation on the other, and in doing so it assesses the influence of network structures on the forging of European trade policies.