[HN Gopher] LobbyFacts - Exposing lobbying in European institutions
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LobbyFacts - Exposing lobbying in European institutions
Author : belter
Score : 296 points
Date : 2023-05-15 15:02 UTC (7 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.lobbyfacts.eu)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.lobbyfacts.eu)
| diimdeep wrote:
| Lobby fights lobby ->
| https://www.corporateeurope.org/en/who-we-are#our_funders
| -> The Open Society Foundations were set up in 1979 by George
| Soros EUR129,570
| RobotToaster wrote:
| https://www.lobbyfacts.eu/datacard/open-society-institute-br...
|
| > _" Since 20 September 2021 self-declared 'non-commercial
| organisations' are no longer required to provide a lobby
| budget."_
|
| That's rather convenient for them.
| burkaman wrote:
| There are 15 funding organizations on that page, why did you
| choose to only mention that one?
|
| Also, this is a simple listing of self-declared lobbying
| efforts. Even the most mal-intentioned nefarious lobbyist could
| not seriously consider this site to be "fighting" them.
| [deleted]
| vrglvrglvrgl wrote:
| [dead]
| willtemperley wrote:
| It would be interesting to see the breakdown by client - e.g.
| Amazon are paying more than EUR500k via Fleishmann-Hillard and at
| least another EUR400k via FTI consulting. Maybe I'm cynical but
| it seems like an attempt at indirection.
|
| EDIT: Searching by client, it's possible to see that Amazon pay
| 16 different consultants for lobbying [1], and that's just under
| the Amazon name, they also have ten subsidiaries that lobby the
| EU via consultants.
|
| [1] https://www.lobbyfacts.eu/client?cid=627
| skrebbel wrote:
| (I know nothing about big companies)
|
| Or just different departments doing their own lobbying in their
| own preferred way
| pomian wrote:
| Is there something like this for North America? That would be
| even more fun! And then comparing the relationships between
| them...
| weberer wrote:
| https://www.opensecrets.org/
| whimsicalism wrote:
| opensecrets
| ckardat123 wrote:
| I commented above, but I'm currently working with U.S. lobbying
| data so I can help answer that question!
|
| Here's the U.S. disclosure site:
| https://lda.senate.gov/filings/public/filing/search/
|
| I've been working on building an improved version of that site
| (allowing users to search by the issue being lobbied on, show
| trends by company, etc.) but it's still in the pretty early
| stages of development. Have a big update coming in the next few
| weeks though: https://www.quiverquant.com/lobbyingsearch/
|
| OpenSecrets also does great work summarizing lobbying data:
| https://www.opensecrets.org/federal-lobbying
| f_devd wrote:
| Very cool, found the party behind the recent privacy invading
| proposal (I forget the name) that mullvad was advertising
| against:
| https://www.lobbyfacts.eu/datacard/thorn?rid=854246640306-96
| Surprisingly informative
| pfoof wrote:
| "Meta Platforms Ireland Limited", something is off here, hmm...
| sva_ wrote:
| Cool site. It would be nice to be able to search by subject of
| meeting (such as "Artificial Intelligence act").
|
| Microsoft: https://www.lobbyfacts.eu/datacard/microsoft-
| corporation?rid...
|
| OpenAI: https://www.lobbyfacts.eu/datacard/openai-
| lp?rid=67221974675...
|
| Google:
| https://www.lobbyfacts.eu/datacard/google?rid=03181945560-59
| mstef wrote:
| a few years ago i was maintaining lobbyfacts. ama
| willtemperley wrote:
| Is there a way to see breakdown of exactly what a company is
| paying lobbyists, either directly or via a consultancy? It's
| currently a lot of manual work searching for e.g. Amazon and
| looking at the eleven trading names that lobby the EU via a
| multitude of consultants.
| vanderZwan wrote:
| Did you ever get any feedback from journalists and researchers
| using it?
| mstef wrote:
| yes, back in the days CEO (Corporate Europe Observeratory
| https://corporateeurope.org/) alter-eu (https://www.alter-
| eu.org/), and a bunch of other NGOs where using (and also
| sponsoring it). But it is also well known by the OCCRP people
| (one of whom actually started the whole thing).
| pudo wrote:
| hello sir :-P
| mstef wrote:
| haha. hello OG
| nathan_phoenix wrote:
| What constitutes lobby costs?
|
| Also why do some organizations have relatively big lobby costs
| but no EP passes or meetings with EC? Does that mean that they
| are less "effective" than their peer lobby organizations?
| mstef wrote:
| lobby costs is a self reported value based on their spending
| on lobbyings, including for example staff, office rent,
| events, etc.
|
| not having ep passes or meetings with the ec, only means less
| direct contact, or possibly having outsourced this contact.
| nathan_phoenix wrote:
| What constitutes lobby costs?
|
| Also why do some organizations have relatively big lobby costs
| but no EP passes or meetings with EC? Does that mean that they
| are less "effective" than their peer lobby organizations?
| hulitu wrote:
| > What constitutes lobby costs?
|
| "Legal" corruption. The money they invest trying to convince
| the EU representatives.
| beebmam wrote:
| As long as the EU representatives aren't getting paid,
| lobbying seems fine to me, unless you want all campaigns
| publicly financed (which I'd also be good with).
|
| It's a dubious claim to state that lobbying is legal
| corruption.
|
| The difference between actual corruption and lobbying is
| large: corruption enriches politicians personal wealth, while
| lobbying (at its worst) increases the money a politician can
| use to get elected. Maybe some would believe one is just as
| bad as the other, but I don't. Election finance law is
| critically important to preventing corruption from creeping
| in.
| snowwrestler wrote:
| Lobbying is not election finance.
|
| Lobbying is telling elected officials what you want the law
| to be. It costs money because employees get salaries,
| websites cost money to build, reports cost money to write
| and publish, TV ads cost money to make and run, etc.
|
| None of that goes to the elected official or their election
| campaign. It's paid to staff, consultants, and vendors.
| tpxl wrote:
| Using lobbying corps can spend money to get laws that are
| against common good. Whether that money goes to the
| politician directly or indirectly (ie corruption), or a
| bunch of astroturfing puppets whose goal is to drown out
| the peoples voice with FUD is irrelevant.
| timrichard wrote:
| Laws are proposed by the (lobbied) Commission, and also the
| Council. Not by the Parliament, which is made up of the
| MEPs that citizens directly vote for.
| ckardat123 wrote:
| Very cool! I've been working with U.S. lobbying data recently,
| and it's interesting to compare with what's going on in the
| Europe.
|
| If anyone is interested, here's my project combining data on
| proposed legislation, U.S. lobbying by publicly traded companies,
| and congressional stock trading:
| https://www.quiverquant.com/sources/behind-the-curtain/
| akudha wrote:
| This is slick!
|
| On the home page, there is a transaction that was added
| yesterday, but the transaction itself was on Nov 7th. Is there
| a 6 month delay for congressmen to disclose?
|
| It would be nice to see these transactions in near real time
| (or better, ban congress from buying/selling individual stocks)
| ckardat123 wrote:
| That's actually due to a STOCK Act violation (surprisingly
| common)
|
| Transactions are supposed to be disclosed within 45 days, but
| they are sometimes disclosed late. The fines for late
| disclosures are usually a couple hundred dollars at most.
| INTPenis wrote:
| Finally IT is being used for something useful, recently a Swedish
| version[1] was launched too.
|
| 1. https://lobbykollen.se/
| tootie wrote:
| It's a major pet peeve how we misapply the term "lobbying".
| Lobbying is basically just asking. A citizen writing a letter to
| their representative is lobbying. The problem isn't lobbying in
| and of itself. It's paid access and, by extension, regulatory
| capture.
| coretx wrote:
| It's far worse. There is no difference between a high end
| lobbying entity and a full blow intelligence agency. If the
| lobby wants something, they also do things such as genuinely
| help person X on dossier Y for free in order to covertly
| influence the personnel of person Z that they otherwise can't
| reach.( Without anyone knowing, and targeting anyone they deem
| worth it. )
| bigdict wrote:
| What is up with Belgium? Or is the dataset incomplete and
| therefore skewed?
| dybber wrote:
| Brussels
| bigdict wrote:
| Oh that's right.
| frollo wrote:
| That's where Brussels is located. It makes sense to have your
| lobbying office near the offices of the institutions you want
| to lobby. Less time spent travelling.
| doikor wrote:
| Brussels. It is just like a lot of lobbying groups in the US
| have their office in Washington D.C.
|
| For example United States Chamber of Commerce, Pharmaceutical
| Research & Manufacturers of America, Business Roundtable and
| NCTA The Internet Television Association all have their HQ in
| Washington D.C. (all 4 are in top 10 largest lobbying groups in
| the US)
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