POLICY ADVICE IN THE EUROPEAN UNION: APPLYING A POLICY ADVISORY SYSTEM APPROACH

Abstract

The thesis examines the provision of policy advice in the European Commission. How does the constellation of actors providing policy advice to the Commission’s decision-makers change depending on the character of the policy problem addressed? Have the policy advice giving in the Commission exhibited externalisation and politicisation trends over the last two decades, and why? How does the content of policy advice vary across different types of policy advisors within the Commission? The thesis addresses these research questions in order to examine different aspects of the policy advisory system of the European Commission with an aim to contribute to the comparative public policy and public administration literature on policy advisory systems.