How small states can influence important group decisions §

How can small states use their limited resources to be of influence issues of great importance? In what conditions?

• Difficulties of small states in influencing EU decisions

  • In EU, weighted voting gives small states 3 votes and big states 29 votes
  • Small states have less administrative and personnel capacity
    • Less ability to prepare for all issues on negotiation table
  • Fewer financial resources, leads to less access to experts, leads to lower ability to persuade other EU members

• Small states can still influence decision making, even with these challenges.

  • Focus the limited resource on items most important to the small state
  • Work with stakeholders and NGOs to learn past actions, routines, and institutional memory of EU policies from prior negotiations

• Use different shaping strategies to influence other EU members’ decisions depending on the nature of the issue of discussion

  • Arguing: By making arguments that fit the nature of the issue and resonate well with prior beliefs of other EU members
    • Scientific arguments for technical issues (pesticide)
      • Empiricism
      • Small states Use of limited resource using prioritization strategy by concentrate their available resources on specific issues or policies
    • Normative and Moral Points for political policies or distributional conflicts requires
      • persuade others as a neutral actor: if you have no bias in any side, your argument will mean more than just ‘looking out for your own interest’
  • Framing: to change position of actors with opposing and narrowly defined interests you re-frame the issue
    • Re-framing effectiveness depends on their existing ideas.
    • How the cost-benefit ratio would not go well as seen in a broader frame if you don’t change position
      • How in the broader scheme, it is a better idea to change position
      • Ex: In accepting accommodating new members and not isolate new EU citizens, therefore should accept the less desirable option
    • Re-framing of the distributional elements into common-good questions to talk actors with opposing preferences into acceptance

Example

• UK and bigger countries in EU used the normative approach to ineffectively convince members in a technical issue of ‘pesticides’ use. (food insecurity)
  • No scientific argument
• Denmark argued EU members should be able to deny imports of pesticides as it can contaminate the ground water that’s also used as drinking water in Denmark. Its scientific arguement or hazard based approach resonated with members and the technical issue in question
• Netherlands used analogies of a glass of wine vs an overdose of wine to justify some import of pesticide isn’t bad. The risk based approach didn’t resonate with other members because it had no scientific arguments for the technical problem.

Example

“In order to strengthen its claim (vodka made of different ingredients tastes different), the Polish delegation arranged vodka testing in the corridors of the European Parliament and the Council of Ministers”

• Many truths related arguments were put forward with ineffectiveness as the Vodka issue was of taste, culture, and preference/norm and not of technical ones.
  • Technical arguments to a Vodka purist, would not convince them.

Collective Diplomatic Strategy §

• Stop importing from the big exporter
• Support own collective group’s production of the product instead
• Sharing wealth in a group of country

References §

• Panke, D. (2012). Being small in a big union: punching above their weights? How small states prevailed in the vodka and the pesticides cases. Cambridge Review of International Affairs, 25(3), pp.329-344.