In over their heads: Public consultation, administrative capacity and legislative duration in the European Union

Abstract

What effect do online public consultations have on legislative duration in the European Union? While scholars are divided on whether consultations speed things up or slow things down, they agree that consultations affect how decision-makers think about legislative proposals. I argue that this is only part of the story: the impact of consultations on legislation duration is also a function of the administrative capacity of decision-makers and their staff to process consultation submissions. I test this argument using a unique data set of over 750 legislative proposals in the period 2009–2013. I find that consultations tend to have a negative impact on the time it takes to pass legislation. However, this negative effect is less pronounced when decision-makers have sufficient administrative capacity to process submissions.