Transparent Lobbying and Democracy

This book deals with the current, as yet unsolved, problem of transparency of lobbying. In the current theories and prevalent models that deal with lobbying activities, there is no reflection of the degree of transparency of lobbying, mainly due to the unclear distinction between corruption, lobbying in general, and transparent lobbying. This book provides a perspective on transparency in lobbying in a comprehensive and structured manner. It delivers an interdisciplinary approach to the topic and creates a methodology for assessing the transparency of lobbying, its role in the democratization process and a methodology for evaluating the main consequences of transparency. The new approach is applied to assess lobbying regulations in the countries of Central Eastern Europe and shows a method for how lobbying in other regions of the world may also be assessed.

Šárka Laboutková is Associate Professor at the Economics Department of the Faculty ofEconomics at the Technical University of Liberec (TUL), Czech Republic.
Vít Šimral currently serves as a Councillor of the City of Prague responsible for education, sports, science, and business development.
Petr Vymětal is Assistant Professor at the Political Science Department of the Faculty of International Relations at the University of Economics in Prague, Czech Republic.