Regulation of lobbying and civil society organisations
On the 11th of March 2025 an international conference “The Regulation of Lobbying Activities and Civil Society Organizations” was held in Sofia, Bulgaria. It was organized by the Bulgarian Center for Not-for-Profit Law, Transparency International – Bulgaria, the Access to Information Program and the Institute for Market Economics.
The forum was opened by the Minister of Justice Georgi Georgiev, who said that the Ministry will work on drafting a law on lobbying as part of Bulgaria’s commitments under the Recovery and Resilience Plan and as part of the implementation of the recommendations received in the framework of the process of Bulgaria’s accession to the OECD.
“By creating a law on lobbying, we need to ensure a public and predictable process for drafting legislation. This is in the public interest and that is why this should be a joint effort of the institutions and the CSO sector.”
In his speech Minister Georgiev paid special attention to the role of the CSO sector as a guarantor for drafting a law that will not lead to unwanted negative consequences.
“We hope to find good legislative models together so this law will not lead to restrictions of the sector “
Adoption of lobbying laws has been a trend in Europe for the last 15 years. Therefore, foreign experts Prof. Grzegosz Makowski from Poland, Emina Nuredinovska from North Macedonia/European Center for Non-Profit Law, Gaja Šavelė from Lithuania and Maksym Popovych from the international organization Article 19 were invited to the conference. They presented both successful and unsuccessful attempts to regulate this matter from Poland, North Macedonia and Lithuania as well as the overall development of the topic in Europe and the risks of a lobbying law to become a restrictive law pf the “Foreign Agents Registration Law” type.
A law on lobbying can promote transparency in the legislative and policy decision-making processes. This would benefit everyone – those involved in lobbying, civil society organisations and activists who advocate for publicly beneficial causes, and our society as a whole.
There is also a risk, however, for a Lobbying Law to turn out to be a hollow and quickly forgotten regulation or even worse – a mechanism for limiting civic participation and stigmatising civil society organisations.
That is why the international experts attending the conference warned us:
- Do not draft a bill to simply check off a commitment made to an international organisation.
- Do not copy mechanically – tailor any regulation in this area to the Bulgarian context
- “One size fits all” is the wrong approach – you need to provide guarantees that regulation will not disproportionately affect civil society organisations and that it will not discourage citizens from taking part in decisions of public importance.
During the conference a comparative legal study of civil society organizations and the regulation of lobbying activities prepared by the BCNL was presented. The study coveres Austria, Poland, Lithuania, Slovenia, Cyprus, Croatia, North Macedonia, Finland, Latvia, Montenegro, Italy, Romania, Spain. The full text of the study can be accessed here.
The study, information about the conference and more useful materials related to the regulation of lobbying activities can be found in the conference booklet here.
The conference is organised in the framework of the project “ Make transparency not war – responding to the weaponisation of transparency legislation against civic society “, funded by the European Union. The views and opinions expressed at the conference are those of the authors and/or participants alone and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or the Netherlands Helsinki Committee. The European Union and the Netherlands Helsinki Committee are not responsible for them