Dear Sir or Madam,

We are pleased to announce the international conference: „Political Consulting and Lobbying in the Political Decision-Making Process“, which will take place on October 26, 2018 in Słubice (Poland).

The conference closes a research project, which was implemented under the direction of the Chair for Comparative Political Science of the European University Viadrina Frankfurt (Oder) (Germany) in cooperation with the Faculty of Political Science and Journalism of the Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznan (Poland).

The research project addresses the issue of the delineation of boundaries between scientific political consulting and lobbying as well as their role in the practice of political decision-making. The investigation focuses on the comprehensive comparative analysis of structures and the functionality of political consulting, the realisation of a substantial basis for decision-making with special consideration of the boundary between the scientific political consulting and lobbying.

During the conference the research results of our analysis from a German-Polish perspective will be presented. The conference is also intended to serve as a preamble to a bigger project that involves more European countries. The relevance of political consulting is currently increasing, which can be observed in scientific debates and the fact that this topic is newly found on the agendas of Eastern European EU-Member states, where it has not been found in the recent past. The aim of the project is to develop a comparative study, in order to fill this research gap.

Participation in the conference is free of charge. The languages of the conference will be Polish, German and English. Presentations and discussions will be translated simultaneously.

Further information on the research project and the authors involved can be found on the following link: https://www.border-studies.de/web/wim

We are looking forward to welcoming you at our conference.