The EU as a negotiator in multilateral chemicals negotiations: multiple principals, different agents

Abstract: This article focuses on the way the EU operates in negotiations leading to an international agreement, which touches upon competences shared between the EC and the member states. More specifically, the article addresses the EU decision-making process and the EU negotiation arrangement with regard to multilateral chemicals conventions. A principal-agent model is used to frame theoretically the relation between the member states and the EU negotiator. This model is adapted to mixed agreements and supplemented with 'private information for the principals', 'cost of no agreement' and the 'compellingness of the external environment'. Its application to the EU decision-making process regarding the Rotterdam PIC Convention and the Stockholm POPs Convention shows that the EU managed to speak with a single voice, that the EU negotiation arrangement was organized in rather an ad hoc way and that the member states mainly used the ad locum control mechanisms to limit the discretion of the EU negotiator.