Accredited Parliamentary Assistants are ‘eyes and ears’ of Members of the European Parliament, yet their influence on MEPs and role as a backstage support has not been widely discussed. The scope...Show moreAccredited Parliamentary Assistants are ‘eyes and ears’ of Members of the European Parliament, yet their influence on MEPs and role as a backstage support has not been widely discussed. The scope of APAs tasks and employment status prevent unequivocal categorisation. This paper draws from the literature on ‘policy professionals’ and three types of knowledge provision: problem formulation; process expertise; information access to shed more light on their work and environment which they operate. To answer the research question, six hypotheses were formulated and descriptive statistics and statistical analysis were applied. The anonymous, online survey was conducted among APAs and the set of data was collected (N = 116). The thesis concluded that APAs share similarities with policy professionals – yet they differ in their attitude towards academic education and on-the-job training.Show less
The expression of public opinion varies depending on the issue. This variation could be linked to highly salient issues. We argue that public opinion will be more involved in the case of highly...Show moreThe expression of public opinion varies depending on the issue. This variation could be linked to highly salient issues. We argue that public opinion will be more involved in the case of highly salient issues. In such circumstances, it would be interesting to examine if a higher saliency leads to a more accountable government. While some scholars link foreign policy with domestic debate, few of them link accountability with saliency as a means to verify the importance of domestic factors. Therefore, we will add new elements to the existing literature by focusing on this link. The question guiding our research will try to confirm that governments give more account when facing a salient issue within public opinion. Our question is the following: Does the high salience of a foreign policy issue have an influence on the extent of account-giving by democratic governments to citizens?Show less
