Can we ban all corporate lobbying? It’s bribing with extra steps
Lobbying in the EU is not the same as lobbying in the US. In the EU, lobbying is simply being an advocate group that is consulted whenever issues in their domain arise, with everyone understanding their partiality.
While I agree with the statement that lobbyists are not inherently evil, I will call this out as an overly optimistic statement.
We have cases like Ylva Johannson trying to enforce the use of AI detection algorithms for CSAM after being thoroughly consulted by Thorn, a company that sells such algorithms (who spent $24M on this). Meanwhile, she never met with digital rights lobbyists despite them repeatedly asking for a meeting.
Also good ‘ol bribing occurs at the EU parliament https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-63952993
can you life only from eating at lobby events
it is a bit more nuanced than that
Can I order some of that over here?
Sounds good.