Elizabeth Monaghan
The climate change issue has attracted the attention of civil society organisations in the European Union but standard theories of groups as interest aggregators fail to offer a convincing explanation of their characteristics and contribution. However as the concept of representation has been transformed – from a static view pertaining mostly to legislatures, to a dynamic view of a creative act involving all political actors – it has opened up the possibility of a new explanatory framework for understanding how groups make environmental issues present. This is in direct contrast to the idea of representation and the role of groups outlined in the Lisbon Treaty.