ABSTRACT
This chapter explains how European Union (EU) decision-making works and defines small states. It examines which types of size-related disadvantages small states face and uses more than interviews alongside secondary literature on EU negotiations to show how structural disadvantages affect policy-making, since big states tend to be better at pursuing their own national interests than small states. It then argues that comparative state of the art research often focuses on big states and identifies comparative insights on small states' negotiation behaviour as a gap: people do not have a comprehensive knowledge about which small states are most likely and which are least likely to participate actively in EU negotiations to make their voices heard and under which conditions small states succeed in influencing European policies. EU decision-making processes can be distinguished into inter-governmental conferences (IGCs) that create, change and amend primary law and daily decision-making processes that produce secondary law.
