On a recent afternoon, Erik Wesselius took 20 visitors on a guided tour of Brussels. His tour didn’t pause in front of Renaissance-era townhouses or the city’s heralded Art Nouveau mansions.
Instead, Wesselius led his guests into the heart of the European Quarter, a sort of continental Capitol Hill. He pointed to the European Commission — the executive arm of the 27-state European Union — then across the street to an office building.
“Laws are debated there,” said Wesselius, who is the co-founder of a transparency advocacy group called the Corporate Europe Observatory, as he pointed at the Commission building. But then he pointed at a cluster of squat office buildings: “But these days, they’re being written and shaped there.”
For many people, Brussels may evoke images of chocolate and beer. But corporations and governments around the world are also realizing that institutions situated in Brussels, like the European Commission, European Parliament and European Council of Ministers, churn out rules that affect them — and not always in a good way.
That’s one reason why demand for commercial office space near Europe’s government campus is climbing; corporations and lobbying firms are opening offices to create a trans-Atlantic version of Washington’s K Street. In Brussels, it’s called the “Leopold Quarter” in addition to the “European Quarter.” The 1-square-kilometer district is an assemblage of public squares surrounded by short modern office buildings.
Demand for office space has set off a building boom. At 200 million square feet, Brussels now has more commercial office space than Washington, D.C., which has about 120 million square feet. (Even throwing in suburban Maryland and Virginia only puts D.C. slightly ahead at 250 million.) While only 2 percent of the office space in Brussels is leased by European institutions, nearly 10 percent is leased by corporate lobbyists, according to a report by CB Richard Ellis.
Despite the increased supply — about 4 million square feet of further office space is under construction, and the commercial vacancy rate is about 9 percent —Brussels’ office rents have grown, too. Since 2000, rents have risen from about $31 per square foot to about $47 for Class A office space. This is more than it costs in Brussels’ other commercial enclaves like the downtown financial center, where asking prices are around $31 per square foot, and suburban business parks, where asking rents are about $25 per square foot, according to CB Richard Ellis. (All prices have been converted from euros to U.S. dollars, at the exchange rate for mid-April.)
In the past five years, the number of U.S. firms with a lobbying presence in Brussels registered in the European Public Affairs Directory has risen by 20 to 25 percent, according to the Corporate Europe Observatory. Lobbying firms such as Burson Marsteller, Hill and Knowlton and GPlus are expanding, and their staff lists often include the names of well-connected former EU officials.
Total lobby-related turnover is still far smaller than in Washington — it was estimated at $1.2 billion in 2006 compared to $3.8 billion in D.C. — but it is on the rise.
The presence of U.S. firms and lobbies is not always obvious in Brussels. Lobbyists say strains between the U.S. and Europe have been exacerbated by the war in Iraq, and U.S. firms setting up in Brussels steer clear of gaffes that could damage their lobbying.
“European institution officials are happier talking to Europeans rather than Americans. Europeans are more accepting and understanding of issues if they’re presented by a fellow European,” said Anita Kelly, who is Irish and the spokesperson for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in Brussels.
Beyond nationality, lobbying in Brussels is to some extent shrouded in mystery. Unlike the United States, the European Union has no transparency rules requiring lobbyists to reveal their clients or incomes.
“In the absence of a lobby register, real estate leases are the way to gauge corporate interest operating in Brussels,” said Wesselius.
Certainly, the name plates on the buildings closest to the commission and parliament read like a roster of companies, which may have objections with EU regulations.
For instance, Philip Morris and General Electric have offices opposite the European Commission. GPlus, the lobbying firm hired by Microsoft to dispute the contention that the software giant deploys anti-competitive practices, is located in the next building.
According to brokers, Boeing, Caterpillar, eBay, International Paper, MasterCard, Pioneer, Texas Instruments and Time Warner have all recently leased small offices in the European Quarter from which to lobby.
American lobbyists and corporations aren’t the only ones snapping up space. Toyota has its European headquarters nearby. Agents say that the Republic of Turkey, whose application for EU membership is one of the bloc’s most contentious policy issues, is seeking to move its diplomatic offices from a forbidding concrete building to a contemporary glass structure, the better to broadcast an image of transparency and modernity.
Overall, observers say lobbying represents something of a growth industry in Brussels.
“If anything, lobbyists will just move a few streets on and closer to the European Parliament,” said Wesselius. “That’s where there’s still untapped potential for influence.”
Juliane von Reppert-Bismarck is a freelance reporter based in Brussels.