Management summary

Current standards policy appears to be caught up in a polarised discussion about what type of organisation best serves the market for democratic and timely standards: standards consortia or the traditional formal standards bodies. The general feeling is that standards consortia work more effectively, but that they have restrictive membership rules and are undemocratic. The latter is a cause of concern for the European Commission, which requires democratic accountability in the standards process if it is to refer to such standards in a regulatory context. The Commission's request for new input on how to deal with consortium standards is set against this background. Aim The Standardisation Unit of DG Enterprise had two objectives when it issued this grant t