EU decentralised agencies dispose of a wide network of external relations giving third countries

various degrees of access to their management boards, secondary bodies and/or operational cooperation.

These venues constitute hitherto under-explored opportunities for third country influence

on EU laws and policies. Based on an original dataset, this article maps the widening scope and

depth of third country de jure access to 26 EU agencies over time and provides first explanations

for the variation across agencies and countries. We find that agency autonomy and international

mandate as well as third country democracy, regulatory capacity, and wealth are positively correlated

with access. Whilst the de jure provisions examined in this article capture the formal institutional

scope for third country influence, they underline the potential for more detailed case studies

on de facto third country influence and its determinants.