To inform, strategise, collaborate, or compete: what use do lobbyists make of lobby registers?

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (3) ◽  
pp. 347-369
Author(s):  
Michele Crepaz
Keyword(s):  
Interest Groups ◽  
Interest Group ◽  
Undue Influence ◽  
Group Type ◽  
Material Resources ◽  
The Media ◽  
Public Scrutiny ◽  
Group Characteristics ◽  
External Scrutiny

Governments claim to establish lobbying registers with the intent of giving citizens and the media the opportunity to see who is lobbying whom and for what purpose. This external scrutiny is expected to help prevent undue influence and corruption. Scholars, however, have noted that transparency might also serve internal scrutinizers by providing information to the lobbyists themselves. This study employed a survey of more than 300 interest groups in Ireland to test this alternative to the ‘armchair scrutiniser’ assumption, whereby transparency serves the purpose only of public scrutiny. The analysis found that a small but well-defined group of organizations routinely accesses the website of the Irish lobbying register and ‘consumes’ the information during the advocacy process. Interest-group characteristics, such as group type and material resources, help explain these trends. This study is relevant for scholars interested in the effects of transparency and how the availability of information is linked to lobbying strategies.

scholarly journals Diversity in the News? A Study of Interest Groups in the Media in the UK, Spain and Denmark

2016 ◽  
Vol 47 (2) ◽  
pp. 313-328 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anne Skorkjær Binderkrantz ◽  
Laura Chaqués Bonafont ◽  
Darren R. Halpin
Keyword(s):  
Interest Groups ◽  
Interest Group ◽  
News Media ◽  
Media Coverage ◽  
Extensive Coverage ◽  
Citizen Groups ◽  
Country Analysis ◽  
The Media ◽  
Cross Country ◽  
The Uk

This article provides the first systematic cross-country analysis of interest group appearances in the news media. The analysis included three countries – the UK, Spain and Denmark – each representing one of Hallin and Mancini’s1three overall models of media and politics: the liberal system, the polarized pluralist system and the democratic corporatist system. It finds important similarities across countries with high levels of concentration in media coverage of groups, more extensive coverage of economic groups than citizen groups, and differential patterns of group appearances across policy areas and between right- and left-leaning papers. It also identifies country variation, with the highest degree of concentration among group appearances in Spanish newspapers and the most attention to economic groups in Danish newspapers.

scholarly journals An Index of Mediatisation: Comparing Interest Groups’ Political Communication Behaviour

2019 ◽  
Vol 48 (3) ◽  
pp. 1
Author(s):  
Florian Weiler
Keyword(s):  
Interest Groups ◽  
Political Communication ◽  
The Political ◽  
Communication Behaviour ◽  
Political Actors ◽  
Group Type ◽  
The Media ◽  
Media Logic ◽  
Two Indices ◽  
Political Logic

This article investigates the political communication behaviour of interest groups. First, by proposing indices to capture the degree to which mass media have become central for political communication (media logic of communication), and the degree to which conventional strategies aimed at politicians directly govern groups’ communication behaviour (political logic of communication). Based on these two indices, the article then proposes an overall index of mediatisation. Second, the article tests three hypotheses regarding the use of the media logic, the political logic, and the mediatisation of interest groups, and finds that group type, resources, and the level of competition all play a role for how strongly interest groups are mediatized. Thus, this article contributes to the scarce empirical research on mediatisation by a) proposing a way to operationalise this concept which can be adjusted using a different set of variables, but can also be applied for different political actors, and b) by showing the usefulness of the constructed indices in an empirical example for Swiss and German interest groups.

scholarly journals Interest group perceptions on water policy reforms: insight from a water-stressed basin

Water Policy ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 20 (4) ◽  
pp. 794-810 ◽  
Author(s):  
Encarna Esteban ◽  
Ariel Dinar ◽  
José Albiac ◽  
Alfonso Calera ◽  
Marta García-Mollá ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Interest Groups ◽  
Interest Group ◽  
Water Scarcity ◽  
Water Policy ◽  
Policy Outcomes ◽  
Policy Reforms ◽  
Water Policies ◽  
Group Perceptions ◽  
Water Users ◽  
Group Characteristics

Abstract Water policies have been implemented worldwide to face water stress. However, the existence of water users' groups with opposite interests and different political power results in the plain failure or low effectiveness of water policy reforms. A better understanding of users' perceptions regarding policy outcomes is important to avoid the failure of water policies and the intensification of water conflicts. This paper empirically examines the divergent perception of interest groups on the implementation of different policies dealing with water scarcity and their proactive involvement with water agencies. We have conducted a survey in the Jucar River Basin (a water-stressed basin in southeastern Spain) to analyze interest group opinions regarding water policy effectiveness and water institutions' performance in water management. Questionnaires were sent to the main irrigation districts and urban water utilities within the basin. The collected information gives a general picture of the behavior of opposite water interest groups in this basin. The analysis of the perceptions on water policy reform between the groups highlights the existence of significant differences between preferred measures to address water scarcity and lobbying capacity. These differences depend on the size of the group, the specific basin location, and other group characteristics.

A Framework for the Study of Electoral Persuasion

2020 ◽  
pp. xiv-25
Author(s):  
Elizabeth Suhay ◽  
Bernard Grofman ◽  
Alexander H. Trechsel
Keyword(s):  
Interest Groups ◽  
Democratic Politics ◽  
Democratic Process ◽  
International Perspectives ◽  
Electoral Choice ◽  
The Media

Electoral persuasion rests at the center of the democratic process. Politicians, parties, interest groups, members of the media, and citizens themselves are constantly communicating with one another about electorally relevant topics. These communications will ultimately influence—although not always in predictable ways—voters’ choices and, therefore, election outcomes and the direction of government. Scholarship on this important topic has exploded in recent decades. Yet, there have been relatively few efforts to synthesize the accumulated knowledge. In this volume, we bring together accomplished scholars who study one or more aspects of electoral persuasion—who communicates with whom about democratic politics, what they communicate about and why, how and where they communicate, and with what effect. The result is a vibrant collection of US-based and international perspectives on the relevant actors, their motivations and methods of persuasion, and their varied influences on electoral choice.

scholarly journals The kiss of death. Public service media under right-wing populist attack

2021 ◽  
pp. 026732312199133
Author(s):  
Christina Holtz-Bacha
Keyword(s):  
Public Service ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Democratic Accountability ◽  
Political Actors ◽  
The Public ◽  
The People ◽  
Democratic Control ◽  
The Media ◽  
Democratic System ◽  
Public Scrutiny

With the surge of populism in Europe, public service broadcasting has come under increased pressure. The established media are considered part of the corrupt elite not serving the interests of the people. The public service media, for which pluralism is at the core of their remit, are a particular thorn in the side of the populists. Therefore, they attack the financial basis of public service, which is supposed to guarantee their independence. The populist attacks on the traditional broadcasting corporations meet with the interests of neoliberal politics and of those political actors who want to evade public scrutiny and democratic control and do no longer feel committed to democratic accountability. The assaults on the public service media are thus an assault on freedom of the media and further increase the pressure on the democratic system.

The Effects of Interest Groups' Ideology on Their PAC and Lobbying Expenditures

2010 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 1-21 ◽  
Author(s):  
Amy McKay
Keyword(s):  
Interest Groups ◽  
Political Action ◽  
Political Action Committees ◽  
Unanswered Question ◽  
Group Type ◽  
Congressional Campaigns ◽  
Extreme Groups

While the literature on political action committees' (PACs) contributions to congressional campaigns is substantial, one key variable has been missing: the ideology of the PAC. Such a measure is needed to evaluate a normatively important yet unanswered question: to what extent do PACs give to candidates with whom they agree ideologically, as opposed to candidates they may want to influence after the election? This study shows that many interest groups' preferences for an electoral strategy or an access strategy can be predicted by their left-right ideology and their level of ideological extremism. The analysis finds that more ideologically extreme groups and more liberal groups spend more money on PAC contributions relative to lobbying. Further, groups' underlying left-right ideology is also highly predictive of their allocation of PAC contributions between the two parties—even controlling for group type.

British Politics

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter John
Keyword(s):  
Interest Groups ◽  
Political Science ◽  
Policy Making ◽  
British Politics ◽  
Political Behaviour ◽  
Media Agenda ◽  
The Media ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Politics And Law ◽  
Institutional Foundations

British Politics provides an introduction to British politics with an emphasis on political science to analyse the fundamental features of British politics, and the key changes post-Brexit. Part A looks at constitutional and institutional foundations of the subject. Chapters in this part look at leadership and debating politics and law creation. The second part is about political behaviour and citizenship. Here chapters consider elections, the media, agenda setting, and political turbulence. The final part is about policy-making and delegation. The chapters in this part examine interest groups, advocacy, policy-making, governing through bureaucracy and from below, delegating upwards, and British democracy now.

Agricultural policy debates: Examining the alternative and conventional perspectives

1993 ◽  
Vol 8 (3) ◽  
pp. 98-106 ◽  
Author(s):  
Curtis E. Beus ◽  
Riley E. Dunlap
Keyword(s):  
Interest Groups ◽  
Interest Group ◽  
Agricultural Policy ◽  
Alternative Agriculture ◽  
Conventional Agriculture ◽  
Considerable Similarity ◽  
Policy Debates ◽  
Wide Range

AbstractControl of agricultural policymaking by the “agricultural establishment” has been challenged by a wide range of interests concerned with the externalities of modern industrialized agriculture. An “externalities/alternatives” or “ex/al” coalition appears to be an emerging force in agricultural policy debates. We surveyed three alternative agriculture groups, three conventional agriculture groups, and a statewide sample of farmers to learn whether each category forms a distinct, unified interest group whose perspectives on agricultural policy diverge substantially from the others'. There is considerable similarity among the alternative agriculture groups and among the conventional agriculture groups, the differences between them being much greater than the differences within each category. The statewide farmer sample is generally intermediate between the two sets of interest groups, but is closer to the conventional perspective on most issues.

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