Interest group influence on the political agenda
across decision-making levels
Anne Skorkjær Binderkrantz
Aarhus University
Anne Rasmussen
Copenhagen University
Leiden University
Paper prepared for presentation at the Annual Meeting of
The Danish Political Science Association
Vejle, October 24rd-25th
First draft. Please do not cite
1
Abstract
Despite a large increase in studies on EU interest representation, the vast share of the existing
literature has focused on interest group strategies rather than influence and rarely compared EU and
national policy-making. To fill these gaps we analyze the patterns of perceived agenda setting
influence on EU and national policy-makers. More specifically, we examine whether the
explanatory potential of factors at the national, policy and interest group level vary when it comes
to persuading national and EU level policy-makers to initiate new issues. The analysis is based on
surveys of domestic interest groups in the United Kingdom, Denmark and the Netherlands. Our
findings indicate that agenda influence on EU policy-makers is considerably lower than on national
ones but finds little variation between national contexts in absolute levels of influence on national
and EU decision-makers. Despite frequent criticism of the prominent role of business interests in
the EU, we also do not find strong evidence of comparative advantages for business groups in
dealing with EU as opposed to national policy-makers. Instead, an organization’s policy portfolio
has a substantial impact on the size of the gap between influence on national and EU policy-makers.
Relative increases in an organization’s EU focus have a positive effect on perceived agenda
influence on EU policy-makers and a negative effect on its ability to influence national ones.
Moreover, staff resources play a stronger role in the EU level playing field than the national one
when it comes to ensuring agenda influence on an occasional basis.
2
1. Introduction
European interest groups operate in a multi-level system, where they are affected by decisions made
at different levels. Therefore, many domestic groups do not only operate at the national policy level
but have incorporated the EU level in their political action repertoire (Beyers & Kerremans, 2012;
Dür & Mateo, 2012). In fact, even when it comes to influencing EU policy, interest group lobbying
in the multi-level EU system often takes place at both the national and EU level. Lobbying tends to
be cumulative with most domestic groups beginning their efforts at the national level and
subsequently extending their work to the European level (Beyers, 2002: 607).
Even though the EU is of at least some relevance to most if not all domestic groups, existing
studies demonstrate significant variation in the extent to which groups have Europeanized their
lobbying efforts (Beyers & Kerremans, 2012; Dür & Mateo, 2012; Eising, 2004; Klüver, 2010). A
relatively small, but cumulative literature has made significant progress in describing and
explaining interest group lobbying and access to the EU. Here, it has been demonstrated that the
extent to which groups target the EU level varies for example across different group types, across
different policy issues and across countries (Beyers & Kerremans, 2012; Dür & Mateo, 2012;
Beyers, 2002; Eising, 2004; Klüver, 2010; Dür & Mateo, 2013; Greer, Fonseca & Adolph, 2008).
The issue of group access and influence in the EU is of relevance to discussions of the socalled democratic deficit in the EU policy process (Greer, Fonseca & Adolph, 2008). At the same
time, studying influence on EU policy separately from influence at the national level leaves us with
no good benchmark for judging whether specific influence patterns at this level are democratic.
Finding that certain group types, or groups with certain policy portfolios, dominate EU agenda
setting may for example not mean that the EU is any less democratic then its member states.
Moreover, the multi-level character of the European political system raises the important issue of
whether the same groups are influential at the domestic and the EU level. The issue of whether the
3
same actors are active at different decision-making level also echoes a classic theme in the interest
group literature focusing on whether different arenas provide possibilities for different types of
interests or whether the same groups are able to dominate across all political arenas
(Schattschneider, 1975 [1969]; Truman, 1951).
While many studies have focused solely on the factors affecting group strategies at the EU
level, we therefore follow the recent study of group focus by Dür and Mateo (2013) in incorporating
the domestic and EU level in a single study. We aim to bring the literature a step further by focusing
on the factors affecting perceived interest group influence on the agenda of the EU compared to
interest group agenda setting influence at the national level. From a democratic perspective, it is
particularly interesting whether the factors affecting group influence at the national and the EU
level differ. This focus allows us to address questions such as: Do resources matter more or less for
influence at the EU level compared to the domestic level? Are groups who are well-integrated in
national decision-making processes also more influential at the EU level? And how does a group’s
policy portfolio affect its level of agenda setting influence at the different levels?
Interest group influence may come in many shades – from behind-the doors attempts to push
the political agenda of bureaucrats and politicians, over lobbying for specific amendments to
regulation, to attempts at affecting the implementation of political decisions. We focus on agenda
setting influence because this may be considered the least demanding type of influence, yet an
important step in influencing policy making. This provides us with greater variation in the
dependent variable because more groups can be expected to report success with affecting political
agendas than specific decisions.
We conduct a multinomial regression analysis of different degrees of perceived agenda
influence at the national and EU level based on survey data with responses from almost 1,500
domestic interest groups in Denmark, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom. This allows us to
4
include factors at the group, policy and country level in a single study of perceived influence at the
national and EU level. This articles contribution thus lies in: 1) the focus on perceived agenda
setting influence, 2) the incorporation of the domestic and the EU level in a single study and 3) the
explicit comparison of similarities and differences in what explains perceived agenda influence at
these two levels.
Our analysis finds similarities between the patterns of perceived agenda setting influence at
the national and EU level. Agenda influence on national decision-makers is considerably higher
than on European ones and this pattern is consistent no matter what country we examine. We also
see that – despite differences in the character of state-society structures – there are hardly any
differences in absolute levels of influence on EU and national decision-makers between the three
countries. Moreover, we only find modest differences in perceived agenda influence between
business groups and other interest groups. Overall evidence of comparative advantages for business
groups in dealing with EU as opposed to national policy-makers is weak.
In other respects important differences in the ability of groups to persuade national and EU
level decision-makers to initiate new issues are present. An organization’s policy portfolio affects
the gap between perceived influence on national and EU policy-makers. The higher the relative EU
policy focus of an organization the higher its perceived agenda influence on EU policy-makers and
the lower its perception of national agenda influence. Conversely, formal embeddedness in national
advisory bodies is a more important factor for securing agenda influence on national as opposed to
EU policy-makers. Finally, staff resources are more important for exerting some degree of agenda
influence on EU than national policy-makers. However, we see that whereas increases in political
staff are important for influencing EU policy-makers on an occasional basis, the effect of staff
increases on exerting influence in the EU playing field “often” is more limited.
5
We begin by discussing the role of domestic interest groups in the EU multi-level
governance system and propose a set of hypotheses on the factors affecting agenda setting influence
at the two levels. After a section presenting the research design, our analysis of group agenda
setting influence at the national and EU level is presented and discussed.
2. Explaining group influence at different levels
2.1 Interest groups in a multi-level system
European interest groups operate in a multi-level governance system, where decisions of relevance
to groups are made at different levels (Eising, 2004). While domestic interest groups could
traditionally stick to the national arena when pursuing their interests, nowadays most groups cannot
ignore that EU level decisions affect their interest domain. With the increased decision-making
powers of the EU in many policy areas, powerful incentives exist leading groups towards being
active in EU. The process by which national political actors such as interest groups adapt
themselves to the impact of European integration is typically termed Europeanization (Beyers &
Kerremans, 2007).
While the EU has been rising in importance, there is no reason to expect that the EU
replaces the national level for most domestic interest groups. Some policies are still exclusive
national competence and even in EU policy areas a considerable share of the policy activity takes
place at the national level and/or involves national actors. Interest groups are after all tied to their
national members and to the national context in which they emerged (Eising, 2004). Even empirical
studies which specifically focus on EU policy-making indicate that the national level has first
priority. Beyers for example concludes that: “Most actors start to push their interests domestically
and only after these networks are established do they extend their networks to the European level”
6
(Beyers, 2002: 607). In general, groups direct the greatest share of attention to the most proximate
lobbying venues (Beyers & Kerremans, 2012).
The last decade has witnessed increased scholarly attention to interest group politics
generally and EU lobbying in particular. However, rather than integrating the study of EU and
national level interest representation, there has been a certain division of labor between scholars
focusing on interest group behavior vis-à-vis national and EU policy-makers. Some studies have,
however, taken a different point of departure asking to what degree national level interest groups
target the EU in their political work (Beyers & Kerremans, 2012; Dür & Mateo, 2012; Beyers,
2002; Eising, 2004; Klüver, 2010; Dür & Mateo, 2013; Greer, Fonseca & Adolph, 2008; Beyers &
Kerremans, 2007; Eising, 2007; Constantelos, 2007; Falkner, 2007). Here, it has been established
that many domestic groups have an action repertoire including the EU level but that even in EU
related areas groups may naturally also seek to affect their own government. Overall, much support
for the multilevel governance perspective for understanding interest group strategies has been
generated (Eising, 2004).
A common finding is that the degree of Europeanization varies between groups (Beyers,
2002). The extent to which groups incorporate the EU in their political work differ with some
groups sticking entirely to the national level and others developing intense lobbying strategies
directed at the EU. When it comes to seeking influence on EU policy specifically, national groups
are more prone to lobby national venues than EU-level venues. Beyers and Kerremans thus describe
a cumulative system, where groups first tend to lobby more proximate venues before adding more
distant venues (Beyers & Kerremans, 2012). The degree to which groups target the EU directly is
mediated by domestic institutions, policies, culture and identities (Beyers & Kerremans, 2007).
The focus in this literature is mainly on group strategies and to some extent on access to the EU.
Also, much of the literature focuses on one specific policy area (Klüver, 2010; Greer, Fonseca &
7
Adolph, 2008; Beyers & Kerremans, 2007) or one specific type of group (Eising, 2004;
Constantelos, 2007). As discussed below this may explain some of the partly contradictory results
found. Thus, according to Beyers and Kerremans (2012: 265):
“the functioning of interest groups in multilevel and federal systems is, despite some recent
research, a largely underexplored terrain as most empirical research remains confined to
horizontal venue shopping situated at one territorial level”.
The most encompassing study so far has been conducted by Dür and Mateo (2012; 2013). However,
there is a lack of studies which examine access and influence patterns of interest groups in national
and EU level policy-making within a single analysis design. As a result, our design includes both
the EU and national level in a study of perceived agenda influence of interest associations across all
policy fields in several countries.
2.2 Factors affecting agenda influence
The EU may be seen as an alternative for groups excluded from influence at the national level. It
may also be seen a venue exploited by groups that are already successful at the national level.
Beyers and Kerremans (2012) thus point to two different lines of argument concerning group
presence at the EU level. One view argues that multilevel governance benefits groups that are
already well integrated at the national level. Another, that EU provides a compensatory arena
primarily inhabited by groups finding themselves constrained by the national context. In general,
most studies conclude that EU interest representation is biased in favor of those who are already
powerful in the member states (Greer, Fonseca & Adolph, 2008: 427). We formulate predictions
about the factors expected to determine perceived agenda setting influence in general as well as
how the effect of certain factors in influencing national and EU level policy-makers may differ.
8
Some explanatory factors may affect agenda setting influence at the EU and national level with
varying strength or sometimes even in an opposite way.
National as opposed to EU level agenda influence
A first crucial factor to consider in explaining perceived agenda influence relates to the decisionmaking level of the actors who the groups are trying to influence. Based on the findings of
comparatively low levels of attention towards the EU among domestic interest groups, we would
expect them to demonstrate a lower rate of success when it comes to affecting the agenda of EU
level actors than national level ones. EU policy making is more distant for the average interest
group and, all things equal, the average interest group can also be expected to devote a lower share
of its overall level of policy activity to EU than national matters. Many policy competences have
not been transferred to the EU level. Moreover, even in the areas where competence has been
transferred to the EU level, national interest groups are often not responsible for all the lobbying
activities on their own but can delegate a considerable share of the work to the European-level
groups. As a result, our first hypothesis is therefore:
H1: Interest groups are likely to be have more influence on national than EU-level policy-makers
In addition, factors at the country, policy and group level may be emphasized when it comes to
specific variables affecting group influence at the national and EU level,
The contextual level: country, policy focus and national embeddedness
The discussion of differences in the overall structures in interest group-government relations has
historically played a prominent role in the interest group literature. Adopting a macro perspective,
9
scholars have developed system level theories of how the character of competition between groups
and the access of different types of groups to policy-makers varies between systems with
differences in overall state-society structures. A key distinction has been between pluralist societies
which provide relatively open and easy access for a broad range of different interest groups and
corporatist ones with substantial entry barriers for groups and where a narrow set of groups often
enjoy privileged access (Schmitter, 1974).
There tends to be variation between systems with different state-society relations in how
dispersed access and influence is between different types of groups. A corporatist system is well
known for providing privileged access to the key groups involved in policies of crucial importance
to the coordination of the economy, such as employer and employee organizations (Rokkan, 1966).
In contrast a pluralist system provides more equal access to different types of groups by establishing
looser bonds to a broader range of actors (Eising, 2004). However, the fact that these theories
allocate different types of groups a very different role when it comes to influencing public policy
does not imply that an average interest group should be more or less successful in systems with a
given set of state-society structures than in another one. As an example, it is highly plausible that
the advantages of some groups in corporatist systems are evened out by the disadvantages of others.
As a result, we expect that
H2a: Differences in state-society structures between countries do not affect the agenda influence of
an average interest group on national policy-makers
When it comes to looking at EU interest representation, scholars have considered whether variation
in national structures of interest representation lead to differences in the access and influence
enjoyed by interest groups in EU policy. The overall argument is that the national institutional
10
context channels and constrains interest group behavior and mediates the impact of European
integration (Klüver, 2010: 180; Falkner, 2007). The specific nature of the country effect is,
however, disputed. Some scholars focus on the general level of access at the national level and the
consequences hereof at the EU level. Others focus on the degree of fit between the national mode of
interest intermediation and the EU institutions (Klüver, 2010: 176).
Eising belongs to the latter group of authors arguing that negotiation capacities are
important for group influence at the EU level. He therefore expects groups operating in neocorporatist settings at the national level to adapt more easily to the EU system (Eising, 2004: 218).
Groups in such countries can exploit bargaining skills developed in their national systems of
representation at the EU level. According to such an argument, we could therefore expect a smaller
gap between national and EU level agenda influence for groups in such systems than for groups in
non-corporatist systems. However, Beyers and Kerremans (2012: 284) find support for a contrary
line of argument with for example French organizations being more active in the EU than Dutch.
They argue that this is because groups in a statist system are used to “break in the system” whereas
groups in corporative settings are less stimulated to develop the skills to compete with other groups
for access (Beyers & Kerremans, 2012: 284). Klüver supports this line of reasoning arguing that
groups in statist countries are more likely to Europeanize because of their lack of access at the
national level (Klüver, 2010). Reflecting the different arguments in the literature as to how country
context can be expected to matter, we leave the direction of the effect open and simply hypothesize
that,
H2b: Differences in state-society structures between countries affect the agenda influence of
interest groups on European policy-makers,
11
In addition to the national context, the policy portfolios of interest groups may affect their perceived
agenda influence. Interest groups are first and foremost involved in a set of policies drawn from the
types of members or causes they represent. Several authors have drawn attention to the importance
of policy-specific and sector-specific characteristics, when it comes to explaining the role of EU in
the political work of domestic interest groups (Greer, Fonseca & Adolph, 2008: 405; Beyers &
Kerremans, 2007: 463; Falkner, 2007). Falkner has even argued that the importance of policy sector
may be so significant as to reduce any generalization (Falkner, 2007: 224). Most notably, even
though most policy areas are to some extent affected by EU level regulation the effect is not
uniform across policy areas. One reason for many groups to stick to the national level is thus simply
that they are still able to realize many of their political goals at the domestic level (Beyers &
Kerremans, 2007: 477). Other groups have a policy portfolio that is much more Europeanized.
According to an old pluralist argument groups mobilize in accordance to disturbances to their
fundamental interests and will therefore be most active when and where there is something at stake
for them (Truman, 1951). When it comes to obtaining agenda influence a group’s relative EU focus
is therefore likely to affect its allocation of lobby efforts between EU and national decision-makers.
Given that such efforts translate into some element of lobbying success, we can therefore also
expect a link between relative EU focus and perceived agenda influence. As a result, we
hypothesize that,
H3: Increases in the relative EU focus in the policy portfolio of an interest group has a positive
effect on its perceived agenda influence on European policy-makers and a negative effect of its
perceived agenda influence on national policy-makers
12
The perceived agenda influence of groups may also depend on domestic institutional factors, more
specifically on the access societal interests enjoy to domestic public actors. It follows directly from
some of the theories of overall difference in state-society structures discussed that interest groups
are not necessarily “equal”. Some may enjoy privileged access to the national policy process by
being represented in national advisory bodies and other types of committees. Assuming that such
access is not purely ceremonial, we would also expect that the groups that have been selected for
such positions enjoy a greater degree of influence on national agenda setting than other groups.
Moreover, it may even be the case that such privileged positions enjoyed at the national level can
affect an interest group’s agenda setting influence not only on national but also EU level decisionmakers. Beyers (2002: 585-586) argues that the supposed Europeanization of domestic interest
associations may be substantially stimulated or constrained by the degree to which they are
embedded in domestic policy networks. The role of such integration is contested (Beyers, 2002:
591-592). On the one hand, access to domestic policy making, may be a resource that can be
utilized also at the EU level. On the other, groups excluded from national policy making may seek
access to the EU to a larger degree than other groups. Empirically, there is most support for the first
position with positive effects of domestic access on access at the EU level (Beyers, 2002: 608).
Beyers and Kerremans even conclude that:
“..relational variables – such as access gained to domestic policymakers or the distance visà-vis governing political parties – generate significant and substantial explanatory power. In
comparison, organizational resources or the policy sector in which organizations are active
do not significantly predict the extensiveness of multilevel venue shopping” (Beyers &
Kerremans, 2012: 284).
13
We therefore expect integration into national policy making to be an important predictor of
influence not only when it comes to putting issues on the domestic but also on the EU agenda, even
if the effect is likely to be most pronounced at the domestic level.
H4: Groups integrated into domestic political systems have more influence on the national and EU
agenda, but the effect is strongest at the national level.
The interest group level: resources and group type
Business groups have continually been singled out as more prominent in the political system than
other types of groups (Schattschneider, 1975 [1969]; Schlozman, Verba & Brady, 2012), although
some also question the power of business (Smith, 2000). As such we would expect business groups
to play a strong role no matter whether we examine national or EU policy-makers. At the same
time, different types of groups may have different rates of success when it comes to setting the EU
and national agenda. Specifically, Beyers argues that European policies basically concern the
deregulation of specific economic domains, and therefore that concentrated producer interests are
more focused on and adapted to Europe (Beyers, 2002: 590). Business groups thus have more welldefined constituencies with concentrated gains and losses from specific pieces of EU legislation
(Dür & Mateo, 2012: 972). Business associations are also more likely to possess information and
expertise than other types of associations, which may be particularly useful for influencing EU
policy which is often regarded as technical. The EU policy portfolio consists of a range of
regulatory policies involving a high degree of complexity and relevance for especially business
interests. In support of this, previous studies have found that business groups invest a greater
proportion of their time on EU legislation than non-business groups, although the effect seems to
interact with the possession of resources (Dür & Mateo, 2012: 983; Dür & Mateo, 2013: 27). This
14
leads us to suspect that any advantages enjoyed by business groups in agenda setting should be
most pronounced at the EU level.
H5: Business groups have more influence than other groups on the national and EU agenda but the
effect is strongest at the EU level.
The next factor of relevance is interest group resources. Resources are crucial because they enable
interest groups to be continually involved in monitoring and lobbying. Several studies have found
that well-endowed groups are more active and more likely to gain access at the domestic as well as
the EU level. Also in the European multi-level system, several studies have found that wellendowed groups are especially able to make use of the opportunities provided by the (Beyers &
Kerremans, 2012; Dür & Mateo, 2012: 983; Eising, 2004; Greer, Fonseca & Adolph, 2008: 428;
Beyers & Kerremans, 2007: 462; Binderkrantz, Pedersen & Christiansen, 2012). Groups differ in
their possession of resources such as finance and staff. While these differences are crucial for their
level of access and influence at both the domestic and EU level, we expect such resources to matter
most at the EU level. Two arguments are relevant for the expected difference in the role of
resources. First, according to Klüver, the EU institutions are understaffed and in need of external
expertise. The ability of groups to deliver such expertise is related to their financial and personal
resources (Klüver, 2010: 179). Second, for domestic groups, being active at the national level is
typically most crucial for the relation to group members. Groups will thus prioritize their resources
first towards the domestic level and only be active at the European level if additional resources are
available. Based on this argument we expect that:
15
H6: Group resources affect influence on the national and EU agenda but the effect is strongest at
the EU level.
3. Research Design
The ambition of the study is to test the importance of different factors for perceived agenda setting
influence at the national level and the EU level. The study includes the United Kingdom, Denmark
and the Netherlands allowing us to investigate possible country level differences. It draws on largescale surveys among domestic interest groups in the three countries. We have restricted the study to
associations – that is groups with members or supporters. This enables us to include a large number
of groups operating in a wide range of policy areas and exhibiting different levels of resource
possession and integration into national decision-making.
Identifying relevant and comparable interest group populations across countries is
challenging. We are interested in comparing the influence of domestic interest groups at the
national level and the EU level. Therefore, the surveys were conducted among politically active
groups. These groups were identified in a wide range of sources. Specifically, we identified groups
in: 1) The UK: written and oral evidence to parliament, meetings with ministers, appearance in the
national newspapers: the Guardian and the Telegraph, and responses to selected government
consultations, 2) Denmark: letters to parliament, membership of government committees,
appearance in the national newspapers: Politiken and Jyllands-Posten, and responses to
consultations on bills and 3) The Netherlands: letters to and participation in meetings in the
parliament and responses to government consultations.
16
We obtained response rates of respectively 15 percent (UK), 65 percent (Denmark) and 53
percent (The Netherlands)1. An ongoing follow-up on the UK survey will hopefully lead to a
somewhat higher response rate, although UK groups are known to be particularly reluctant in
responding to surveys. The absolute number of respondents in the three countries are: 339 in the
UK, 520 in Denmark and 636 in the Netherlands.
We focus the analysis on perceived agenda setting influence. Generally, the proportion of
national groups reporting to be influential in relation to the EU is rather low. Agenda setting may be
considered the least restrictive type of influence and using this measure therefore provides us with
more variation simply because a higher share of groups reports at least some success even at this
decision-making level. More specifically, we compare survey questions where respondents are
asked how frequently the EU institutions and national politicians respectively have taken up an
issue suggested by an interest group.
The question of how to measure interest group influence is highly debated in the literature
(Dür, 2007; Leech, 2010). The advantage of focusing on “perceived” or “attributional” influence is
that it allows us to rely on surveys and thus to include a large number of groups in the analysis as
opposed to conducting a study of preference attainment, in which policy preferences and outcomes
on specific proposals are mapped (Dür, 2007). The disadvantage is that groups may have incentives
to over- or underreport their level of influence. However, studies have found a relatively high level
of convergence between measures of perceived influence and other measures of group access and
influence (Pedersen, 2013). Further, the potential problem is less relevant for comparisons of the
factors affecting influence at different levels than for studies of the absolute level of influence
1
In Denmark, the survey was sent to a larger population of groups including groups not appearing in political arenas. In
order to make the survey respondents as comparable as possible across countries these groups have been excluded in the
present paper.
17
obtained by groups. There is thus no reason to expect groups to differ systematically in their
evaluation of influence at the national as opposed to the EU level.
Because we are interested in comparing perceived agenda setting at the national and EU
level and in examining whether the explanatory factor of perceived influence vary between these
two levels we use a stacked dataset. Perceived national and EU level influence is stacked in one
general influence variable meaning that each respondent appears twice in our regressions. In these
regressions, the unit of analysis is therefore each individual “respondent-agenda measure dyad”
rather than the total number of survey responses. Because the background characteristics for each
respondent are the same no matter whether we look at national or European level agenda influence,
we cluster the standard errors by respondent to avoid artificially low standard errors (Primo,
Jacobsmeier & Milyo, 2007; Moulton, 1990). Descriptives for our variables are shown in Table 1
and 2. We distinguish between “Often”, “Occasionally” and “Never” having agenda setting
influence2. Hence, even if the level of influence can be ordered, the Brant test indicates that the
parallel regression assumption is violated, which makes ordinal logis
tic regression inappropriate in the current study. We use multinomial logistic regression with
the middle category as the baseline to maintain the ordinal nature of the comparison.
<TABLE 1>
<TABLE 2>
Our first independent variable is a dichotomous measure of whether the perceived agenda influence
measure relates to the national or EU level, whereas our second variable is a categorical variable for
2
Our survey question used a four point scale asking respondents to distinguish between ”very often”, “fairly often”,
“occasionally” and “never” having influence. However, due to the limited number of respondents reporting to have
influence on EU agenda setting “very often”, we have collapsed the two upper categories.
18
national context. The third independent variable reports the share of policy activity of the
organization in core EU policy areas. We calculated this measure based on questions where
individual organizations were asked to report their degree of activity on a scale from 1 to 4 (max
activity) in18 different policy areas3. We added the overall score of activity per interest group and
subsequently calculated the share of overall activity which fell with into four policy areas where the
EU competences lie exclusively or to a very high extent at the EU level, i.e. a) Research,
technology and communications policy, b) Industrial and consumer policy, c) Agriculture, fishery
and food policy, and d) Environment and energy policy. Classifying the degree of EU competence
in policy areas is of course a difficult exercise, since many general policy areas may involve an
element of EU activity. However, the four selected policy areas distinguish themselves by their
strong degree of EU competence.
The fourth independent variable measures the national embeddedness of the group based on
a survey question where groups indicate how frequently the group has been “represented in public
council, boards, and committees”. The advantage of assessing national embeddedness based on a
response question looking at actual membership of advisory bodies compared to other methods of
participation with open access (e.g. national government consultations) is that the former indicates a
more selective type of access than the latter (Öberg et al., 2011).
The fifth independent variable is a dichotomous measure reporting whether the group in question
was a business group coded based on the Interarena coding scheme for interest groups
(www.interarena.eu). Our interest group survey respondents were coded into business groups and
3
The 18 policy areas were Labour market policy, Urban and housing policy, Research, technology and communications
policy, Defence and security policy, Industrial and consumer policy, Refugee and immigrant policy, Religious policy,
Local government and regional policy, Culture and sports policy, Agriculture, fishery and food policy, Environment and
energy policy, Monetary, fiscal and tax policy, Law and order/justice policy, Social affairs and families policy, Health
policy, Traffic and infrastructure policy, Education policy, and Foreign affairs.
19
remaining interest groups based on information on their websites. Finally the sixth independent
variable is the number of full term staff of a given organization engaged in political work defined
broaly as “contact with civil servants, politicians or journalists; generating analyses or research for
policy advocacy, or monitoring the political process”.
We start by presenting a multinominal logistic regression model with all the main effects of
our independent variables followed by a model which includes interactions between the
national/European agenda setting level and the different explanatory factors to test for differential
effects at these two levels. Our tables present the relative risk ratios, whereas we report predicted
probabilities with 95 per cent confidence intervals for all the three levels of our dependent variable
in figures.
4. Analysis
As expected in hypothesis 1 we see a strong effect of decision-making level in our first regression.
According to model 1, the relative risk of exerting agenda setting influence “never” compared to
“occasionally” is expected to increase by a factor of 8.857 when we move from national to EU
policy-makers given that the other variables in the model are held constant. Conversely, we see that
the relative risk of persuading policy-makers to take up an issue “often” as opposed to
“occasionally” decreases by a factor of 0.239 when the targeted decision-makers are at the EU
rather than the national policy level.
<TABLE 3>
In model 1, we find some small overall differences in agenda setting influence between countries,
some of which are statistically significant. It is for example the case that the Dutch organizations
are less likely than the British ones to “never” exert agenda setting influence as opposed to
20
“occasionally” whereas the Danish and British organizations do not differ in this respect, Instead,
we see that the Danish organizations are somewhat less likely than the British organizations to exert
agenda setting influence “often” as opposed to “occasionally”.
The limited variation between countries is also apparent when we consider national and EU
level policy influence separately in Figure 1. Agenda influence on EU policy-makers is consistently
ranked lower no matter which country we look at. As expected in hypothesis 2a there is no
significant variation in agenda influence on national policy-makers except that the British groups
are slightly more likely to “never” have influence on national policy-makers than the Dutch ones
are. All other confidence intervals overlap.
Turning to influence on EU policy-makers, we also do not find evidence in favor of any of
the two contradictory predictions in the literature that groups from neo-corporatist countries should
be either disadvantaged or advantaged compared to groups from systems with different state-society
structures. The variation in agenda influence is not statistically significant except for a few
exceptions. Hence, the Dutch respondent are somewhat more likely to “often” and less likely to
“never” have influence on EU policy-makers than the Danish ones. Somewhat ironically, the only
significant variation we find at the country level with regard to EU agenda influence is thus between
countries with similar rather than different state-society structures, which contradicts the
expectation in hypothesis 2b.
Despite a few smaller, statistically significant differences between countries, the
overwhelming share of evidence does therefore not support that national context is an important
factor in explaining variation in interest group agenda influence no matter which decision-level we
examine. As a result, the gap between agenda influence on national and EU level decision-makers
therefore also does not vary much between the countries with the exception of the Danish groups
21
that witness a somewhat stronger gap (especially with regard to “occasional” influence) between
national and EU policy-makers than the other two countries.
<FIGURE 1>
Unsurprisingly there is no effect of the share of EU related out of total political activity on overall
agenda influence in model 1. Instead, we see a strong interaction effect in the expected direction in
hypothesis 3. As illustrated in figure 2, EU policy activity has a positive effect on EU level agendainfluence and a negative one on national agenda influence. The higher the share of activity in areas
of EU competence, the more likely a group is to “never” have influence on national and the less
likely it is to “never” have influence on EU policy-makers. Conversely, EU involvement increases
having influence on EU policy-makers both “occasionally” and “often” and it decreases having
influence on national policy-makers “occasionally” and “often”. We even see that for those
organizations that have the highest EU involvement there is no longer a positive gap between
influence on national and EU level policy-makers. Agenda influence on policy-makers at the two
levels is no longer significantly different.
<FIGURE 2>
According to model 1, national embeddedness has the expected overall effect on agenda influence
in hypothesis 4. The stronger a group is represented on national boards and committees, the lower
the likelihood that it “never” has influence on policy-makers as opposed to having influence
“occasionally” and the higher the likelihood that it has influence “often” as opposed to
“occasionally”. Figure 3 shows that the direction of this relationship is the same no matter whether
we deal with national or EU policy-makers. In other words, national embeddedness is a factor that
22
has a positive effect on influence at both levels as we hypothesized. At the same time, there is also
strong evidence of an interaction effect between national embeddedness and policy level. As
expected, national embeddedness exerts a stronger influence on national than EU-level policymakers. The slope in Figure 3 is considerably steeper with regard to national than EU policy when
we examine the predicted probability of “often” having agenda influence. This means that the gap
between “often” having influence on national and EU-level policy-makers is generally much wider
for groups that are “very often” as opposed to “never” represented on national boards. This also
means that whereas there is also a weak positive relationship between national embeddedness and
EU agenda influence, we only find significant differences in EU agenda influence between groups
located at the extreme ends of national embeddedness scale. Moreover national embeddedness does
not affect the likelihood of having influence “occasionally” no matter whether we examine the
national or EU level.
<FIGURE 3>
In aggregate terms, we find mixed evidence with regard to business group influence in line with the
expectation in hypothesis 5. According to model 1, business groups are significantly less likely than
other groups to have agenda influence “never” as opposed to “occasionally”. However, even if the
co-efficient is in the expected direction there is no significant difference between business and other
interest groups when it comes to comparing having agenda-influence exerted “occasionally” versus
“often”. In the interaction model we also do not find differences between business and other groups
in affecting the agenda of policy-makers at the two policy levels. The direction of the relationships
in figure 2 point towards business influence. However, the differences between business and other
groups are insignificant except for the difference in the predicted probability of “never” having
influence on EU policy-makers, which just meet the threshold of statistical significance at the 0.05
23
level with business groups being less likely than other group types to “never” have influence. The
figures show a weak tendency for business group to experience a narrower gap between influence
on national and EU-level policy-makers as we would expect for influence exerted “occasionally”.
However, there are only minor differences in the national versus EU agenda influence policy gap
between business and remaining groups for the remaining levels of influence4.
<FIGURE 4>
<FIGURE 5>
Finally, we see an effect of political staff size as expected in hypothesis 6. In the overall analysis in
model 1 a higher staff means a lower likelihood of “never” (as opposed to “occasionally”) having
influence and conversely a higher likelihood of “often” (as opposed to “occasionally” having
influence). We also see some interesting interactions between resources and the decision-making
level. When it comes to “never” having agenda influence, resources play a much greater role in EU
as opposed to national policy. Hardly any of the organizations with the highest level of political
staff have no influence at any of the two decision-making levels. In contrast, there is a large
difference between small organizations when it comes to having influence on EU and national level
policy-makers. Small organizations without political staff have a predicted probability of never
exerting influence that is more than double as high for EU than national-level policy makers.
In other words, it is clear that resources play a strong role pushing groups to exert some
degree of influence not only on national but also on EU-level policy makers. As staff size increases,
the share of groups that report to have influence “often” goes up for decision makers at both the
4
The confidence intervals for the business category are wider than the remaining interest group types not least because
the number of business groups is smaller than that of other groups.
24
national and EU level. However, “the win” is greater for national policy makers where the
relationship between staff size and exerting influence “often” is stronger. Instead, staff size plays a
strong role for securing “occasional” agenda setting influence on EU policy-makers whereas there
is a negative relationship between staff size and “occasional” agenda influence on national level
policy-makers. Hence whereas resource gains play a positive role in moving from having “no” and
to some influence on EU policy, they primarily ensure that groups get influence on EU level policymakers “occasionally” rather than “often”.
5. Conclusion
The point of departure for this paper was the observation that domestic interest groups operate in a
multi-level system, where important decisions are made at the EU as well as the national level. Our
study draws on the existing literature demonstrating variation in the degree to which groups have
incorporated the EU in their action repertoire (Beyers & Kerremans, 2012; Dür & Mateo, 2013). In
contrast to most of the existing literature the different policy-making levels were included in a
single analysis focusing on perceived agenda setting influence. More specifically, we examined
whether the explanatory potential of factors at the national, policy and interest group level vary
when it comes to persuading national and EU level policy-makers to initiate new issues.
Based on surveys of domestic interest groups in the United Kingdom, Denmark and the
Netherlands we were able to disconfirm some of the often-held assumptions about the nature of
interest group influence. First, the variation in agenda setting influence across countries was small
and the evidence therefore does not indicate that groups originating from a corporatist context
should be neither disadvantaged nor advantaged compared to groups in pluralist countries. Also,
despite frequent criticism of the prominent role of business interests in the EU, we did not find
25
strong evidence of comparative advantages for business groups in dealing with EU as opposed to
national policy-makers.
What did matter for the size of the gap between influence on national and EU policy makers
was the nature of an organization’s policy portfolio. Groups focusing relatively more on areas
heavily affected by EU regulation were more likely to experience agenda influence on EU policymakers and less likely to affect national decision makers. Also, staff resources were – as expected –
important for influence at both levels, but with a stronger role at the EU level when it comes to
ensuring agenda influence on an occasional basis.
26
Table 1. Descriptives (categorical variables)
Variable
Value
Dependent variable Model 1 & 2:
Agenda influence (EU
Institutions & National Civil
servants)
Dependent variable Model 3 & 4:
Agenda influence (EU
Institutions & National
Politicians)
Never
Occasionally
1
2
37,72
38,15
Often
Never
Occasionally
3
1
2
24,13 2731
37,06
40,54
Often
National
EU
UK
DK
NL
No
Yes
Less/Never
At least once a year
At least once a month
At least once a week
Never
3
0
1
1
2
3
0
1
1
2
3
4
1
22,4
50
50
22,68
34,78
42,54
78,95
21,05
52,4
30,2
11,86
5,53
15,61
Occassionally
2
36,65
Fairly often
3
29,52
Very often
4
18,22 2832
Level
Country
Business Groups
Contact EU institutions
Participation in national boards
Label
%
Table 2. Descriptives (numerical variables)
Variable
Share of EU
activity
Political staff
(log staff + 1)
min.
max.
0,2337382 0,0724251 0,097561 0,470588
1,028803 0,9322081
0 5,638355
27
N
2438
2496
N
2728
2990
2990
2984
2748
Table 3. Multinomial logistic regression results
(1) Outcome 'never’ (baseline 'occasional’ agenda setting influence)
Variable
Model 1
Model 2
EU Level
8.857
(0.969)***
18.544
(8.642)***
DK
0.905
(0.138)
0.554
(0.136)**
NL
0.665
(0.108)**
0.478
(0.119)***
Country (Ref. UK)
EU Level#Country (Ref. UK)
EU*DK
1.914
(0.525)**
EU*NL
1.603
(0.454)*
Business Group
0.676
(0.108)**
0.859
(0.221)
0.765
(0.221)
EU Level#BusinessGroup
Representation boards (Ref. Never)
Occassionally
0.638
(0.126)**
0.603
(0.142)**
Fairly often
0.479
(0.098)***
0.319
(0.095)***
Very often
0.439
(0.096)***
0.221
(0.091)***
EU Level#Representation boards (Ref. Never)
EU Level*Occassionally
1.183
(0.334)
EU Level*Fairly often
1.897
(0.645)*
EU Level*Very often
2.791
(1.287)**
Share EU activity
0.360
(0.333)
0.001
(0.001)***
EU Level#Share EU activity
Political staff (log)
0.560
0.342
(0.045)*** (0.072)***
1.720
(0.365)**
EU Level#Political staff (log)
Constant
58.477
(80.531)***
1.153
(0.333)
28
0.680
(0.273)
(3) Outcome 'Often’ (baseline 'occasional’ agenda setting influence)
Variable
Model 1
Model 2
EU Level
0.239
(0.037)***
0.528
(0.384)
DK
0.716
(0.118)**
0.793
(0.148)
NL
1.200
(0.203)
1.138
(0.221)
Country (Ref. UK)
EU Level#Country (Ref. UK)
EU*DK
0.582
(0.223)
EU*NL
1.254 (0
.433)
Business Group
1.051
(0.174)
1.025
(0.195)
1.131
(0.361)
EU Level#BusinessGroup
Representation boards (Ref. Never)
Occassionally
1.719
(0.488)*
1.899
(0.576)**
Fairly often
3.394
(0.965)***
3.962
(1.204)***
Very often
5.011
(1.490)***
4.934
(1.566)***
EU Level#Representation boards (Ref. Never)
EU Level*Occassionally
0.469
(0.268)
EU Level*Fairly often
0.367
(0.203)*
EU Level*Very often
0.699
(0.394)
Share EU activity
1.214
(1.216)
15.336
(28.921)
EU Level#Share EU activity
Political staff (log)
1.682
(0.123)***
N
Pseudo R2
2.006
(0.188)***
0.615
(0.084)***
EU Level#Political staff (log)
Constant
0.828
(0.926)
0.158
(0.057)***
2113
0.2165
29
0.125
(0.051)***
2113
0.2342
.8
.6
0
.2
.4
Occasionally
.4
0
.2
Never
.6
.8
Figure 1. Agenda setting influence across countries (predicted probabilities
with 95 per cent confidence intervals)
UK
DK
UK
EU
.6
Often
.4
.2
0
UK
DK
National
DK
National
.8
National
NL
NL
EU
30
NL
EU
.8
.6
0
.1
.2
.3
.4
0
.2
.4
Occasionally
.4
0
.2
Never
.6
.8
Figure 2. Agenda setting influence and relative EU policy focus (predicted
probabilities with 95 per cent confidence intervals)
.5
0
Share of activity in EU areas
Nat
EU
.6
Often
.4
.2
0
0
.1
.2
.3
.4
.5
Share of activity in EU areas
Nat
.2
.3
.4
Share of activity in EU areas
.8
Nat
.1
EU
31
EU
.5
.8
.6
Never
Occassionally Fairly often
0
.2
.4
Occasionally
.4
0
.2
Never
.6
.8
Figure 3. Agenda setting influence and representation in advisory bodies (predicted
probabilities with 95 per cent confidence intervals)
Very often
Representation national advisory bodies
National
.6
Often
.4
.2
0
Never
Occassionally Fairly often
Very often
Representation national advisory committees
National
Occassionally Fairly often
Very often
Representation national advisory committees
EU
.8
National
Never
EU
32
EU
.8
.6
.4
0
.2
Occasionally
.4
.2
0
Never
.6
.8
Figure 4. Agenda setting influence across interest group types (predicted
probabilities with 95 per cent confidence intervals)
0
1
0
Business Group
EU
National
.4
.2
0
Often
.6
.8
National
0
1
Business Group
National
1
Business Group
EU
33
EU
1
.8
.6
0
0
.2
.4
Occasionally
.4
.2
0
Never
.6
.8
1
Figure 5. Agenda setting influence and political staff (predicted probabilities
with 95 per cent confidence intervals)
2
4
Political staff (log)
0
EU
.8
.6
Often
.4
.2
0
0
2
4
Political staff (log)
National
2
4
Political staff (log)
National
1
National
6
6
EU
34
6
EU
References
Beyers, Jan (2002). "Garining and seeking access: The European adaptation of domestic interest
associations", European Journal of Political Research, 41pp. 585-612.
Beyers, Jan & Bart Kerremans (2012). "Domestic Embeddedness and the Dynamics of Multilevel
Venue Shopping in Four EU Member States", Governance: An International Journal of Policy,
Administration, and Institutions, 25, 2, pp. 263-90.
Beyers, Jan & Bart Kerremans (2007). "Critical resource dependencies and the Europeanization of
domestic interest groups", Journal of European Public Policy, 14, 3, pp. 460-81.
Binderkrantz, Anne S., Helene Helboe Pedersen & Peter Munk Christiansen (2012). "Accessing
political arenas. Interest group access to the administration, parliament and media", Paper, .
Constantelos, John (2007). "Interest group strategies in multi-level Europe", Journal of Public
Affairs, 7pp. 39-53.
Dür, Andreas (2007). "The Question of Interest Group Influence", Journal of Public Policy, 27pp.
1-12.
Dür, Andreas & Gemma Mateo (2013). The europeanization of interest groups: National
associations in multilevel europe.
Dür, Andreas & Gemma Mateo (2012). "Who lobbies the European Union? National interest groups
in a multilevel polity", Journal of European Public Policy, 19, 7, pp. 969-87.
Eising, Rainer (2007). "Institutional Context, Organizational Resources and Strategic Choices:
Explaining Interest Group Access in the European Union", European Union Politics, 8pp. 32962.
Eising, Rainer (2004). "Multilevel Governance and Business Interests in the European Union",
Governance: An International Journal of Policy, Administration, and Institutions, 17, 2, pp.
211-45.
Falkner, Gerda (2007). "Policy networks in a multi-level system: Convergence towards moderate
diversity?", West European Politics, .
Greer, Scott L., Elize Massard da Fonseca & Christopher Adolph (2008). "Mobilizing Bias in
Europe: Lobbies, Democracy and EU Health Policy-Making", European Union Politics, 9, 3,
pp. 403-33.
Klüver, Heike (2010). "Europeanization of Lobbying Activities: When National Interest Groups
Spill Over to the European Level", Journal of European Integration, 32, 2, pp. 175-91.
Leech, Beth L. (2010). "Lobbying and Influence", pp. 234-567 i Sandy L. Maisel, Jeffrey M. Berry
(red.), The Oxford Handbook of American Political Parties and Interest Groups.
35
Moultion, B. R. (1990). " An Illustration of a Pitfall in Estimating the Effects of Aggregate
Variables on Micro Units", The Review of Economics and Statistics, 72pp. 334-8.
Öberg, PerOla, Torsten Svensson, Peter Munk Christiansen, Asbjørn Sonne Nørgaard, Hilmar
Rommetvedt & Gunnar Thesen (2011). "Disrupted Exchange and Declining Corporatism:
Government Authority and Interest Group Capability in Scandinavia", Government and
Opposition, 46, 3, pp. 365-91.
Pedersen, Helene Helboe (2013). "Is measuring interest group influence a mission impossible? The
case of interest group influence in the Danish parliament", Interest Groups & Advocacy, 2, 1,
pp. 27-47.
Primo, D. M., M. L. Jacobsmeier & J. Milyo (2007). "Estimating the Impact of State Policies and
Institutions with Mixed-Level Data", State Politics & Policy Quarterly, 7pp. 446-59.
Rokkan, Stein (1966). "Norway: Numerical Democracy and Corporate Pluralism", Robert A. Dahl
(red.), Political Oppositions in Western Democracies, New Haven: Yale University Press.
Schattschneider, E. E. (1975 [1969]). The Semisovereign People. A Realist's View of Democracy in
America. US: Thomson Learning.
Schlozman, K. L., S. Verba & H. E. Brady (2012). The Unheavily Chorus. Unequal Political Voice
and the Broken Promise of American Democracy. Princeton University Press: Princeton.
Schmitter, Philippe C. (1974). "Still the Century of Corporatism?", Review of Politics, 36pp. 85131.
Smith, Mark A. (2000). American Business and Political Power. Public Opinion, Elections, and
Democracy. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press.
Truman, David B. (1951). The Governmental Process. Political Interests and Public Opinion. New
York: Alfred A. Knopf.
36