Interest Groups & Political Polarization

Abstract

This panel examines how rising political polarization reshapes interest group behavior and success. While polarization has been extensively studied in relation to voters, parties, and media systems, its implications for organized interests remain less well understood. The contributions to this panel place interest groups at the center of polarized political environments and analyze how they respond to heightened conflict and ideological contestation. A first unifying theme concerns access under polarization. Several papers investigate whether polarized political contexts alter long-standing patterns of interest group access to policymakers. Rather than assuming stable resource-based hierarchies, the contributions explore how conflict intensity, ideological divides, and democratic backsliding condition who gains access, which venues remain open, and whether inequalities in access are reinforced or reconfigured under polarization. Second, the panel highlights strategic adaptation to polarized environments. Interest groups and firms adjust their lobbying strategies in response to ideological pressure, protest activity, and shifting political opportunity structures. This includes venue shifting across levels of governance and recalibrating engagement with controversial political actors. Polarization is thus shown to operate not only as a constraint, but also as a driver of strategic reorientation. Third, the papers foreground the normative and reputational dimensions of interest group activity under polarization. Decisions about whether to engage with far-right actors, how to position oneself in polarized public debates, or how to communicate in politicized media environments carry reputational risks that shape lobbying behavior.

Title	Details
The Normative Boundaries of Access: Lobbyists and the Far Right in the European Parliament	View Paper Details
The Effect of Political Polarisation on Lobbying Opportunities in Poland: the Case of Energy Sector and Creative Industry	View Paper Details
Do the Privileged Benefit When Under Pressure? Explaining Patterns of Interest Group Access Under Conditions of Conflict and Political Polarization	View Paper Details
Informal Lobbying and Polarization on the Belt and Road	View Paper Details
Mobilizing Firms: How Protest Movements Drive Lobbying Efforts	View Paper Details