Organised Interests in Post-Communist Policy-Making

Abstract

The panel will tackle a scientific area that has been relatively overlooked in both previous research on organized interests in comparison and on post-communist governance in generally. Specifically the panel participants will contribute to our understanding of how societal demands are channelled into the political process and how societal organizations shape three of the most important policy areas for the long-term prosperity of nations - energy, health care and higher education. The overall objective of the panel is to explore the structures, democratic-participative incorporation and impact of organized interests in Central and Eastern Europe. The participants will explore how interest groups organize civil society and contribute to the political preference aggregation process, while examining the structure of the interest group landscape. To do so, we will address a number of questions, including: the extent to which interest groups impact partisan preferences and then draw on the so-called “preference realization method”, according to which interest group preferences are measured against the initial government proposal, the official legislative bill and the final output. We will examine how European integration and EU accession have affected the structure, democratic-participative means, and impact of organized interests in CEE. Has European integration resulted in the consolidation and professionalization of domestic interest groups, ultimately strengthening their impact on policy output? Or has Europeanization prompted major interest groups to shift their activities to Brussels, thus increasing the clout of the state or previously structurally disadvantaged organized interests?