This paper investigates the impact of social movement protests on parliamentary agendas. Protests represent a key resource through which non-institutionalized actors attempt to influence political elites. Nevertheless, protests are far from being the only existing “information signal” on which MPs may rely on when prioritizing policy issues. This paper explores both theoretically and empirically how, and the extent to which, “objective conditions” measured by relatively unambiguous “real-world” indicators may influence the agenda effect of protest across issues and countries. The paper builds on the social movement and agenda-setting perspectives, underlining how these two strands of the literature may benefit from a closer dialogue. Empirically, the paper contrasts the impact of protests on the prioritization of political issues related to “socio-economic” (i.e. unemployment) and “cultural” (i.e. immigration) dimensions in six West European countries (Belgium, France, Netherlands, Spain, Switzerland and the UK).
