Lobbying Beyond Policy Preferences in the EU Climate Change and Energy Policy-Making Process

As part of the EU policy-making process, the European Commission regularly opens consultations to collect position papers from interest groups and receive technical expertise that policy-makers and bureaucrats from EU institutions usually lack. During these open consultations, interest groups, private companies and members of the civil society have the opportunity to submit position papers to the European Commission, gathering a list of policy preferences and arguments in their support. Position papers can be submitted individually, or together through informal coalitions, or formal umbrella organisations. Within the same consultation, actors try to enhance their influence over the European Commission by submitting multiple position papers through different groups and umbrella organisations. While the multiple submission of position papers can be explained as a form of lobbying strategy; however, how can we identify the revealed preferences of actors? By looking at the 2012 EU open consultation on energy and climate change, this research will identify revealed preferences through the combination of two analytical levels. First, the relational ties that interest groups form, such as membership with umbrella organisations and other institutionalised coalitions. Second, the analysis of policy preferences and positions expressed by actors within each document. A methodological approach combining network analysis and automated text analysis (factorial LDA) is used to highlight revealed preferences of actors across different documents. This research will bring two main contributions to the literature on influence and interest groups. First, a reliable tool to map policy preferences and positions in presence of multiple documents from one actor; second, a deeper understanding of how actors rely on the network of the umbrella organisations they are members of to reach the European Commission.