Organized interests and their attitudes towards legal proceedings – Evidence from a survey in Germany

A growing body of research studies the legal mobilization of organized interests. In explaining recourse to the legal system, the predominant focus has been on organizational or behavioral factors, e.g. resources, centralization of decision-making or the inclination towards insider vs. oustider strategies of advocacy. By contrast, attitudes towards the legal system have largely remained a blind spot. Where attitudes have been the focus of empirical investigation, these have been surveyed predominantly at the individual level and are usually confined to criminal justice. In turn, as far as organizations are concerned, the perception of courts and the legal system as a favorable or unfavorable opportunity structure to promote their interests and advance their causes is usually assumed rather than ascertained. How do organized interests perceive the justice system? And what explains the attitudes of these organizations towards formal legal proceedings? The proposed paper addresses these questions by making use of original data collected as part of a survey among representatives of 348 organizations seated in Germany. The survey data provide information on attitudes linked to the potential opportunities and risks of legal proceedings, including the perception of courts as counter-majoritarian institutions and preferences for easier access to justice for collective interests. The organizations in the sample include both interest groups proper, i.e. business associations, professional associations, or labor unions, and firms, research institutions and organizations under public law. Among the factors that drive attitudes towards courts and court proceedings, the paper considers attitudinal (e.g. orientation towards different categories of fundamental rights), behavioral (e.g. previous litigation activity, support of litigation by third parties) and organizational factors (e.g. political and legal resources, organizational type).