How Do Stakeholders Influence Evidence References in Parliamentary Committees?

Stakeholders may influence references to evidence in parliament through policy briefs, reports, or other documents submitted to parliamentary committees. Previous research has examined stakeholder composition and access to parliaments in various contexts, suggesting that more resourceful groups tend to enjoy disproportionately higher access. However, few studies have investigated how stakeholder knowledge is referenced in parliamentary settings. This study explores how different stakeholders influence evidence references in parliamentary committees. Members of Parliament (MPs) are expected to scan stakeholder documents for potentially relevant evidence and to use such evidence during committee sessions to test, scrutinize, or challenge proposals from opposing parties. We propose that a higher number of evidence references in stakeholder documents will lead to more evidence references in MPs’ questions to proposed legislation and parliamentary decisions. We test this proposition using an explanatory mixed-methods design. First, a quantitative analysis compares evidence references in stakeholder documents submitted to parliamentary committees (udvalgsbilag) with evidence references in written questions posed by committee members across the 30 standing committees of the Danish Folketing from 2015 to 2025. Second, we explain policy variation in evidence referencing through a qualitative analysis of selected committees, based on document analysis and interviews with committee members. By examining how different stakeholders influence evidence references in parliamentary committees, the study contributes to both the literature on interest group influence and parliamentary behaviour, by showing the extent to which the political opposition utilizes stakeholder evidence to contest proposed legislation.