Publication
Title
The captive or the broker? Explaining public agency-interest group interactions
Author
Abstract
The literature offers individually valid yet collectively inconsistent hypotheses concerning the nature of public agencies' responsiveness to interest groups. This article analyzes the nature of this responsiveness by examining the brokerage potential of public agencies among interest groups. Such a brokerage potential is hypothesized to follow from agencies' preferences for policy goods as well as the tendency of interest groups to seek access to public agencies. It combines analyses of agencies' demand for policy goods with interest groups preferences for seeking access to specific policy venues. The analyses are based on survey data of national civil servants and interest groups in the United Kingdom and in the Netherlands. The findings suggest that both strategic preferences as well as organizational routines positively correlate with a brokerage potential while interaction patterns within and with the organizational environment of public agencies can constrain their brokerage potential in several distinct ways.
Language
English
Source (journal)
Governance: an international journal of policy and administration. - Oxford
Publication
Oxford : 2012
ISSN
0952-1895 [print]
1468-0491 [online]
DOI
10.1111/J.1468-0491.2012.01567.X
Volume/pages
25 :2 (2012) , p. 291-314
ISI
000301786100008
Full text (Publisher's DOI)
Full text (publisher's version - intranet only)
UAntwerpen
Faculty/Department
Research group
Publication type
Subject
Law 
Affiliation
Publications with a UAntwerp address
External links
Web of Science
Record
Identifier
Creation 14.05.2012
Last edited 09.10.2023
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