Strategies to Policy Success: Preference Attainment in Global Trade and Climate Negotiations

How successful are transnational advocates? While much research on transnational advocacy has focused on explaining varying patterns of mobilization and the development of transnational advocacy communities, there is limited knowledge on whether and how specific advocacy strategies may contribute to the attainment of policy preferences. Instead of testing which type of advocate – for instance business versus non-business – was more or less successful, I thus analyse which lobbying strategy results in a higher chance of success. In this paper, I focus on three strategies that non-state actors may use at the international level: (1) interaction with policymakers (inside lobbying), (2) collaboration with other non-state actors and (3) outside lobbying. Based on approximately 500 interviews with transnational advocates on 15 concrete policy cases, I measure the success of each individual advocate by comparing the final policy outcome of each case with the initial policy position the advocate adopted. The theoretical starting point here is that a particular advocacy strategy cannot be studied in isolation of the particular context in which it is implemented. For instance, the effectiveness of a strategy is largely conditioned by the extremeness of the adopted policy position, the availability of allies, and the existence of sympathetic policymakers.