Whom to Trust? How Salience Shapes Public Officials’ Information Processing of Stakeholder Input

Many studies have shown that issue salience is an important contextual factor to understand regulatory decision-making processes. As regards the supply side - the provision of information - several studies have demonstrated how salience shapes the strategies and influence of external stakeholders. Less academic attention has been devoted to how salience shapes the demand side, namely how information is prioritized and processed by public officials. In this paper, we address how the varying salience assessment of an issue among both external stakeholders and public officials shapes how the latter seek and prioritize certain input from particular stakeholders. Specifically, we clarify which stakeholders are perceived as more credible and reliable, and under what conditions. Empirically, we focus on the case of the financial regulatory agencies at the EU level, and examine the interactions between external stakeholders and public officials, relying on survey-data and qualitative interviews. The findings contribute to a better understanding of why and when policymakers prioritize or discount certain stakeholder input, and hence clarify the outcome of regulatory decision-making processes.