Group interest and agenda setting dynamics: Explaining interest group position-taking across policy dimensions in a pre-defined policy space

Whether and where interest groups place themselves in policy space matters for the representative potential of interest groups. Some politically active interest groups have clearly articulated policy positions on one or more policy dimensions while other politically active groups do not. In this paper we examine how we can explain differences in interest group position-taking across policy dimensions. While group interest and group characteristics are likely to explain parts of such variation in interest group position-taking, this paper hypothesizes that the party salience and polarization of the respective policy dimension also matter. By utilizing data from the "Party-Interest Group Relationships in Contemporary Democracies" (PAIRDEM) project on interest group positions (within a predefined policy space) in seven different countries as well as the Chapel Hill Expert Survey (CHES), this paper investigates interest group position-taking across policy dimensions. The analysis shows that interest groups with an economic interest and more resources are more likely to have policy positions than other groups. Furthermore, party salience matters for interest group position taking. This means that agenda setting dynamics, together with group interest and group characteristics, influence interest group position-taking.