Abstract
Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) are considered important intermediaries between citizens and policymakers. They are assumed to function as transmission belts that filter societal preferences and channel them to policymakers. Although the ability of CSOs to connect civil society with policymakers has been put into question, it has rarely been theoretically specified and empirically tested. This paper develops a conceptualization of CSOs that examines their capacity to function as transmission belts. It does so by distinguishing two organizational dimensions related to member involvement and organizational capacity. The paper draws on a large survey of CSOs active at the EU to empirically assess these organizational dimensions and relate them to basic CSOs’ characteristics. The findings indicate that one out of three organizations approximates the ideal-type transmission belt. The findings contribute to a better understanding and assessment of CSO’s potential contribution to policy-making in representative democracies.
Highlights
Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) are crucial intermediary organizations that connect citizens with policymakers (Easton 1971; Putnam 1993; Rasmussen et al 2014; Truman 1951)
The capacity of CSOs to act as transmission belts is crucial to their contribution to policy processes and democracy
To move the literature forward and increase our understanding of the role of CSOs in policy-making, this paper theoretically unpacks the transmission belt notion based on the distinction of two organizational dimensions: member involvement and organizational capacity
Summary
Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) are crucial intermediary organizations that connect citizens with policymakers (Easton 1971; Putnam 1993; Rasmussen et al 2014; Truman 1951). This paper examines CSOs by focusing on their organizational structure, which reflects member involvement (i.e., internal democratic structures) and organizational capacity (i.e., features aimed at efficiently generating, processing, and transferring information to policymakers) The focus on these organizational dimensions enables us to assess how much organizational variety exists among CSOs and how many of them are effectively organized as transmission belts. Even though involving members and having organizational capacity are not easy or cheap (Jordan and Maloney 2007), an important number of CSOs successfully combine both organizational dimensions.8 To further explore these results, this second part of the section examines the relationship between the four clusters and five basic variables of CSOs: type of organization (i.e., citizens vs businesses), organizational age, resources, organizational scale, and membership diversity. That is, having the same type of members facilitates the development of organizational structures aimed at involving members and at having the necessary organizational structures to generate, process, and transfer information to policymakers
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