Abstract
This article presents an analysis of the formation of organized interest groups in the post-communist context and organizational populations over time. We test two theories that shed doubt on whether vital rates of interest groups are explained by individual incentives, namely, the political opportunity structure and population ecology theory. Based on an analysis of the energy policy and higher education policy organizations active at the national level in Hungary, Poland, and Slovenia, we find that while the period of democratic and economic transition indeed opened up the opportunity structure for organizational formations, it by no means presented a clean slate. Communist-era successor and splinter organizations survived the collapse of communism, and all three countries entered transition with relatively high density rates in both organizational populations. We also find partial support for the density dependence hypothesis. Surprisingly, the EU integration process, the intensity of legislative activity, and media attention do not seem to have meaningfully influenced founding rates in the two populations.
Highlights
What explains the formation rates of interest organizations in post-communist democracies over time?1 While interest groups in the European Union (EU), Western Europe, and the United States are an increasingly broadly studied phenomenon, 1044 East European Politics and Societies and Cultures previous research has—with several notable exceptions2—largely neglected organized interests in the post-communist context
The theory developed by Hannan and Carroll explains “the variation in founding rates and mortality rates as functions of organizational density.”[11]. They emphasize that founding rates and mortality rates operate at different levels, as they are governed by different processes: the founding process “operates for the population as a unit,” whereas “mortality processes operate at the level of organizations”
The two policy areas differ in an important respect, : energy policy is mostly privatized despite a considerable degree of state control and tight regulations, whereas higher education is mostly publicly owned and financed in all three countries, despite a relatively large private sector in Poland and a considerable reduction in state-financed places at Hungarian universities, since 2011
Summary
What explains the formation rates of interest organizations in post-communist democracies over time?1 While interest groups in the European Union (EU), Western Europe, and the United States are an increasingly broadly studied phenomenon, 1044 East European Politics and Societies and Cultures previous research has—with several notable exceptions2—largely neglected organized interests in the post-communist context. Civil society is seen as weak and underdeveloped.[4] This is compounded by a legacy of distrust in political institutions and apathy towards the political process This very particular context of the abrupt collapse of totalitarian command economies followed by a fast-paced transition to democracy and market economy as well as the EU accession process offers a unique chance to test standard theories about organized interests. The Theory of Density Dependence and the Political Opportunity Structure Framework
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