Political Networks, Ideology and Lobbying

We study lobbying with information in a setting where politicians are connected through a network describing information flows. There are two opposing lobby groups, who choose which politician to address. The decision depends on the ideological bias of politicians as well as the overall network structure. We show that there is an interplay between the strength of the network, as given by the information flow, and ideological bias. More precisely, when the information flow in the network is high, the effect of the ideological bias is amplified. Further, the network structure affects whether a priori supporting or opposing politicians are being lobbied. However, it matters not only what ideological biases politicians have, but also whether they are connected with like-minded politicians or politicians with a different ideological bias. "The real puzzle of its [a lobbies] P[ublic]A[ffairs] management is to select the most useful actors to approach, the best connections . . . ". van Schendelen (2010) p. 113.