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Introduction
On 7 October 2010, Greenpeace activists climbed flag poles in front of the European Parliament (EP) and raised banners that read ‘Nuclear waste, no solution’.1 In addition, dozens of volunteers handcuffed themselves and blocked the passage of Members of the European Parliament (MEPs). The demonstration was widely discussed in the newspapers and intended to influence the European Commission’s (EC) proposal for a directive on the management of radioactive waste [COM(2010)618]. Meanwhile, the European Atomic Forum (FORATOM), the organization representing the European nuclear industry, was lobbying on the same issue. While Greenpeace relied on protest activities in addition to its private meetings with European Union (EU) officials, FORATOM refrained from a visible public campaign and almost exclusively relied on direct contact with policymakers.
The case of Greenpeace and FORATOM illustrates two distinct advocacy strategies (Kollman, 1998; Beyers, 2004; Binderkrantz, 2005; Hanegraaff et al., 2016). The first, used by Greenpeace, is outside lobbying, which comprises tactics that indirectly address policymakers through mobilizing and raising the awareness of a broader audience. Outside lobbying includes the use of public communication channels rather than direct exchanges with policymakers, and involves tactics such as contacting journalists, issuing press releases, establishing public campaigns, and organizing protest demonstrations. The second strategy, as exemplified by FORATOM, is known as inside lobbying, and involves direct exchanges with policymakers through private communication channels, such as face-to-face meetings, telephone calls, or e-mail exchanges. These forms of advocacy largely take place behind the scenes and out of view of the public.
This article seeks to clarify how the use of inside and outside lobbying affects the extent to which organized interests realize their policy goals. More specifically, we analyze under which conditions outside lobbying leads to higher or lower levels of policy success when compared to inside lobbying. Many scholars have analyzed the extent to which advocates adopt a particular strategy (Kollman, 1998; Binderkrantz, 2005; Kriesi et al., 2007; Dür and Mateo, 2013; Weiler and Brändli, 2015; Hanegraaff et al., 2016) or have sought to explain the varying levels of policy success (Smith, 2000; Burstein and Linton, 2002; Klüver, 2013; Dür et al., 2015), but few have investigated the link between advocacy strategy and policy success (exceptions include Mahoney,...