Introduction

There exists a wide variety of traditions in explaining mobilisation and voting patterns in the literature. Different voter models emphasise socioeconomic, institutional, and more recently, psychological factors, in determining voter turnout, with a vast number of both theoretical

​This paper undertakes an analysis of campaign finance and lobbying regulations with the aim of evaluating and contrasting the effectiveness of these regulations in promoting transparency within politics. Both types of transparency regulations have been widely discussed in the literature, with studies analysing their implementation across various political systems (Cucciniello et al., 2017) and measuring their impact on outcomes such as representation (LaPira and Thomas, 2014) and trust in government (Grimmelikhuijsen, 2012). Despite this, no thorough comparative analysis has been conducted between these regulatory frameworks to date. This paper seeks to address this gap by directly comparing these regulations and assessing their efficacy in achieving their respective aims of fostering transparency both on theoretical and practical grounds. In doing so, the paper highlights the benefits of undertaking a comparative analysis of different types of transparency regulation. Through its examination, the paper aims to highlight the relative strengths and weaknesses of each regulatory approach in promoting political transparency, informing both future transparency research and policy-making decisions. 
 

The paper is structured as follows: The first section will establish a clear definition of transparency and examine how this definition can be applied to determine the effectiveness of transparency regulations. The second section will evaluate whether campaign finance regulations or lobbying regulations are more effective in promoting transparency when ‘at their best’ and will outline the criteria for highly robust regulations. The third section will evaluate the effectiveness of regulations ‘in practice’, discussing the shortcomings of existing lobbying regulations in contrast to current campaign finance regulations. The paper will conclude that at their best, lobbying regulations can prove more effective in promoting transparency in politics, however, weaknesses in existing lobbying rules have rendered campaign finance regulations more effective at achieving transparency to date. 

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Section 1: Conceptualising Transparency in Politics

In order to evaluate the effectiveness of regulations in promoting transparency in politics, it is crucial to first establish a clear understanding of transparency in the political context. This section will discuss some of the most prominent conceptualisations of transparency present  in the literature, as well as their implications for transparency regulations. 
 

Numerous studies have delved into both the theoretical and empirical underpinnings of transparency, most prominently converging on the availability of information and the monitoring of political activities. Porumbescu et al. (2022) defines transparency as “the availability of information about an organisation or actor” which allows for the monitoring of their“internal workings or performance” (Porumbescu et al., 2022, p.10). An emphasis is placed on the quality of the information made available by relevant actors, which should be granular, unbiased and usable in order to facilitate the effective monitoring of activities by the public. Similarly, Michener and Bersch (2013) emphasise the visibility and inferability of the information made available to the public. As per this definition, visibility refers to the completeness and findability of information, while inferability relates to the extent to which information can be used to reach reliable conclusions. Additionally,  Broz (2002) emphasises the role of transparency regulations in informing the public about the influence of private interests during the policymaking process, which is particularly relevant in the context of lobbying regulations. 
 

These definitions have significant implications for how we think about the effectiveness of transparency regulations. The first implication is that transparency regulations should increase the level of information available about the political activities of relevant actors. This aspect is crucial for enabling the effective monitoring of such activities by the public (Broz, 2002). In the context of the two regulations evaluated in this paper, this information will concern either the donations made to political candidates and parties during elections or the activities of private interest groups towards public officials in the context of policy development (Crepaz and Chari, 2020).  Moreover, highly effective regulations will stand-out not only by the quantity of information they oblige actors to provide but also the quality of this information, characterised by a high level of detail and usability (Michener and Bersch, 2013; Porumbescu et al., 2022). In order to truly promote transparency in politics, the regulations in question must therefore include provisions for high-quality information disclosure. 
 

An additional implication is that the effectiveness of regulations in enhancing transparency within politics heavily relies on the extent to which the public engages with the disclosed information. Transparency is enhanced when the public actively utilises this information to monitor the political activities of relevant actors, a process associated with increased accountability and reduced corruption within the political system (Cuccinello et al., 2017). As civil society actors, including the media and NGOs, play a crucial role in enhancing the accessibility of disclosed information for the public (Goss, 2010), the effectiveness of transparency regulations additionally hinges on the attention these organisations devote to  monitoring the implementation of regulations (Briffault, 2008). Robust enforcement mechanisms prove equally crucial, as by ensuring widespread compliance among relevant actors, the public can be equipped with the necessary tools to effectively monitor political activities.  In the context of both campaign finance and lobbying rules, greater enforcement is associated with the establishment of strong independent oversight bodies and the implementation of strict penalties for noncompliance, which highlights the role that the legal system plays in the monitoring process (Šimral, 2020). 
 

To conclude this section, the relative effectiveness of campaign finance and lobbying regulations largely hinges on the information these policies can provide to the public. The more effective type of regulation will provide for a higher quantity and quality of information about relevant political activities. This coupled with  the presence of civil society and robust enforcement mechanisms, can facilitate the monitoring of political  activities by the public. 
 

Section 2: Evaluating Regulations ‘At Their Best’

This section will compare campaign finance and lobbying regulations ‘at their best’, meaning that the effectiveness of highly robust lobbying regulations will be contrasted with the effectiveness of very strong campaign finance regulations. For this purpose, the section will first highlight the criteria which must be met by these regulations in order to be considered highly effective. It will then make the argument that at their best, lobbying regulations are a more effective tool for achieving transparency in politics when compared to campaign finance regulations. 
 

2.1. Defining Highly Robust Regulations
Firstly, campaign finance regulations are composed of three main aspects: the public financing of campaigns, contribution limits and disclosure requirements (Witko, 2007). Public finance provisions within campaign finance regulations determine the level of state funds which are allocated for the operation of election campaigns. Their primary aim is to reduce the dependence of political candidates on private donors, thereby equalising the financial playing field for candidates and mitigating the influence of private interests in the electoral process (Kilborn and Vishwanath, 2022).  Similarly, contribution limits are fundamentally concerned with restricting the political influence that any one private actor can exercise through campaign contributions, thus preserving the democratic ideal of ‘one person, one vote’. Contribution limits can also increase transparency in the political system when matched with disclosure requirements for individual contributions (Shapiro and Zillante, 2017). Finally, transparency within the electoral process is most directly promoted by disclosure requirements, which establish the rules for political actors to disclose their campaign contributions and expenditures. These rules consequently ensure that this information is made available to the public (Briffault, 2010). Highly robust campaign finance regulations will thereby contain strong controls on all three of these regulatory aspects, including extensive disclosure requirements, strict contribution limits and a regulated system of public campaign funding (Horncastle, 2022). As aforementioned, it is also essential that these measures are matched with extensive oversight and enforcement mechanisms to ensure their effectiveness for the monitoring of relevant activities (Lochner and Bruce, 1998).
 

Lobbying regulations also encompass a diverse range of provisions, including registration obligations, spending disclosure requirements and revolving door provisions (Chari et al., 2019). Within the lobbying process, registration obligations determine who needs to register as a lobbyist and specify the level of detail lobbyists must disclose about their activities. Extensive registration rules require lobbyists to enlist on a publicly available registry and to disclose detailed information regarding their clients, the specific issues they are lobbying on and any interactions they have with public officials. As such, stricter registration obligations facilitate increased public access to detailed information regarding lobbying activities and are therefore associated with higher levels of transparency (Holman and  Luneburg, 2012). Similarly, spending disclosure requirements increase transparency in the lobbying process by establishing how much lobbyists must reveal about their expenditure on lobbying activities. This may include both regulations on the spending disclosure of individual lobbyists and of their employers (Chari et al., 2019). Finally, revolving door provisions establish cooling-off periods for public officials transitioning to the lobbying profession. Their primary aim is to separate the work of public officials and their subsequent engagement in the lobbying profession, thus preventing conflicts of interests and undue influence between the private and public sectors (LaPira and Thomas, 2014). Highly robust lobbying regulations will thereby contain strong controls on the registration of lobbyists, require extensive spending disclosure from individual lobbyists and their employers and set cooling-off periods for public officials. As in the case of campaign finance regulations, the effectiveness of these lobbying provisions will also require efficient oversight and enforcement mechanisms (Chari et al., 2019). 
 

2.2. The Case for Lobbying Regulations
Robust lobbying regulations can be deemed a more effective tool for the promotion of transparency in politics based on both conceptual and practical considerations. 
Conceptually, information disclosure plays a more central part in lobbying regulations than in campaign finance laws. At their core, lobbying rules relate to the availability of information, with highly robust regulations characterised primarily by expansive registration and financial disclosure requirements. The foremost aim of lobbying regulations is therefore not to restrict lobbying activities, but rather to ensure that adequate information about these activities is made publicly available (Briffault, 2008). In contrast, campaign finance regulations are to a large extent driven by concerns about equality in the electoral context. While financial disclosure requirements for political actors relate to the dissemination of information to the public, both contribution limits and regulations regarding the public financing of campaigns do not promote transparency in isolation. Rather than increasing the quantity or quality of publicly available information about political actions or the election campaign, these two provisions instead work to level the playing field for political candidates. While this constitutes an important aim in terms of political equality, it does not necessarily elevate the level or quality of information available in the political system (Straus, 1994; Briffault, 2008). As such, the availability of information is of a secondary purpose for campaign finance regulations, with only one provision, the branch referencing disclosure requirements, directly addressing the dissemination of information. This has important implications for the effectiveness of campaign finance regulations because, as aforementioned, enhanced transparency in politics largely hinges on the availability and inferability of information (Michener and Bersch, 2013).

 

Furthermore, lobbying disclosure frequently assumes a more consequentially informative role than campaign finance disclosure. At their best, lobbying disclosure requirements increase citizens’ awareness of lobbying expenditures, the affiliations of public officials and the content of lobbying activities (Briffault, 2008). They can also inform public officials about what actors are lobbying them and why, as well as allowing other lobbying groups to monitor the activities of their competitors in their policy area of interest (Holman and Luneburg, 2012). The informative role of campaign finance disclosure requirements is limited in comparison, primarily due to the limited electoral context within which such regulations operate which diminishes the value of the disclosed information to the public. The details of campaign contributions are rarely the primary concern of voters or the determining factor of their electoral choices. As such, even when information on campaign finance is publicly accessible, voters will be less inclined to actively seek out and use this information to inform their candidate preferences (Baron, 1994). Similarly, the media is less likely to focus its efforts on presenting disclosed campaign finance information to voters in the electoral context, generally deeming other aspects of elections as more salient (Briffault, 2008). This is significant because the effectiveness of disclosure requirements often depends on the media’s interest in the disclosed information, which can act as a key agitator to help reveal the stakes of citizens in a given outcome (Mahoney, 2007). These limitations are less applicable to lobbying regulations because lobbying disclosure occurs on an ongoing basis, and the information disclosed can be used by both the public and the media at any given time. Robust lobbying disclosure regulations therefore have a stronger informative role than campaign finance disclosure laws and can thus promote transparency in politics more effectively (Briffault, 2008).
 

This section has therefore outlined the criteria for highly robust lobbying and campaign finance regulations and argued that under these criteria, lobbying regulations are comparatively more effective in promoting transparency in politics. This effectiveness was attributed to the regulation’s inherent focus on information.  
 

Section 3: Evaluating Regulations ‘In Practice’

The main limitation of the above evaluation is that the vast majority of lobbying regulations in place globally do not satisfy the criteria for ‘highly robust’ regulations. This section will discuss how lobbying and campaign finance regulations work in practice, and thus will argue that existing campaign finance regulations are more effective in promoting transparency in politics than current lobbying rules. 
 

In practice, only a very small number of states have implemented lobbying regulations, including only half of the OECD states (Crepaz and Chari, 2020). Within the states that have implemented regulations, a significant majority contain relatively weak measures with regards to disclosure. Most lobbying regulations require very little information to be provided by lobbyists and lack robust provisions regarding the individual registration of lobbyists and financial disclosure (Chari et al., 2019). As per the above discussion, the US stands out as the only example of a state which has adopted lobbying disclosure requirements that can be described as highly robust, with US lobbyists required to submit quarterly and semi-annual reports disclosing the substantive and financial details of their lobbying activities (Holman and Luneburg, 2012). This has significant implications for how effective these regulations can be in practice. As aforementioned, the disclosure of information is a fundamental aspect of lobbying rules and serves as the primary means through which these regulations can enhance transparency in politics. Without robust disclosure requirements, the public and other relevant actors cannot effectively monitor the actions of lobbyists and public officials (Porumbescu et al., 2022). As such, weak disclosure requirements limit the informative role of lobbying regulations in practice, and it is this limited effect on transparency which is observed in most countries to date. 
 

In contrast, almost all democracies have adopted some type of campaign finance regulation, and these tend to be relatively robust with regards to disclosure requirements (OECD, 2016). The majority of EU states, for example, have implemented highly comprehensive regulations regarding the disclosure of campaign financing, with political parties and candidates generally obliged to report both the amount and source of their donations, along with details of their campaign expenditures (Transparency International, 2012). In fact, disclosure requirements often constitute the first aspect of campaign finance regulation which is adopted by states, as these generally face fewer objections from critics of campaign finance reform (Witko, 2007). As such, even weak campaign finance regulations will often include substantial disclosure requirements which work to inform the public – something which is not seen with regards to weak lobbying regulations. In addition, even very narrow changes in disclosure requirements have been observed to have a noticeable positive impact on transparency in the electoral context (Gilens et al., 2021). Consequently, the campaign finance regulations adopted globally to date are more informative and thus achieve a greater level of transparency than existing lobbying regulations. 
 

To conclude this section, most campaign finance regulations include relatively extensive disclosure requirements which increase the level of transparency within the political process. At the same time, most lobbying regulations include relatively weak disclosure requirements which limit the extent to which lobbying rules can actually inform the public. Consequently, despite facing limitations due to the lack of media attention campaign finance receives during elections, these regulations still outperform lobbying regulations globally. While theoretically, the transparency achieved by highly robust lobbying regulations may trump the transparency achieved by strong campaign finance laws, this effect has not yet been observed in practice. Campaign finance regulations have therefore likely had a greater effect on enhancing transparency in politics than lobbying rules based on existing regulations alone.

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Conclusions & Implications

This paper has assessed and compared the effect of campaign finance and lobbying regulations in enhancing transparency in politics. Firstly, the paper argued that at their best, lobbying regulations are more effective than campaign finance laws in this area, due to the former’s fundamental concern with disclosure and consequently stronger informative role. It also highlighted the constraints of the informative role of campaign finance regulations due to the equality-related purpose of two out of its three provisions and the diminished media interest in campaign finance matters during election periods. Secondly, the paper discussed the practical weaknesses of existing lobbying regulations with regards to disclosure requirements, arguing that as a result of these shortcomings, existing campaign finance regulations have had a greater effect on increasing transparency in politics in practice. In conclusion, while lobbying regulations have the potential to act as a more effective tool to promote transparency in politics, existing campaign finance regulations prove more informative and facilitate the monitoring of political activities more effectively than the weak lobbying rules adopted by the majority of states to date. 
 

The key implication of this analysis concerns the need to enhance the quality of lobbying regulations on a global scale. This enhancement should involve the implementation of stricter and more expansive obligations for the disclosure of information by lobbying actors, alongside robust enforcement mechanisms incorporating harsher penalties and the establishment of strong oversight bodies. Such improvements are essential to fully realise the potential of these regulations in fostering transparency within the political system. Furthermore, the classification of campaign finance regulations as primarily focused on political equality warrants further examination, as it may have significant implications for the theoretical categorisation of this regulation type in the literature. Finally, the paper has highlighted the benefits of undertaking a comparative analysis of different types of transparency regulation. Future studies should broaden this analysis to encompass a wider range of regulations, thereby enriching both our theoretical and practical understanding of their impact.

 

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