The four Ps of corporate political
activity: a framework for
environmental analysis and
corporate action
Nicolas M. Dahan*,y
College of Management, Long Island University, CW Post Campus, NY, USA

In this paper, I propose a new integrated framework which may be used to conduct a
thorough analysis of a firm’s political environment. The four steps of the methodology
include the problem (how a political problem emerges and can be shaped by actors), the
procedure (the public decision-making procedure), the policies (relevant public policies
currently implemented) and the players (including policy-makers as well as participants
in the political debate). Together, they form what I call the ‘Four Ps of corporate political
activity’.

This framework can serve not only for environmental analysis and monitoring, but also
to improve the effectiveness of a firm’s attempts in the field of political influence, through
actions such as arena selection, issue framing, the use of procedural opportunities,
proactive negotiation of a compromise or gate-keeping the political arena.
Copyright # 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Introduction
With the possible exception of executives
from the largest companies, most managers
feel uncomfortable handling their firm’s
political environment and being politically
active on its behalf. For example, take today’s
US energy policy. It is as rough a political
landscape as can be. Business interests are all
over the place, from the ‘traditional’ energy
sources (nuclear, coal, oil) and car-manufactur-
ing lobbies, to the Midwest farmers producing
ethanol; as well as environmentalists pushing
for alternative sources of energy (wind, solar,
etc.) which are less harmful to the environ-
ment. Consider the incredible variety of
arguments being hurled in the current energy
debate: concerns range from clean energy and
climate change to sustainable energy, to
energy security, to energy cost. To make
matters even more complicated, the debate
and the public policy are not the purview of a
single political institution. Instead, policy-
makers at all levels (international, national,
infra-national) are addressing the issue in a
manner just as likely to be complementary as
contradictory. Who could blame a corporate
executive for wanting to stay away from such
confusion? After all, business is about making
Journal of Public Affairs
J. Public Affairs 9: 111–123 (2009)
Published online in Wiley InterScience
(www.interscience.wiley.com) DOI: 10.1002/pa.321
*Correspondence to: Dr Nicolas M. Dahan, College of
Management, Long Island University, CW Post Campus,
720 Northern Blvd., Brookville, NY 11548-1300, USA.
E-mail: nicolas.dahan@liu.edu
yAssistant Professor.
Copyright # 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Journal of Public Affairs, May 2009
DOI: 10.1002/pa

profits, not public policy, right? Actually, it is
not that simple. Obama’s campaign as a
presidential candidate and the new adminis-
trationwhich took office after his election have
made clear that this was a key issue on their
political agenda and that major and swift
departures from the policies of the previous
administration were to be expected. As Ackley
(2008) puts it, ‘energy and environmental
policy promises to be one of the hot lobbying
issues for the 111th Congress’. This is due to
the fact that public policy concerning energy
will have a major impact on the financial
performance of all energy industries. Major
threats lie ahead for energies such as coal or
nuclear power, which could be perceived as
too polluting to be viable long-term sources.
This is why these industries are fighting to be
seen as part of the solution, rather than part of
the problem. Major opportunities will emerge
as alternative sources of energy become more
affordable. Indeed, farming lobbies have rallied
support for subsidies in order to lower the cost
of ethanol. Clearly, there will be winners and
losers from these public policies. Winners are
likely to be those who have managed to
understand the political landscape and how to
influence the process. It is therefore clear that
firms cannot afford to ignore public policy.
It logically ensues that companies should
keep monitoring their political environment
and maintain an in-depth understanding of it.
Unfortunately, there is a gap between should
and do. A study by Watkins et al. (2001, p. 10)
found that 77% of public affairs professionals
for Fortune 100 firms felt that their top
executives have little understanding of their
political environment and how it impacts their
firms. These authors concluded that this was a
‘dangerous state of ignorance’. If such danger
also exists in the largest corporations, the
situation is likely to be even worse in smaller
firms. It thus looks like companies could still
use a hand in understanding their political
environment.
Unfortunately, business scholars have not
been very responsive to this need. Even though
extensive literature exists on corporate
political activity, its focus has rarely been on
providing practical tools to managers in order
to facilitate the analysis of their firms’ political
environment. Authors concentrated instead on
how to manage the firm’s environment and
paid much less attention to environmental
analysis. They have also emphasized descrip-
tive and explanatory research rather than
normative contributions, which might provide
practical advice to managers. Up till now, the
relative dearth of concepts and techniques to
facilitate the analysis of a firm’s political
environment has only been addressed in a
significant manner by the issue management
literature (see below) as well as by a handful of
authors, including Baron (1995a,b), Cummings
and Doh (2000), Mahon and McGowan (1996),
Van Schendelen (2002) and Watkins et al.
(2001).
The issue management stream is a relatively
old and rich body of literature (see Wartick and
Mahon, 1994 for a review). It has provided us
with some useful environmental analysis
techniques and concepts such as social issues,
issue definition, the issue’s life cycle (some of
which I will use in the framework presented
below). However, the contributions are typi-
cally focused only on the issue concept (see for
example Dutton et al., 1983), and the firm’s
broader social environment (e.g. Sethi, 1979).
They tend to overlook the importance of other
relevant dimensions of the firm’s political
environment such as political arenas, institu-
tions and procedures for public decision-
making, which are just as crucial to successful
corporate political activity, as we will see
below.
Table 1 provides a summary of the key
contributions and the main limitations of each
of the more recent authors who have dealt
with the analysis of the firm’s political
environment.
Upon reviewing the existing literature, it
appears that few authors have truly offered
integrated methodologies for in-depth environ-
mental analysis centred on the firm’s political
environment. Furthermore, each author has
overlooked some key variables and/or uses
some concepts in a somewhat ambiguous
manner. On the other hand, there is some
Copyright # 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Journal of Public Affairs, May 2009
DOI: 10.1002/pa
112 Nicolas M. Dahan