Signaling expertise through the media? Measuring the appearance of corporations in political news through a complexity lens

Abstract

This paper analyses how corporations appear in media coverage on six policy domains through a complexity lens in two major British newspapers between 2012 and 2017. Corporations are often thought to avoid press coverage, though another strand of literature indicates that they dominate the news compared to other organized interests. We argue that corporations use multiple lobby strategies including media strategies in order to maximize influence. They do so to signal technical expertise to specific constituencies that is not necessarily accessible to the general public. The results show that corporations are more likely to be involved in news coverage that is technical in nature which is an important finding as it tells us more about the media involvement of key players in the political process. Yet, this coverage is not necessarily less accessible which is a positive finding for the functioning of our democracies.