When does the structural power of business fade? assessing business privileged access at global climate negotiations

Abstract

Which non-state actors gain privileged access to policymakers during global environmental negotiations? This paper offers a first systematic answer to this question. I argue that, overall, business non-state actors gain more access to policymakers compared to NGOs. Importantly however, the privileged position of business groups becomes less pronounced–sometimes even disappears–if countries are more developed, less reliant on fossil fuels, more democratic, or the impact of climate change is higher for a country. For the empirical analysis, I first analyzed all business groups and NGOs that participated in country delegations at UN climate conferences between 1997 and 2012 (n = 3,734). To evaluate privileged access, I compare actors which gained access to country delegations (n = 804) with the organizations that participated during the conferences as observers (n = 2,930). The results confirm that business has more privileged access in general but not in all countries.