Digital communication strategies of lobbies in European Union

Emilia Smolak Lozano^*

• University of Malaga, Málaga, Spain

Digital technologies have made it easier for lobbies to reach a larger audience, generate support, and collect data to support their campaign. Simultaneously digital tools have also contributed to opening up participation in lobbying activities, as information can be more readily accessible to the public. Policymakers are also leveraging digital technologies to engage with a wider range of stakeholders, gather input on policy issues, and increase transparency in the policy-making process. Lobbies, or interest groups, use digital tools and platforms to interact with policymakers, communicate their interests, and influence decision-making. However, there are also concerns about the influence of big tech companies and the potential for digital lobbying to distort public policy outcomes. Overall, the digital age has reshaped the dynamics between lobbies and public policies, presenting both opportunities and challenges for achieving transparent and accountable governance. For the time being, the EU lacks an evaluation or regulatory service to scrutinize digital lobbying strategies. In the digital age, the relationship between lobbyists and public policies has changed, with technology playing an important role. The purpose of the study is to examine the digital strategies of the lobbyists in the EU by means of web mining, social media tracking, and text mining techniques. The content analysis will be conducted to identify and describe digital strategies that EU lobbyists employ: online media, social media, online formats, and publications to advocate and influence public policies. The results will allow determining the strategies of lobby influence in digital environments on the one hand and the scope and scale of digital discourse created by thereof on the other. As such, we will be able to get a more profound knowledge of the impact of these organizations on the public policies in the EU in many sectors in terms of digital communication and the online factors of the policy-making process with engaged stakeholders. Finally, the methodology will serve as a proposal for an analytical framework of the lobby digital practices in order to better monitor the development of political communication of these entities with their stakeholders in the digital ecosystem and thus the generated digital discourse.