Henrik Schatzinger to present research about lobbying April 11

Henrik Schatzinger, associate professor of politics and government, will give a Faculty Scholarship Series presentation April 11. The presentation will run from 11:15 a.m. to 12:15 p.m. in Todd Wehr 104.

Schatzinger will address “How Does Lobbying Affect Federal Contracts?” His research is being done with Aaron Dusso, of Indiana University-Purdue University, and Thomas T. Holyoke, California State University, Fresno.

“Perhaps the most high-stakes, but under-studied, lobbying interest groups and corporations engage in is for obtaining federal procurement contracts,” Schatzinger says. “Business viability and local economic development often depend heavily on the ability of business lobbyists and their allies in Congress to pressure federal bureaucrats into awarding them contracts worth millions and even billions of dollars.”

The work “analyzes a data set built from lobbying expenditures and disclosure reports as well as campaign contributions for interest groups in five industries, coupled with data on federal contracts and disbursement broken out by congressional districts, which also allows use of data on specific members of Congress.”

Schatzinger’s talk follows a paper that was presented Friday, April 7, at the annual meeting of the Midwest Political Science Association in Chicago, with Dusso and Holyoke.