Public issues, policy proposals, social movements, and the interests of the Koch Brothers network of allies

Patrick Doreian () and Andrej Mrvar
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Patrick Doreian: University of Ljubljana
Andrej Mrvar: University of Ljubljana

Quality & Quantity: International Journal of Methodology, 2022, vol. 56, issue 1, No 16, 305-332

Abstract: Abstract There are many important societal issues facing the US and the world. There are also policy initiatives intended to deal with the problems raised by these issues. We couple some of the social issues and the policy initiatives to address them to the efforts of the Koch Brothers who created a powerful network of allies mobilized to support their libertarian ideas and ambitions. The relevant theoretical domain concerns the operation of social movements as the network of their allies forms a social movement. The mobilization includes obstructing many of the constructive policy initiatives discussed in the literature. This network has a diverse array of actors, each with their own core interests. A total of 443 Koch Brothers allies were identified. Their URLs were visited repeatedly to identify their core interests, for which a set of 47 keywords were established. A network for these keywords was constructed in which the links are the number of times they were shared by allies of the Koch Brothers. A variant of community detection was used to determine six communities of interests, all of which are very coherent. These communities are discussed in terms of the issues they raise for the US and the world. The implication for theory construction is to more fully understand the organization of actors opposing policy proposals for solving important societal problems and find effective ways for countering their destructive efforts.

Keywords: Social movement; Koch Brothers; Social networks; Networks of allies; Community detection (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
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DOI: 10.1007/s11135-021-01127-5

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