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Transaction Cost Perspectives on Cooperation: A Study of Hybrids Through Foundations Lobbying in the EU

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Abstract

This article uses a transaction cost economics (TCE) approach to analyze cooperation between nonprofits, governments and firms, namely, hybrids. This is a different concept from hybrids in the nonprofit management literature. In TCE, hybrids are organizational modes of transactions where the parties contribute limited resources, for which they establish modes of coordination. This article explains how the concept of hybrids can be applied to research on nonprofits, illustrating this with an analysis of foundations lobbying in the European Union (EU). As regulatory transactions are organized through hybrids, this article proposes that foundations are likely to participate in EU policymaking for regulatory transactions, which are too costly to solve individually. The results show that foundations participate in different EU regulatory environments; significantly, this includes environments with high coordination costs.

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Fig. 1

Source: Adapted from the EU Transparency Register (2017)

Fig. 2

Source: Own elaboration

Fig. 3

Source: Adapted from Williamson (1991) and Wilson (1974, 1989)

Fig. 4

Source: Regulatory environments adapted from Wilson (1974, 1989), EU initiatives adapted from the EU Transparency Register (2017)

Fig. 5

Source: Adapted from the EU Transparency Register (2017)

Fig. 6

Source: Regulatory environments adapted from Wilson (1974, 1989), EU initiatives adapted from the EU Transparency Register (2017)

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Notes

  1. See https://www.irs.gov/charities-non-profits/private-foundations/lobbying-activity-of-section-501-c-3-private-foundations.

  2. See https://trust.guidestar.org/perspectives-on-the-johnson-amendment?utm_campaign=GuideStar+Newsletter+-+Researchers+and+Media&utm_source=hs_email&utm_medium=email&utm_content=42750102&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-8342u549mLXOy33a4rzs8KLvT0g94wc8jr5ypfB6GkeLnZMuAfswXXWmBHRdfWxsCZroHmrJjr12lkxfUelAFyEClYLg&_hsmi=42750102.

  3. See the list of participants here: http://ec.europa.eu/transparency/regexpert/index.cfm?do=groupDetail.groupDetail&groupID=2210&NewSearch=1&NewSearch=1.

  4. See, for example, collective action (Commons 1950: 23), congress and environments (Wilson 1989: 248).

  5. Previously, each institution had separate registers (Greenwood and Dreger 2013; Greenwood 2011).

  6. See http://ec.europa.eu/transparency/regexpert/index.cfm?do=faq.faq&aide=2.

  7. See http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/HTML/?uri=URISERV:ai0020&from=EN.

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Acknowledgements

I thank Sara Stühlinger for her research assistance, Heidy Maldonado for her helpful comments, and Jeffrey Brudney and two anonymous reviewers for their valuable guidance in the development of this paper. Early versions of this manuscript benefited from the comments of the participants of the CEPS Interne Kolloquien May 2016, the 12th ISTR World Conference, and the ECPR General Conference 2016.

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  1. Center for Philanthropy Studies (CEPS), Universität Basel, Steinengraben 22, 4051, Basel, Switzerland

    Marybel Perez

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Perez, M. Transaction Cost Perspectives on Cooperation: A Study of Hybrids Through Foundations Lobbying in the EU. Voluntas 30, 408–421 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11266-017-9928-z

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