The alignment of parties and interest groups in EU legislative politics. A tale of two different worlds?

Political science research on European Union (EU) interest groups and parties represents two separate study fields and both literatures convey a somewhat different image of EU legislative policy-making. While most scholars of party politics endorse the notion that parties politicize EU legislative politics, scholarship of interest groups tends to portray EU policy-making as embedded in a somewhat de-politicized context in which expertise-based exchanges between societal interests and bureaucratic agencies is crucial. By analysing the context of EU legislative lobbying in relation to 54 legislative acts we demonstrate that, in particular on controversial cases, the alignment of parties and interests groups reflects party political cleavages.