A Meso‐level Understanding of Business‐Government Relations

Previous studies of business‐government relations have tended to take either a macro approach (using a single theoretical framework to explain all business‐government relations) or a micro approach (one that fails to explain why business‐government relations have not improved over time). This article applies Lowi′s four‐part typology of policy types. In order to test the typology′s usefulness, a survey of business executives and government officials was carried out. The findings confirmed the thesis: business satisfaction with its relationship to government will be highest in the case of distributive policies, and decline to lowest in the case of constituent policies. A“meso‐level” theoretical framework is recommended to provide not only a better understanding of the multi‐levelled character of business‐government relations, but also future research with a practical orientation.