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Abstract
This article is a case study focusing on employer organisations and business organisations in the Czech Republic. In legal terms, employer organisations are a specific type of interest group with special regimes of registration and record keeping. Unlike business groups, they are endowed with certain privileges and, in particular, can participate in collective bargaining. This study analyses the relations between these two types of groups. The database originates from a questionnaire-based survey undertaken in 2010 among 91 groups representing businesses and employers. The analysis focuses on the relationship between a group's registration as an employer organisation and its orientation towards employer and business interests. It also investigates similarities between the two organisation types in terms of secondary organisation and strategies used. The analysis suggests that the differences between these two types are minimal and that the possibility of participating in collective bargaining and in tripartite counselling bodies remains the only relevant distinction. This holds true even when we take into account these groups' self-perceived primary role, i.e. defending their members as employer or as business organisations.

The article explores institutional platforms used to incorporate non-governmental groups into the decision making process and the possible impacts of such incorporation on their choice of strategy. The paper starts with an overview of relevant theories and concepts, such as the political opportunities structures, the concept of access points to the political system and, most importantly, the insider – outsider typology of interest groups. The empirical part of the paper focuses on the Czech Republic and the two institutional platforms available to NGOs within its political system: participation in advisory committees and formal commenting procedure. The article further presents a case study of employer and business groups in the Czech Republic, using a scale of institutional incorporation as an independent variable influencing the groups' strategy choice. The scale roughly indicates the level of the organizations' institutional incorporation, based on their involvement in both advisory committees and formal commenting procedure. On the basis of the findings from the case study, possible impacts of institutional incorporation on strategy choice are outlined, indicating that the so-called insider strategies are more often used by more incorporated groups. This suggests a continuing relevance of Grant's insider – outsider typology, which has been questioned by political scientists in recent years. While the article focuses on a relatively narrowly defined category of organizations, the findings also suggest that the role and influence of institutionalized platforms on the overall strategy choice of traditional interest groups should not be ignored by researchers, as it is often the case both in the Czech Republic and internationally.

Marián Kočner, a controversial Slovak businessman, alleged to have ordered the killing of a young journalist, Ján Kuciak, in 2018, is now—on account of the investigation of the murder—known to have controlled many judges at different levels of the judiciary, frequently bribing them in exchange for information and favorable verdicts. In this case study, we analyze Kočner's influence on the Slovak judiciary system through the concept of state capture. State capture, manifested in a substantial overrepresentation of powerful economic interests over the state and its political system, has long been a topic of interest for researchers specialized in post-communist countries. Despite frequent use in academic literature, however, its operationalization remains inconsistent. We propose that four empirical criteria can define state capture: (1) identifying multiple corrupt public actors on the one hand, and a captor exerting some form of decisive influence over them on the other; (2) an illegitimate exchange takes place—that is, the mechanism of capture; (3) the exchange has a beneficial outcome for the captor; and (4) the captor's influence within the institution is systematic. We argue that in the case of "Kočner's judges," all these criteria are fulfilled.

Abstract
This article is a contribution to the 'know your data' approach to the issue of measuring corruption, in two specific areas: the impact of the way questions are formulated on the results of surveys on corruption perception; and the potential pitfalls of using businesspeople as expert respondents in surveys measuring corruption. The article first presents and analyses the sources of two most frequently used indicators to measure corruption perceptions – the Corruption Perception Index and the Control of Corruption, one of the Worldwide Governance Indicators. Based on this analysis, hypotheses are posed on how the formulation of the questions will influence the out-comes of surveys, and what differences there will be between studies conducted on the general public and businesspeople. These are tested using data obtained from two original survey experiments conducted concurrently, one on a representative sample of the public and another on businesspeople.

"Dieser Artikel analysiert die Staatsfinanzierung der politischen Parteien in der Tschechischen Republik im Kontext der Theorie der Kartellisierung. Nach einer theoretischen Einführung wird ein Überblick über die rechtlichen Rahmenbedingungen der Parteienfinanzierung gegeben, unter besonderer Berücksichtigung des sozioökonomischen Kontextes. Der anschließende empirische Teil fokussiert auf die Rolle, die die Staatsfinanzierung in der Gesamteinnahmenstruktur der politischen Parteien spielt. Besondere Aufmerksamkeit wird den Unterschieden zwischen parlamentarischen und nicht-parlamentarischen Parteien gewidmet. Da die staatliche Parteienfinanzierung die parlamentarischen Parteien favorisiert, stärkt dieses System eher den Status quo und fördert weniger die Inklusivität des Parteiensystems in der Tschechischen Republik. Die Staatsfinanzierung stellt die wichtigste Einnahmequelle der meisten in der Analyse umfassten Parteien dar." (Autorenreferat)