phenomenon · claim-type · cross-domain-transfer · mechanism · claim-relation · replication-status · limitation — grounded in the full text| phenomenon | platform power— “This article articulates a distinctive source of political influence of some technology firms, which we call platform power.” | |
| claim-type | mechanism— “The mechanism that translates market power into political clout, we argue, flows from the appreciation, verging on dependence, that consumers have for the convenience these companies provide.” | |
| method — evidence | — “Empirically, we apply this conceptual apparatus to a range of recent, high-profile cases in which platform companies were political protagonists.” | |
| transfer | from psychology / social-science research on identity priming: The concept of priming - that individuals hold multiple identities whose salience can be cued, thereby shifting their political preferences - is imported to explain when consumers defend or abandon platform firms.— “Our theoretical position draws on the priming literature in social science, which posits that individuals have multiple identities, the salience of which can influence their political preferences on a given political issue.” | transfers[0] |
| transfer | from European Union integration studies: The permissive-consensus model of EU public opinion is borrowed as the analogy for how consumer support licenses platform firms until salient issues break it.— “The orientation of today’s consumers with respect to companies enjoying platform power can perhaps best be made by analogy to what Hooghe and Marks (2009) called the permissive consensus in public opinion.” | transfers[1] |
| mechanism | Consumer appreciation verging on dependence on platform convenience translates market power into political clout, because politicians anticipate the backlash from depriving constituents of that convenience— “The mechanism that translates market power into political clout, we argue, flows from the appreciation, verging on dependence, that consumers have for the convenience these companies provide.” | mechanisms[0] |
| mechanism | Which of a person's identities is made salient shifts their regulatory preferences: priming the citizen identity produces sociotropic preferences, priming the consumer identity produces a narrow focus on self-interest— “Priming citizen identity can lead to more sociotropic preferences, while priming consumer identity can lead to a narrower focus on individual self-interest.” | mechanisms[1] |
| mechanism | Platform power operates automatically in politicians' minds as anticipated political fallout, not as fear of disinvestment or job loss— “The power these companies wield operates not through politician’s fear of the pain that these firms can visit upon the economy so much as the anticipated political fallout to which overeager regulators would expose themselves by messing with the infrastructure of people’s lives.” | mechanisms[2] |
| mechanism | A TERM IS COINED IN ONE SENTENCE AND GIVEN A STRUCTURAL DEFINITION IN THE NEXT: this article articulates a distinctive source of political influence of some technology firms, WHICH WE CALL PLATFORM POWER. The coinage is announced as the article's contribution, so the word arrives already carrying the claim it was invented to make— “This article articulates a distinctive source of political influence of some technology firms, which we call platform power.” | mechanisms[3] |
| mechanism | AND THE DEFINITION IS A STRUCTURAL POSITION RATHER THAN A PROPERTY OF THE FIRM: platform power INHERES IN COMPANIES OF ECONOMIC SCALE THAT PROVIDE THE TERMS OF ACCESS through which large numbers of consumers access goods, services, and information. What the term denotes is a place in a structure - who controls the terms of access - not a size, a sector, or a behaviour— “Platform power inheres in companies of economic scale that provide the terms of access through which large numbers of consumers access goods, services, and information.” | mechanisms[4] |
| mechanism | THE TERM IS THEN DEFINED BY WHAT IT IS NOT, RULING OUT THE FIELD'S TWO STANDARD MECHANISMS BY NAME: firms with platform power benefit from a deference from policymakers, but this deference IS NOT PRIMARILY A FUNCTION OF DIRECT INFLUENCE THROUGH LOBBYING OR CAMPAIGN CONTRIBUTIONS, NOR DOES IT COME FROM THE THREAT OF DISINVESTMENT. The new construct is positioned by excluding the two things political economy already had words for— “Firms with platform power benefit from a deference from policymakers, but this deference is not primarily a function of direct influence through lobbying or campaign contributions, nor does it come from the threat of disinvestment.” | mechanisms[5] |
| mechanism | THE THRESHOLD FOR THE TERM IS SET DELIBERATELY BELOW THE LEGAL ONE, IN A PARENTHETICAL: platform firms that achieve A CERTAIN ECONOMIC SCALE - WHICH NEED NOT REACH MONOPOLY PROPORTIONS - benefit from the direct relationship they enjoy to a large number of consumers WHO RELY ON THE PLATFORM AS IT BECOMES INTEGRATED INTO THE FABRIC OF THEIR DAILY LIVES. The concept is built to apply where antitrust does not reach, and the gap is stated rather than left to be noticed— “We argue that platform firms that achieve a certain economic scale – which need not reach monopoly proportions – benefit from the direct relationship they enjoy to a large number of consumers who rely on the platform as it becomes integrated into the fabric of their daily lives.” | mechanisms[6] |
| mechanism | A PRIOR DISTINCTION IS ATTRIBUTED TO THE SCHOOL THAT BUILT IT, AS SCAFFOLDING: MARXIST SCHOLARS BUILT SOME OF THE SCAFFOLDING FOR THESE MODERN DEBATES BY DISTINGUISHING BETWEEN THE INSTRUMENTAL AND STRUCTURAL POWER OF BUSINESS. The two inherited terms are named, dated and credited before the paper argues that neither covers its case— “Marxist scholars built some of the scaffolding for these modern debates by distinguishing between the instrumental and structural power of business (e.g., Miliband 1969, Poulantzas 1972, Block 1980).” | mechanisms[7] |
| mechanism | AND THE INHERITED VOCABULARY IS DECLARED INSUFFICIENT RATHER THAN WRONG: however, IT IS NOT AT ALL CLEAR THAT THE TOOLS AND STRATEGIES OF INSTRUMENTAL POWER REPRESENT THE PRINCIPAL FORM OF INFLUENCE THESE COMPANIES WIELD. The older term is left standing and denied primacy, which is a different move from refuting it— “However, it is not at all clear that the tools and strategies of instrumental power represent the principal form of influence these companies wield.” | mechanisms[8] |
| mechanism | AN ASSUMPTION IS ATTRIBUTED TO THREE RIVAL APPROACHES AT ONCE, AND IT IS THE ASSUMPTION THE PAPER DENIES: LEGAL APPROACHES THAT STRESS MONOPOLY CONTROL ALONE, JUST AS INSTRUMENTAL AND STRUCTURAL POWER APPROACHES, ASSUME THAT ECONOMIC INCENTIVES ARE FOREMOST IN THE MINDS OF POLICYMAKERS who are considering adopting regulations that constrain business. One premise is extracted from three literatures and named as the thing they share— “Legal approaches that stress monopoly control alone, just as instrumental and structural power approaches, assume that economic incentives are foremost in the minds of policymakers who are considering adopting regulations that constrain business.” | mechanisms[9] |
| mechanism | `BY DEFINITION` IS USED TO CONCEDE A GENERAL TRUTH AND THEN SET IT ASIDE: CONSUMERS ARE BY DEFINITION IMPORTANT TO ANY CAPITALIST ENTERPRISE, but the relationship to today's dominant platforms GOES BEYOND FAMILIAR MODELS OF CONSUMER LOYALTY OR COST-BASED CHOICE. The phrase marks what does not need arguing so that the contrast can carry the argument— “Consumers are by definition important to any capitalist enterprise, but the relationship to today’s dominant platforms goes beyond familiar models of consumer loyalty or cost-based choice.” | mechanisms[10] |
| mechanism | AND THE PAPER REPLACES ONE OF ITS OWN WORDS MID-ARGUMENT, SAYING WHICH ONE IT MEANS: once these firms reach scale, IT IS NOT SO MUCH CONSUMER LOYALTY THAT INSPIRES THE COALITION BETWEEN USERS AND PLATFORM AS CONSUMER DEPENDENCE. Two candidate terms for one relationship, and the substitution is performed in the open rather than by drifting usage— “Once these firms reach scale, it is not so much consumer loyalty that inspires the coalition between users and platform as consumer dependence.” | mechanisms[11] |
| mechanism | DEPENDENCE IS OPERATIONALISED BY A BEHAVIOURAL CONTRAST CONCRETE ENOUGH TO CHECK: CONSUMERS LOVE LEGO BUT THEY ARE NOT DEPENDENT ON THE COMPANY IN THE SAME WAY that they are dependent on Amazon, WHICH ACTUALLY ALLOWS THEM TO ORDER THEIR LEGOS WITHOUT HAVING TO CHANGE OUT OF THEIR PAJAMAS. Affection and dependence are separated by what the firm lets you avoid doing, and the test is a scene rather than a measure— “By contrast, consumers love Lego but they are not dependent on the company in the same way that they are dependent on, say, Amazon, which actually allows them to order their Legos without having to change out of their pajamas.” | mechanisms[12] |
| mechanism | THE DIFFERENCE FROM EARLIER DOMINANT FIRMS IS LOCATED IN THE CONNECTION, NOT THE SIZE: UNLIKE PREVIOUS GENERATIONS OF LARGE COMPANIES ON WHICH THE BROADER ECONOMY CAME TO DEPEND, such as railways or utility companies, today's largest platforms enjoy A TIGHT, EVEN INTIMATE, CONNECTION TO THEIR USERS. The comparison class is named - railways, utilities - so the novelty claim can be checked against it— “Unlike previous generations of large companies on which the broader economy came to depend, such as railways or utility companies, today’s largest platforms enjoy a tight, even intimate, connection to their users.” | mechanisms[13] |
| builds-on | Hooghe and Marks (2009), permissive consensus— “The orientation of today’s consumers with respect to companies enjoying platform power can perhaps best be made by analogy to what Hooghe and Marks (2009) called the permissive consensus in public opinion.” | claim_relations[0] |
| builds-on | Naoi and Kume (2015) on priming consumer identity and trade preferences— “Empirical support for this proposition can be found in the area of international trade preferences, where Naoi and Kume (2015) show that the priming of consumer identities in Japan raised support for free trade by up to 9 percent, compared to a control group.” | claim_relations[1] |
| sense | platform power - NOT A THING ANYONE DOES: it is 'LARGELY AUTOMATIC - it happens in the minds of politicians', an anticipated reaction rather than an act of lobbying, disinvestment or campaign spending. A power exercised by nobody, which is what makes it hard to observe and easy to deny— “In common with Lindblom’s (1982) punishing recoil mechanism, platform power is largely automatic – it happens in the minds of politicians. The difference, though, is that in the case of platform power, the potential loss is not disinvestment or job loss.” | senses[0] |
| sense | the resource that carries the power - CONSUMERS, NOT MONEY OR JOBS: firms 'benefit from the tacit allegiance of consumers, who can prove a formidable source of opposition to regulations that threaten these platforms'. The asset is an alliance the firm does not have to organise and cannot fully control— “Companies with platform power instead benefit from the tacit allegiance of consumers, who can prove a formidable source of opposition to regulations that threaten these platforms.” | senses[1] |
| audit | platform power —distinct-from→ structural power — Audit 2026-09-28: DOUBTFUL - read against its full span and kept, but endpoint by anaphora: 'The difference' is between platform power and the structural power of the previous sentences.— “In common with Lindblom’s (1982) punishing recoil mechanism, platform power is largely automatic – it happens in the minds of politicians. The difference, though, is that in the case of platform power, the potential loss is not disinvestment or job loss.” | concept_edges[0] |
| differs in | platform power —distinct-from→ structural power — WHAT THE THREATENED LOSS IS. Both work the same way - 'In common with Lindblom's (1982) punishing recoil mechanism, platform power is largely automatic - it happens in the minds of politicians.' The difference is the content of the anticipated punishment: 'in the case of platform power, the potential loss is not disinvestment or job loss.' Two powers with one mechanism and different currencies, which is why a measure built for disinvestment threat would score platform firms at zero— “In common with Lindblom’s (1982) punishing recoil mechanism, platform power is largely automatic – it happens in the minds of politicians. The difference, though, is that in the case of platform power, the potential loss is not disinvestment or job loss.”— “the potential loss is not disinvestment or job loss” | concept_edges[0] |
| weight | platform power —distinct-from→ structural power — 0.9— “In common with Lindblom’s (1982) punishing recoil mechanism, platform power is largely automatic – it happens in the minds of politicians. The difference, though, is that in the case of platform power, the potential loss is not disinvestment or job loss.” | concept_edges[0] |
| replication | untested | |
| limitation | The phenomenon is too recent for systematic testing of the paper's propositions.— “The recency of the rise of platform power as a phenomenon limits our ability to test these propositions systematically.” | limitations[0] |
| limitation | The survey evidence on preferring company self-regulation is American only; the authors lack comparable data elsewhere.— “Although we lack the data to know if this specific impulse exists in public opinion outside the United States, the general popularity and trust of consumers for technology companies that we have documented in this section is an international phenomenon, one that serves the political interests of large platform firms in a variety of countries… | limitations[1] |
| limitation | The assumed consumer preference against regulation is a simplification the authors concede.— “Our treatment of consumer preferences for regulation is admittedly somewhat stylized: if a regulation does good for consumers without having any effect on their ability to enjoy the conveniences delivered by platform innovation, there is in theory no reason consumers should oppose regulation.” | limitations[2] |
finding · quantity · variable · definition · key-term — grounded in the full text| finding | Platform firms' deference from policymakers does not come mainly from lobbying, campaign contributions or the threat of disinvestment.— “Firms with platform power benefit from a deference from policymakers, but this deference is not primarily a function of direct influence through lobbying or campaign contributions, nor does it come from the threat of disinvestment.” | content_tags.findings[0] |
| finding | Market power alone does not produce platform power: economic dominance is necessary but must be combined with a direct consumer relationship. | content_tags.findings[1] |
| finding | Platform companies are more likely than other companies to run broad-based political campaigns, pitting their popularity against their opponents'. | content_tags.findings[2] |
| finding | The Snowden revelations drove a wedge between platforms and consumers by revealing a hidden cost of reliance on them, and the public outrage helped strengthen the GDPR. | content_tags.findings[3] |
| finding | Danish unions defeated Uber by reframing it as a tax and welfare-state question, appealing to people as taxpaying citizens instead of convenience-seeking consumers. | content_tags.findings[4] |
| finding | Politicians bend more to platforms whose users are their own voters, which helps explain why cities regulate Airbnb more than Uber. Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.findings[5] |
| finding | Where consumer and platform interests coincide, as with the harsh labour practices behind fast cheap Amazon delivery, no political mobilisation follows because consumers are themselves implicated in the practice. Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.findings[6] |
| finding | The paper predicts that a platform losing consumer confidence will lose regulatory battles even when its share price and market share are untouched. Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.findings[7] |
| finding | Courts and competition authorities may pose the biggest threat to platform power, because they are relatively insulated from consumer pressure. Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.findings[8] |
| quantity | 74 percent — Share of respondents in the 2018 Edelman Trust Barometer trusting the technology sector to do what is right, the highest of any industry Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.quantities[0] |
| quantity | 39 vs. 56 percent — Americans wanting the US government to restrict false information online versus wanting tech companies to do it Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.quantities[1] |
| quantity | $13 million — Amazon's 2017 US lobbying spending, up from $2.5 million five years earlier Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.quantities[2] |
| quantity | 56 percent — Americans naming Facebook as the least trusted tech company just after the Cambridge Analytica scandal, against 5 percent for Google Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.quantities[3] |
| quantity | 2.4 million views — Reach of the Danish union's anti-Uber video campaign, in a country of 5.7 million people Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.quantities[4] |
| quantity | five of the top six — Places held by platform companies in YouGov's 2018 global brand health rankings Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.quantities[5] |
| quantity | $45 million — Cost of Facebook's publicity campaign for Free Basics in India Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.quantities[6] |
| variable | consumer confidence (independent) Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.variables[1] |
| variable | political effectiveness (dependent) Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.variables[2] |
| definition | platform power Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.definitions[0] |
| definition | permissive consensus Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.definitions[2] |
| concept | platform power Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | concepts[0] |
| concept | structural power Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | concepts[1] |
| concept | quiet politics Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | concepts[2] |
When we have changed our mind. Some entries in the table begin with a word in capitals and the reason for it. EVIDENCE CORRECTED — the finding still stands, but we had quoted the wrong sentence from the paper, and the quotation has been replaced with the right one. RETRACTED — the entry itself was wrong; it stays on the page, marked, with the reason, rather than being deleted. WITHDRAWN AND REPLACED — the entry was wrong, and a corrected version of it appears in the entries below. Each mark carries its own reason, in brackets, because the reasons differ from one entry to the next. An entry we have WITHDRAWN is removed from this page and kept in the record, with its reason. A line reading Audit and a date is a later re-reading of the entry against its whole sentence: DOUBTFUL means it was kept, and the reason says what is loose about it. Quotation marks inside the tagger's sentence. Where a tag is the tagger's own sentence, a phrase in quotation marks inside it is borrowed from the paper — the tagger's wording around it is not. The paper's own sentence is the evidence quote for that row; on this page it is withheld with the article, and the article is at its publisher. Nothing inside quotation marks anywhere on this page is ours: if it is quoted, it is the paper's. Whose words a concept carries. A concept entry records a term the paper itself uses, so the term, the sense given for it, and its evidence are the paper's own words, quoted where the paper fixes them. This is the opposite of a sense entry in the tag table, which is the tagger's sentence about how the paper uses a term. Where a concept entry could not be grounded in the paper's words, the entry says so on its own row.
Tag layer © the Meta-Tagging Project, CC BY 4.0. The paper text is © its authors/publisher
and is linked, not reproduced. Excerpts shown are short quotations for identification and verification.
· back to index
· concepts · authors
· עברית
© 2026 Shir Sivroni · ORCID 0009-0000-2597-2824