Bringing research into policy: understanding context-specific requirements for productive knowledge brokering in legislatures

Abstract

Knowledge brokering is suggested as an instrument to improve productive use of research in policy organisations. Previous research asserted that research utilisation is dependent on dynamics of knowledge exchange in institutional settings, but these claims have not received substantial empirical attention (Saarela et al, 2015; Akerlof et al, 2019; MacKillop et al, 2020). Viewing knowledge brokering as the involved role, three specific challenges are identified: high legitimacy requirements for the brokered knowledge and the broker; the need to cater for a wide range of topics, audiences and uses; and the need to compete with other evidence suppliers. The research question of the article is: how do legislative knowledge brokers navigate context-specific knowledge transfer challenges presented by their institutional context? An in-depth interpretive case study of the UK Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology. The analysis includes interviews with parliamentary actors, shadowing and participant observation. The results substantiate the challenges of legislative knowledge brokering in the UK context and inductively identify a further challenge of demonstrating impact. Legislative knowledge brokers employ multiple strategies to navigate the challenges: co-shape and adhere to the norms of impartiality, mobilise external expertise, collaborate with in-house and external research support actors, employ anticipation techniques, build broker chains, seek understanding of own role and impact. The article contributes to the understanding of knowledge brokering as a context-dependent role. The conclusions discuss influence of knowledge brokers’ work remit and positionality in deploying strategies to overcome the legislative challenges.