Who Runs Interest Groups? A Latent Profile Analysis of Education Interest Group Leaders in Norway

ABSTRACT Leadership is a key component of how interest groups ensure representation and engage in policymaking within corporatist governance systems. This article examines the profiles of education interest group leaders in Norway and their implications for organizational policy capacity. Building on theoretical expectations that organizations with different types of represented interests in the education system draw on distinct combinations of administrative, representative, and sector‑specific experience, the study anticipates variation in leadership profiles across types of interest represented. Drawing on biographical data for 267 elected and employed leaders across 13 major organizations, the study uses Latent Profile Analysis to identify two distinct experience‑based profiles. Veteran Leaders are established figures with extensive administrative and advocacy experience, while Emerging Leaders are early‑ to mid‑career actors with shorter organizational tenures and closer ties to their constituencies. These profiles are shaped not by age or education but by accumulated functional experience across administrative, representative, and domain‑specific roles. The findings show that leaders bring different combinations of analytical, political, and managerial resources to their organizations, reflecting varied experiential foundations on which policy capacity can develop. By linking leadership composition to multiple dimensions of organizational capacity, the study advances understanding of the micro‑foundations of policy capacity and demonstrates how leaders' functional experiences shape the human resources available to interest groups operating within Scandinavian governance systems.